Omega Seamaster Deville – Cal. 562

Shawn came in to see me a couple weeks ago with an Omega Deville that was handed down to him and
wanted it restored. It was working, but it’s amplitude was too low to get a reading. The crown as well as the slit end stem were missing. There were several rusted parts, the crystal needed replacing, well, let’s just say it needed some attention.

Let’s get started, shall we 🙂

Here’s a front and back shot.

1992, hmmm, I’d say it was due, wouldn’t you?

As you can see, this dial isn’t looking that great. The shellac is peeling off 🙁

And the back of the dial, just in case you were curious 🙂

Time to get to work. But, just a quick sneak peak at the dial side of the movement.

Then time to turn the movement over, remove the rotor (oscillating weight) and balance. Removing the balance first is always a good habit.

Speaking of the rotor. It’s actually a really simple system, yet one that works really well.

With the automatic rotor and bridge off.

Then time to turn the movement over and work on the dial side. The first image you can see I still have to dial side cover plate on and in the second, you see the opposite side of that cover plate. Sometimes it’s pretty easy to get caught up in watchmaking that I forget to take pictures. Normally, I’d have a few more pictures showing the disassembly of more parts. At least you’ll see it when I put everything back together.

Back to the bridge side, it’s time to start removing the ratchet and crown wheel as well as click and click spring. And a picture of the parts that I have removed so far.

Then back over to the dial side again to start removing the keyless works.

And over it goes again to continue removing the train wheel and barrel bridge.

That’s quite a bit of rust there. I’m not looking forward to opening up that barrel.

Speaking of rust.

Here’s a look at the movement completely disassembled.

But, before putting those rusted parts into my watch cleaning machine, it’s time to do some preventative maintenance on some rusted parts. I’m not sure who invented it, but, Bergeon has a great tool for this. It’s a brush, but works like a pen. Press the end, and the brush comes out. It’s fiber though, so, you don’t want that getting into your skin. Ouch. But you can see how much of a good job it does.

And Voila, magic. Clean parts 🙂
With a new mainspring, new female stem end and crystal. All Omega original 🙂

As always, I start with installing the new mainspring into the barrel. But, not without putting some breaking grease on the barrel walls.

With that done, it’s time to put the clean barrel and wheel train onto the mainplate before installing their respective bridges.

Barrel bridge then wheel train bridge all on board 🙂

Followed by installing the click, ratchet and crown wheel.

Turning the movement over, I already installed the sliding pinion and winding pinion as well as the stem as well as the cannon pinion. The next image, you can see I’ve installed the rest of the keyless works. Which includes the intermediate gear, minute wheel and yoke. After that, I secure it all with the keyless works bridge.

Finally, I install the calendar works.

I turn the movement over again and reassemble the rotor assembly. As you can see from that image, there’s still some mold on the underside of the rotor. I only noticed it after taking the picture. So, I had to take the few parts I put together on it back off and then use my Bergeon brush again to remove that stubborn mold.

With that done, it’s time to put in the balance, oil the cap jewels and regulate the watch.

Then, time to put the oscillating weight back on.

Getting there. Just a few more chores to do. Next, I have to cut down and file the female end of the split stem to the proper length. This can sometimes take a few shots to get it perfect. When I finally do get it to the proper length, I use some loctite to secure it to the crown.

Installing the hands.

If you will notice from the before pictures compared to these ones, the dial may look different. Now, this isn’t something I would normally do, but, I noticed the shellac was just peeling off, so, I offered Shawn to take most of it off. And, very gently, at that. But, I find it looks much better. Unfortunately, when taking shots at night, my camera doesn’t do a good job. So, perhaps I’ll take some tomorrow and upload some more. I feel the pictures don’t do the watch any justice.

Well, that’s it. I certainly hope you enjoyed the pictures.

Cheers

Chris Marcellin 🙂