timer;
watch-case
- Museum number
- 1958,1201.1263
- Description
-
Timer watch.
3/4 plate; going-barrel. Pin-wheel lever-escapement.
Enamel dial; centre seconds, subsidiary minute recorder and subsidiary 1/4 seconds; Nickel silver case.
inscription on movement.
- Production date
- 1879-1883
- Dimensions
-
Diameter: 54.70 millimetres (case)
-
Diameter: 46.30 millimetres (dial)
-
Diameter: 45.80 millimetres (movement)
-
Thickness: 21.10 millimetres
- $Inscriptions
-
-
- Curator's comments
- Comment from Richard Good, Catalogue of Watches in the British Museum. Vol. V (Unpublished manuscript)
Made by the Auburndale Watch Company
Auburndale Massachusetts, USA, c. 1880
Nickel-silver cased timer with stop and reset functions and with a special pin-wheel lever escapement.
Signature: On the back plate 'AUBURNDALE, MASS. TIMER 5155'. The rear of the front plate is stamped 'PATD MAY 28th 1878 JUNE 31st 1879, SEPT. 30.. 1879'.
Case: Nickel silver open face case with hinged back and snap-on bezel. The movement is held in the case by a locating pin and a single dog screw in such a position that when the watch is held in the hand, the zero point on the dial is at the top and the pendant is to the right i.e. similar to a hunter case design.
Dial and Hands: A flat canister dial with centre-seconds track around the edge and numbered at 10, 20, 40 and 50. Two subsidiary dials, one for minute recording numbered 1-10 anticlockwise (above the centre) and the other numbered 1-4 and calibrated for 1/8 seconds. Blued-steel hands of spade design.
Movement:
Ebauche Marks: None.
Frame: Of nickel-silver, a type of 3/4 plate layout but with the back plate also containing the escape wheel. The back plate supported by three turned pillars. A separate cock for the pallets. The balance cock is stamped 5155 on the underside.
Barrel and Mainspring:
Barrel: going barrel, internal diameter 17.1 mm, height 2.5 mm.
Mainspring: height 2.30 mm, thickness 0.25 mm.
Barrel Arbor: diameter 5.1 mm, snailed.
Hooking: round.
Train: The brass wheels not gilded or plated and left with a grained finish. The second wheel solid, the third and fourth wheels with five crossings. The third wheel is at the centre of the watch.
Jewelling: Jewelled bearings with ruby endstones in screwed brass settings for the balance pivots only.
Escapement: A purpose designed escapement unique to this type of watch made by Auburndale. The brass escape wheel, with four crossings, has four steel pins which work with steel pallets with long impulse planes. There is large drop in the escapement and it has draw. The single roller has a D-shaped impulse jewel.
Balance and Spring: A rounded-rim three-arm, steel balance, diameter 13.3 mm, thickness 0.45 mm. A blued-steel flat spiral spring with 12 2 turns pinned to a steel stud screwed to the balance cock.
Means of Regulation: An index on the balance cock registers against a divided scale with 'S' and 'F' engraved on the balance cock table.
Train Counts and Beat Rate:
Great wheel 80 (barrel)
Second wheel 80 pinion 12 carries 10 min revolution hand
Third wheel 80 pinion 8 carries the centre-seconds
Fourth wheel 60 pinion 8
Escape wheel 4 pins pinion 10 carries the 1/4 second hand
Beat rate: 28,800 (the balance beats 1/8 of a second)
Winding system: A fixed key on the barrel arbor.
Stop mechanism: Turning the pendant operates the stop/start device. Zeroing is accomplished by pressing the pendant.
Dimensions:
Case: diameter 54.7 mm, height 20.5 mm (over the glass)
Movement: diameter 45.8 mm, height 15.0 mm, pillar height 4.0 mm.
Provenance: Formerly in the Ilbert collection. Ilbert purchased this watch from Malcolm Gardner 22/5/1936.
Notes:
See Cat. no. 266 (registration no. 1958,1201.1261) for further references.
- Location
- Not on display
- Condition
- Latest: 3 (Jul 2017)
- Acquisition date
- 1958
- Department
- Britain, Europe and Prehistory
- Registration number
- 1958,1201.1263
- Additional IDs
-
Previous owner/ex-collection number: CAI.1263 (Ilbert Collection)
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Previous owner/ex-collection number: P76 (Ilbert Ledger)
