Fast-forward to this week... I finally had a chance to take the movement apart. The moment I unscrewed the balance cock, I heard the whizzing of the gears as they turned to release the energy wound up in the mainspring. Uh oh... I thought for sure I had broken a piece. Normally, the pallet fork in lever escapements would prevent that fast release of energy - which is usually bad news as that puts unnecessary stress on the gears and pinions. I quickly unscrewed the balance, and much to my surprise, this movement didn't have a normal lever escapement at all.
I stumbled upon a rare gem.
A duplex escapement peeked through the movement, and I knew that this $25 movement was easily worth more than ten times that. The quality of the movement also showed through in that the pieces went together absolutely perfectly. Once I had the gear train all placed in the main plate, all the pinions fit into their respective jewels the moment I rested the top plate on the parts - made my life a whole lot easier.
I had been travelling for two months this summer, so unfortunately haven't had as much time to fix watches. But with about a month left till going back to college, hopefully I'll be able to restore a few more interesting pieces and post them here.
