- Museum number
- 1958,1201.1059
- Description
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MOVEMENT AND DIAL OF A HUNTER-CASED LEVER WATCH.
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3/4-plate, going-barrel, Geneva stopwork, hollow centre-pinion.
Ratchet-tooth lever-escapement, Earnshaw compensation balance, side-set keyless-work.
White enamel dial; hours I-XII; subsidiary seconds dial.
Blued steel minute hand, spade hour hand missing; later blued steel seconds hand.
Case missing.
- Production date
- 1870-1880
- Dimensions
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Diameter: 28.60 millimetres (back-plate)
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Diameter: 30.40 millimetres (dial)
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Thickness: 6.60 millimetres
- $Inscriptions
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- Curator's comments
- Comment from Richard Good, Catalogue of Watches in the British Museum. Vol. V (Unpublished manuscript)
Made by James McCabe
London, c. 1875
Movement of a hunter cased ratchet tooth lever watch
Signature: On the dial 'JAs McCABE LONDON 07963 and on the back plate 'Jas McCabe Royal Exchange LONDON 07963.'.
Case: Now missing but with the keyless work located in the III o'clock position the case was either half or full hunter. The movement was originally held in the case by a pin in the edge of the front plate and two dog screws at the edge of the back plate.
Dial & Hands: A flat dial with subsidiary seconds dial. Blued-steel hands the hour missing, the over-large seconds hand not original.
Dial-Plate: No dial-plate intended.
Dust-cap: No dust-cap intended.
Movement
Ebauche Marks: IMC 07963 SS.(1) The front plate is also scratched neatly and deeply before the front plate was gilded with the number ??3624,(2) the first two digits removed when a dial foot hole was drilled.
Frame: 3/4 plate layout, the back plate supported by three turned pillars and secured by screws. Punched 'IMC 07963 SS' inside the back plate. A separate combined cock for the escape wheel and pallets. The plain balance cock is numbered 963 on the underside of the foot.
Barrel and Mainspring:
Barrel: going barrel with four-turn Geneva stopwork; internal diameter 12.0 mm, height 1.6 mm.
Mainspring: height 1.5 mm, thickness 0.145 mm.
Barrel Arbor: diameter 3.8 mm, snailed.
Hooking: round.
Train: A high quality train with all the wheels gilded, the centre, third and fourth wheels with five crossings.
Jewelling: Jewelled bearings for the fourth wheel onwards in the front plate and for the escapement, apart from the pallet holes. The escapement jewels in screwed settings with ruby endstones.
Escapement: A right-angle layout ratchet tooth lever escapement with short lever, single roller and D-shaped impulse pin. The enclosed pallet stones have convex impulse and locking faces. The polished brass escape wheel has three crossings.
An equal impulse escapement.
No. of teeth embraced 32.
Balance & Spring: A split bimetallic balance with gold compensation screws, two gold quarter screws and two of platinum. Balance diameter 12.0 mm, thickness 0.85 mm. Blued-steel flat spiral spring with 11 turns, pinned to a polished steel stud screwed to the balance cock.
Means of Regulation: An index on the balance cock registers against a divided scale with 'F' and 'S' with a fleur-de-lys between - all engraved on the balance cock table.
Train Counts and Beat Rate:
Great wheel 90 (barrel)
Centre wheel 80 pinion 12
Third wheel 75 pinion 10
Fourth wheel 63 pinion 10
Escape wheel 15 pinion 7
Beat Rate: 16,200
Motion work: cannon pinion 10
minute wheel 30, minute pinion 8
hour wheel 32.
The centre arbor is hollow with a separate pin passing through the middle which is integral with the cannon pinion at the front and retained by a steel collar and transverse pin at the back.
Winding System: Side-set keyless work without rocking bar, there being a sliding pinion which engages with the hand-set intermediate pinion (see ill. ).
Dimensions:
Movement: diameter 30.4 mm, height 8.5 mm, pillar height 2.5 mm.
Provenance: Formerly in the Ilbert Collection. Ilbert purchased this from a jeweller in the Fulham Road 3/12/1930.
Note
(1) According to P. E. Hackamack in "James McCabe" AH, Vol. X (Summer 1977) pp. 312-316, all McCabe's highest quality watches with serial numbers greater than 8000 are stamped "IMC" on the front plate. From about 1830 the punched marks on the front plate are repeated on the inside of the back plate, and from about 1838, the highest quality McCabe watches are punched SS in addition to the marks on the case, the front plate and the inside of the back plate. The significance of the SS is not known.
(2) It is not clear why this number differs from the watch number.
- Location
- Not on display
- Condition
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Latest: 2 (2017)
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2 (1994)
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2 (1992)
- Acquisition date
- 1958
- Acquisition notes
- Following the successful acquisition of the celebrated Ilbert collection of clocks (1958,1006 collection), prints and other related materials made possible by the generous donation of funds by Gilbert Edgar CBE Ilbert's watches were then acquired using funds provided by Gilbert Edgar, public donations and government funds.
- Department
- Britain, Europe and Prehistory
- Registration number
- 1958,1201.1059
- Additional IDs
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Previous owner/ex-collection number: CAI.1059 (Ilbert Collection)
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Previous owner/ex-collection number: H41 (Ilbert Ledger)