A Complete Guide to Watch Repair - Barrels, Fuses, Mainsprings, Balance Springs, Pivots, Depths, Train Wheels and Common Stoppages of Watches

THE MATERIALS USED IN THE CONSTRUCTION AND REPAIR OF WATCHES.

STEEL.

STEEL is used for all the hard-wearing parts of watches, and for parts where strength and rigidity are required—winding squares, barrel arbors, pinions, balance staffs, levers, keyless winding wheels, clicks, and for all screws. It is also used for mainsprings, hairsprings, clicksprings, and innumerable other small springs found in the various parts of keyless and other watches.

The steel used in watches must be of a high quality, and watchmakers generally obtain it in 12-inch lengths from the firms who especially lay themselves out to supply their wants of all kinds. This steel is obtained in the form of wire, rod, flat strips, or sheet. The wire and rod can be had in any size, from that required for the smallest balance staff to about in. in diameter, from which a large barrel arbor can be made. The flat strips and square rods are used for making levers, keyless work, small springs, etc. Steel drawn in lengths of a special section can also be obtained for making particular parts, such as hooking-in steel for making blocks for hooking mainsprings, click-steel for making fusee winding clicks, pinion-wire for making pinions, lever-steel for making levers, etc. A specially hard steel, silver-steel, can also be obtained. It is used by some watchmakers to make turning cutters, drills, etc.

Softening Steel.—Steel as bought is soft, but, being drawn or rolled, is not so soft as it can be made, or as it is desirable to make it for some purposes. In the making of a screw, for instance, it is desirable that the steel be first made as soft as possible, so as to take a good thread, and not injure the screw plate. To soften it, it is heated to a full red and allowed to cool slowly; or it can be made a little softer still by heating to a red, allowing it to cool slowly until, when held in the shade, the red has completely disappeared, and then dipping it in water. This process is called annealing.

Hardening Steel.—In this soft condition it is shaped up by filing, turning, bending, etc., roughly to the required form and size. Before it can be used as a going part of a watch it must be hardened. This is done by heating to a full red and plunging into cold water or oil. Many special mixtures for hardening steel are used by some; also plunging into lead, mercury, etc., is sometimes advocated when great hardness is desired; but there does not appear to be any necessity for the use of anything else but water or oil. When steel is heated to a dull red and hardened in oil, it is tougher, though not so glass-hard as when made hotter and plunged into cold water.

Each method has its uses. For a spring, where toughness and elasticity are required, oil-hardening is best; while for a pinion or for a cutting tool, where extreme hardness of surface is wanted to resist wear and tear, water-hardening should be practised.

Tempering Steel.—Steel just hardened, even by the oil method, is far too brittle for most purposes, and it requires tempering. The application of heat tempers it, that is, it reduces its hardness somewhat, but gives less brittleness and more elasticity. This is only true up to a certain point, at about 570° Fahr. it reaches its maximum elasticity; when heated beyond this point, it rapidly loses both hardness and elasticity, until at about 1200° (dull red heat) it becomes quite soft again.

As bright steel is gradually heated the surface becomes first of a pale straw colour; this deepens into a pale brown, turns to a red, purple, dark blue, pale blue, and then white again. These colours are extremely useful, as showing the temperature, and consequently the temper, to which the steel has been drawn.

Thus, to temper a piece of steel, it is first brightened, to show the colours well, then heated gradually over a spirit lamp flame or upon a slip of brass held in the flame. Blue, that is, the first dark blue that succeeds the red, is the temper to which all springs, screws, pinions, keyless wheels, and other working parts of watches are brought to. The moment this colour appears the steel is removed from the flame, or the blueing slip, and allowed to cool. If a pinion or other part is required to be specially hard, it may be tempered to a red or a purple only.

A drill or a cutter for use on brass or soft steel only is tempered to a pale straw colour; but those for use on tempered steel are made as hard as possible, and not tempered at all.

Good steel may be many times rehardened and softened again without spoiling it, provided it is never overheated. A full red is quite hot enough for all purposes, and, small parts especially, should not be allowed to remain red long.

When hardening extremely fine pieces of steel, such as the drills used for making fine pivot holes, water or oil for dipping need not be used. Indeed, it would be quite impossible to use them, for the steel would be cold before it could touch the liquid. In such a case air-hardening is employed. The drill is heated in the flame, and, when red, withdrawn with a sudden jerk, and the air cools and hardens it. This is termed flirting. Similarly, it is nearly impossible to soften such a drill or any other piece of fine steel. It could not be cooled slowly enough to prevent rehardening, mere removal from the flame being quite sufficient to harden it again. If such a piece is required to be softened, it must be laid upon a slip of brass upon which is also laid a small piece of brightened steel to indicate the colour. It is then heated, while the piece of index steel passes through the series of colours from straw to blue and on to white again. It will then be soft enough to be operated upon or bent as desired.

BRASS.

Brass is an alloy of copper and zinc, a common proportion for good quality brass being two of copper to one of zinc. Common cheap brass has less copper, and is not so strong or so hard. It is distinguished by its very white appearance when broken or filed.

Brass is used very largely in watches. The plates and framework, the wheels, and many other parts being in most watches made of it. Like steel, brass is capable of being softened, hardened, and, to some extent, tempered. Brass rods of all diameters and brass sheet can be obtained ready for the watchmaker. Brass rods, being drawn, are rather hard, but for ordinary purposes of filing and turning, etc., this condition is to be preferred, as it works cleaner than when quite soft. But if it is required to bend or hammer the brass out, it should be softened first.

Softening Brass.—This is done by heating it nearly to a dull red, and allowing it to cool, or, if time is an object, it may be cooled by plunging in water. The result is the same in either case.

Hardening Brass.—Brass is hardened by compression. Any process that tends to compress its particles against one another will harden it. Hammer hardening consists of hammering it with a smooth-faced hammer all over equally until it is sufficiently hard. Unskilful hammering, if long continued, is very liable to crack the metal. Drawing brass wire through a draw plate, decreasing its diameter, will harden it. Twisting a rod also has the same effect. Rolling, as in reducing the thickness of a plate or rod, will harden it. It must not be supposed that any hardening process applied to brass will render it as hard as steel, even in its soft state. But brass can be stiffened very much, and made so elastic that very serviceable springs may be made of it. It is often used for some of the smaller springs in watches.

Very thin brass can be conveniently hardened by simply burnishing it with a polished steel burnisher.

Tempering Brass.—If hammered too brittle, brass can be tempered and made of a more even hardness throughout by warming it, as in tempering steel; but the heat must not be nearly so great. Brass, heated to the blue heat of steel, is almost soft again.

GOLD.

Gold is a useful metal in watches, for small special parts. Hard, polished and burnished gold, when working in connection with hardened steel or jewels, causes very little friction indeed. It seems to take a very slippery surface, which is useful in certain cases. Its incorrodibility is also a recommendation. It has been used for hairsprings, but for this purpose its weight is against it. For the screws used to weight compensation balances, for small contact pieces such as curb pins, etc., it is invaluable. Its weight makes it useful for balances, and its extreme ductility is useful in the collets of small wheels, etc., where a good rivet can be formed upon it without undue pressure. As a protective covering for brass, in the form of electro-gilding, it is used in nearly all watches. Also for dial plates and for hands it is much used.

Gold is hardened, tempered, and softened in the same way as brass, but is capable of much more in the way of hammering than that metal, being more ductile.

SILVER.

Silver is not nearly such a useful metal for watchwork as gold. Not being easily corroded, it is used for small engraved index plates for regulators, and sometimes for dial plates.

It is worked in the same way as gold. Both gold and silver, being very ductile, can be readily worked up for use in watches. Almost any scrap of metal, such as a jump ring, or a broken brooch pin, can be softened, straightened out, hammered flat, or drawn into convenient sized wire with ease, and serves to make such small articles as screws, pins, or small springs as are required in watches of these metals.

GERMAN SILVER.

This metal is really a kind of white brass. It is an alloy of copper, nickel, and zinc, in which copper is the predominating metal. It is used in watchwork mainly for the frames and plates of so-called nickel movements, of which so many are made in America and in Switzerland. It is worked exactly as brass, but is a little harder than that metal. It is white, and takes a good polish. Movements made of it are not gilt to preserve their surface, but are generally ornamented by spotting or etching patterns upon them. They do not readily tarnish.

PLATINUM.

This metal is only used in watches for balance screws. Here its weight is sometimes an advantage, and often enables a watchmaker to overcome difficulties in timing a watch. It is a very soft metal, and screws made of it are easily damaged by handling.

PALLADIUM.

The only use to which this metal is put in watches is for balances and balance springs for non-magnetic watches, where it takes the place of steel. It is not used pure, but is alloyed with other metals to harden it. Even so, it is but an indifferent substitute for steel, balances made of it being soft and easily put out of truth, and balance springs made of it are heavy and soft, easily distorted and damaged, and unsteady in pocket wear. Still, as it answers the purpose of making the watch incapable of being magnetized in its most vital parts, it is used in spite of its softness. In marine chronometers it is often used for the balance springs, and, it is claimed, has advantages in enabling a more perfect adjustment to be obtained. Here, on account of the thickness of the spring wire, its softness does not matter so much.

ALUMINIUM BRONZE.

This is an alloy of aluminium and copper, in which the copper largely predominates. It is hard, takes a high polish, and has a beautiful golden colour. It is a hard-wearing alloy, and is very light. It is largely used for the train wheels of watches, more especially Swiss and American, and for levers and scape wheels, where its wear-resisting qualities and its lightness render it extremely useful. It