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Irrelevant to mustangs, but cool to me

K

ko67

Member
When I am not stealing from the poor or working on my car, I restore antique watches. I am a swiss-trained watchmaker. Today, I needed to make a tiny screw for a 150 year old watch that I am restoring. These watches were frequently hand made by a single watchmaker and all had hand made screws of odd sizes. There was little standardizations and replacements are not available. I made the screw by hand on my watchmaker's lathe under a microscope. I recently got a USB camera for my microscope and I shot a picture of the screw. The color is distorted due to the high magnification. For reference, the background is a dime. The pointed object in the bottom of the picture is the point of a straight sewing pin. The screw is .031 inches head to tip and about .013 wide at the head. This is the smallest screw that I have made since watchmaking school.

Sorry for the brag-post, but I did not have anyone else around to tell.

Let the tiny screw jokes begin
 
Pretty neat.

When I was working in the jewelry world, we would make wax molds and do gold castings or reverse castings depending on the need. Not near as precise as yours.
 
Yes, I have made lots of wax castings of gold for watch case parts, etc. Really neat process.

I did actually make something for the mustang on the watch lathe. My old Grant steering wheel ate up the copper horn contacts because there was no grease used in the install. When I replaced the wheel, the whole turn signal assembly was fine except for the worn out copper horn contacts. I made tiny caps for the horn contacts out of copper and soldered them on to rebuild them rather than repacing the whole turn signal switch. The caps make contact and hold the tension springs in place. A little conductive grease, and these rebuilt contacts should be good forever.

By the way, I mailed your pkg, Pete. Look for a ticking amazon box.
 
No problem.....it goes to my daughters house so I will look for the smoke.

I could have used those horn pieces a couple months ago. Had to replace the T/S switch in the last car because of that very problem. PO shorted the horn out and toasted them. The old switch sits in Midlife's collection now....
 
In response to Kat's question about whether I only restore antique watches, :

anything that I can make or get parts for, I can fix. It may not make economic sense, but I can fix it. (for example, it may cost $400 to fix grandpa's $50 watch.) THere are some premium brands that only sell parts to their dealers/retail watchmakers, so there are some limits. If you have a specific issue, Kat, PM me.
 
Kind of like the classic car world on the dollar end......may not be worth what is spent on it...but a lot do.
 
In response to Pete's comment that he replaced a t/s switch due to bad contacts, Maybe I could make up some replacement copper contacts for Mid and he could start rebuilding horn contacts in t/s switches. Mid, any sense in doing that? Is that really a common reason for t/s switch failure?
 
That is one tiny arse screw! I can't imagine the patience to build something that small/precise. Very impressed Kevin, brag away!
 
"ko67" said:
In response to Pete's comment that he replaced a t/s switch due to bad contacts, Maybe I could make up some replacement copper contacts for Mid and he could start rebuilding horn contacts in t/s switches. Mid, any sense in doing that? Is that really a common reason for t/s switch failure?
Click to expand...

Only for TSSwitches that aren't repro'ed. Most are, and are reasonably priced (~$100). I doubt your work would be able to match half that price, which is a good price point for repair work vice replacement.
 
"Flysure1" said:
I could not get used to handling something that small!! Neat!
Click to expand...

Kevin's used to it by now, been holding little things since he got outta diapers (according to the guys he was in jail with)
 
"Fast68back" said:
Kevin's used to it by now, been holding little things since he got outta diapers (according to the guys he was in jail with)
Click to expand...


Is that what he had to tell you to make you feel more comfortable?
 
Amazing surgical precision. How did they do this work back in the day? Can you even SEE the screw without magnification?
 
"DEL65" said:
Amazing surgical precision. How did they do this work back in the day? Can you even SEE the screw without magnification?
Click to expand...

Watchmaking is all about magnification. I made this screw under a 20x binocular microscope, but the old timers made things this small and smaller with a loupe on one eye. THey did not let us use microscopes in school. I will post a picture of the watch I made in school. We had to make one start to finish by hand.
 
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