Vulcain jump hour

[c.kelly]

Hi all,
Had guy bring me a Vulcain jump hour to try to repair. Have always wanted to check one of those out so I told him I would look at it and see what I could do. This was also very nice looking unusual watch and deserves repair. It had been wound tight and would run for about 60 seconds and stop. It would actually stop at same place everytime. If it had hands I would have thought one was hitting the other. Was not case here. Took drive train out and cleaned and oiled. Put it back together and same thing happened. Decided I must have missed something and took out mainspring barrel to check teeth. They were good. Started looking at rest of train. Wheel that engages mainspring looked a little off center but both pivots were in place but because of that I decided to check if maybe that wheel was warped and hitting on something. Took a small piece of pegwood and rotated it around. It moved very freely and movement ran very easily. Now was wondering why it kept stopping even more. Rotated it almost a full turn then noticed something odd on teeth. Got higher power loupe and saw that a tooth was bent and completely making contact with another. Now I’m stuck. Been researching these models and can’t find much info. This one is 17 jewels, manual wind. Does anyone know where I might look for needed part? Have checked Dashto and Borel. Also how do you determine model number and who may have built movement. Can post picture if needed but that would be tomorrow.
Need to revise description of issue a bit. Was not teeth engaging with mainspring. Was on second wheel that tooth was bad. Still have wheel with bad tooth was just not one I said at first.
Thanks,
Charles

[Bob Tascione]

Hi Charles,
Congratulations on zeroing in on the problem!
If it’s manual wind then it may be an AS 1901. The AS 1901 is 17 jewels. They used the AS 2072 for their auto winds.
Found a couple of links that you can check to try to identify your movement.
This one is for the AS 1901 http://www.ranfft.de/cgi-bin/bidfun-db.cgi?10&ranfft&0&2uswk&AS_1901
This is for the AS 2072 http://www.ranfft.de/cgi-bin/bidfun-db.cgi?10&ranfft&&2uswk&AS_2072
Hope this is helpful Charles,
Good luck and please let me know what you find out.
Bob

[c.kelly]

Hi,
After posted last night I found the AS shield plus the numbers 2080. This causes me a bit more of a puzzle as I find no information on that caliber. It is surely in the family of movements shown in the links posted, thanks. Checked that site well and no mention of 2080. Went back to Borel and checked with no luck. My bestfit makes no mention of 2080. There is an automatic 2082. Hard to check for parts interchangeability like that. Did see that Dashto has some working movements in same family in fact they have some 2066 automatics but I don’t know if parts will exchange. I have found one other watch like one I’m dealing with but it is automatic. The case is large enough to hold automatic and I’m now wondering if sometime in past watch had parts removed for some reason. I’m keeping searching and really want to get watch going. Guy said his wife gave him watch 30 years ago. If I can’t find correct parts is it possible to transfer parts from dial on this jump hour onto another movement in same family? Seconds disc sets on center sweep pinion, hour disc rides on minute wheel. Hour wheel acts like a date ring, just moves more often.
I do get a kick out of trying to figure out ways to find parts to get these old watches going but I do get cazy ideas sometimes. I guess you guys with lathe have it easier but I haven’t got one.
Thanks,
Charles K

[c.kelly]

Hi again,
Kept searching and saw Dashto had nos 2072 as Bob mentioned as possibility. Checked measurements and it should fit even if it is an automatic. Believe I will give that a try. Will be cheaper than buying individual wheels anyway, and guy who wants watch fixed is tickled over prospect of seeing watch that has been setting in drawer for 15 years or so run again. Hope I don’t find anymore surprises. By the way does anyone have any idea how one tooth could get mashed? Haven’t checked but I’m sure there is other damage on other wheels because of that damaged tooth. Seems like there would have to be. Will let everyone know what happens. May even post photo as I just like the looks of this piece of art.
Thanks,
Charles K

[Bob Tascione]

Hi Charles,
Tom at Dashto saves a lot of us!
I’m not familiar with the AS2080 but perhaps it’s base movement is the AS2062 as is the AS2072. Will keep my fingers crossed for you!
As far as why the tooth got bent I would just be guessing. Maybe something jammed while setting like the second disk locking up.
Well good luck with it and yes please do post a pic if you have a chance Charles!
Enjoy,
Bob

[Bob Tascione]

Adding this to my last post—
just checked up at Cousins and found a good pic of the movement with jump hour mechanism display. Also if you scroll down a little you’ll see the plate which may help. Hopefully the parts will be interchangeable Charles. Also I would think there’s a chance that all other gear teeth may be fine.
Please let us know Charles…those are cool watches!
Link to the pdf. http://www.cousinsuk.com/PDF/categories/2023_AS%202072.pdf
Link to Cousins calibre pdfs. http://www.cousinsuk.com/document/departments.aspx
Bob

[c.kelly]

Hi,
Thanks Bob. Those links you posted helped as much as anything. When I saw photos of a movement in that family I could see that watch I was looking at belonged. Way plates were cut was identical, size, jewel placement, winding gears, even screw heads. Movements were like twins. I had worked on a ladies watch recently that needed parts. Movement had a very odd name and I could not figure out who made it. Was first ladies watch I worked on. Finally tracked down parts by searching ladies watches on ebay until I recognized one. Paid about $9.00 for movement, got needed parts and lady is now very happy. She also goes to a lot of estate sales and has found many watches and parts so I may have made a valuable contact. When in doubt a picture works great. As I was posting this I noticed your update with the other links. Now I’m positive the 2072 is right. The discs are identical as well.
Thanks,
Charles

[Bob Tascione]

You’re welcome Charles!
Happy to hear those pics helped out. Sounds like you should be in good shape when that movement gets to you.
Good luck with it,
Bob

[c.kelly]

Hi,
Just wanted to update and brag on Dashto a bit. I paid for movement I needed Friday, he shipped it Saturday and I got it in mail today on Monday. I do have a question out of curosity about how this jump hour movement jumps at the correct time. Between the hour dial and wheel there is a spring. One end of spring is inserted into hour disc and there is a slot for spring to move inside hour wheel and top. This slot seems to be about two hours wide. When spring reaches bottom of slot it will push disc forward past little arm and then stop at a center position of hour. Am I missing something? Just seems to be too large of a gap to insure proper timekeeping. Also are there any tips on putting that spring back other than don’t take it out? I have worked out a plan to hold end that goes into hour wheel and try to tighten it a bit from the center. May not be best plan so if there are any other ideas I would appreciate the info.

[c.kelly]

Hi,
OK thought I would update a little more. First off never mind about the coil spring that advances the hour wheel. I placed hour disc on hour wheel, held end of spring with thumbnail then took small screwdriver and rotated spring around until it fell into slot on hour wheel. May not be proper method but it worked. Is sort of tedious and I was worried about spring launching into unknown regions. I also figured out what caused hour wheel to advance. There is a small point on minute disc that pushes arm away that holds back hour wheel. Pushes arm back then hour wheel is released to move. Also figured two hour gap on hour wheel is to allow spring to tense up so minute wheel point should hit arm at same time that spring is under full pressure. Also there is an adjustment on that arm to accomodate wear on hour wheel or whatever as if it isn’t adjusted properly wheel will not be held back and then it will not jump. Needless to say I have got those two discs on now. Second disc however seems warped and will hit on minute disc. May be part of original issues. Actually disc is nice and flat but it sits on second pinion unevenly. Not exactly sure what I’m going to do about that. Anyway it’s fun figuring this new stuff out.
Charles

[Bob Tascione]

Hi Charles,
Yes Dashto is awesome!
I didn’t have a chance to read your last two posts until tonight. I wouldn’t have been any help though without having one of those movements here to reference…and possibly not even then.
I’m glad you figured it out Charles. Please let us know what the cause of the disk not laying flat was.
Enjoy and congratulations!!
Bob

[c.kelly]

Hi All,
I should have taken pictures of that jump hour stuff while I had it out but my hands were kind of tied up holding onto it all. Imagine the hour wheel capped by a flat disc. The hour disc itself sits in a slot going around the outer edge of this disc. Then take a spring and coil it around the flat disc on top of the hour wheel and attaching one end to the hour disc itself being careful not to drop anything or lose the only spring in the world for this part. After you have done that and it took me several hours to figure out how to do it you have to place a small disc on top of everything and screw it down to hold everything else in place.
As for the seconds disc I still haven’t figured out a solution. I checked out center sweep pinion and it is straight. Put on a regular second hand and it runs nicely and doesn’t hit anything. I did ask guy who owns watch if he knows how things such as a mashed tooth on a gear could have happened and he said he did fall off the back of a truck several times while wearing it. Am thinking of maybe opening hole in second disc a bit more then closing it back to see if that might get it straight. Going to study on it a bit more before trying that though. Have to think of something because watch will not run with seconds disc on it. Even toyed with idea of copying disc then laminating copy and making whole new one. Getting a bit wild here. I will take a picture of watch as it is now and post later so you can see where I’m at.
Charles K

[c.kelly]

Here is blurry picture of what I have been working on this week. Was taken about 6:50. The discoloration you see on the #7 is actually the arm that holds the hour wheel back until time to jump. So far all that is working fine. That is awful picture but was best I could do today.
Charles

CLICK IMAGE TO VIEW WITHOUT SCROLL BAR

• This reply was modified 2 years ago by Tamas Richard.

[c.kelly]

Here is a picture of watch as it is today. It is running fine and was a real learning experience. It was so interesting I picked up a broken Waltham jump hour with a puw movement so I could do another.

Click Image to view without Scroll Bars

[arutha]

Nice watch, dont see too many of those these days
Well done for getting it going.

[Author]

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