elp - Mortima/Cattin66 Shock Spring

I just posted this on WRT and thought I'd try here as well.

I'm servicing a little Mortima diver driven by a Cattin C66. Not a Patek, but a nice little beater with a "Kalashnikov" movement.

Everything was going fine, it had been stripped, cleaned and ready to re-assemble.

I'd just oiled the plate balance jewel and replaced the cap and went to pick up the shock spring.

My brass tweezers were just a stretch too far to reach from where I was using my microscope, so like an idiot, I picked up the nearest set of tweezers (SS ones!).

I looked down and picked up the tiny cap spring, and just as I was about to move it to the movement I felt that sensation we all dread.

The "snick" feeling as the tweezer tips pinged the spring into the ether.

I was like a rabbit in the headlights, not daring to move and straining my hearing for the sound of a landing (a futile effort with my "ex-military" hearing).

I searched high and low from a frozen position, scanning the bench but nothing there. I gently started looking at my lap, shirt front, even got a mirror and checked my face/eyebrows/hair.

Nothing.

A magnet sweep of the whole area turned up two forgotten screws, but no spring.

So, the point of this post. I need a new shock spring or a donor movement and I'm hoping somebody may have one in their parts box.

This is the movement as shown on Roland Ranfft's encyclopedic site

http://www.ranfft.de...uswk&Cattin_C66

I've included a pic below of the balance jewel spring from the other side, shown next to a Seiko spring for size comparison. As you can see it's a tiny little bugger and not your usual item that could be replaced by a common BestFit spare.

If anyone can help, please reply or PM me with price and availability.

Cheers

Jim

Woo Hoo!

Look what I found (no, not the original, but just as good).

After looking through my junkyard I came across a Cattin C66 in an old thing I got in a box buy.

I know it's only an old pin lever but just getting it working again gives me a sense of job satisfaction.



It sure pays to keep all of those old clunkers and basket cases 😁