If Balance Bridge is off, can you make the watch go Backwards?

I have a ‘23 Sixty’ had it here running for 1 1/2 days. I noticed low amplitude face down and better face up. All of a sudden the watch just stopped.
The jewel is engaging the fork, it can be seen since the late Hamilton era have a channel in the pillar plate under the balance wheel.

I was thinking maybe a ‘set’ main spring. I let the watch down wound it full and no joy. I tried using a pin to nudge the train wheels no joy.

I took off the balance bridge and here is where I am needing help. I can (with a full wind) nudge the fork from side to side but it has no kick. I can put it in the center. It seems to kick sometime and when it does better to the left than the right.

Now here is the crazy stuff. I can run the second hand wheel the opposite way almost a full revolution. I do not know if that is supposed to be able to be done. Safety pinion?? Confirmed by the second hand traveling backwards. I can’t make it go back the other way, but now the fork has kick in both directions. And only after I do this backwards movement.

I put the bridge back on and while it was just sitting there it ran. But by the time I got the screw started it quit again, so off goes the bridge again.

I repeat running the seconds wheel the wrong way as I’m doing it the fork and escape wheel are jumping and kicking. Nellie, wooow now. This is the spooky part.

I’m seeing static shock arcing when I move the fork with a screw driver!

It arcs ONLY when it is going to the right. If I gently nudge it the arc actuslly interfers with the directional movement towards the banking pin on the right. And it fails to jump over, just a spark shoots out towards the pin.!

I thought I was seeing things. I did it over and over. The arcs go away when the fork has no life anymore, until I run it backwards and she does the same thing.

Any takers?

I want to do one of two things first, disassemble and clean then if still not good, try a new main spring. Or should I do the mainspring first??

23j Bunn Special 60hr Type III, SN. 5305879 Model 14.

Must be an early prototype electric watch!

Some one said making a time piece go backwards introduces magnetisim into it. In context he asked me to repeat this in a dark room tp prove what I think is a static electricity spark is nothing.

Seeing the pallet fork go from kicking to blaaah, along with this ‘sparking’ being present then going away as the kick dies off is remarkable (to me).

In reply to You Steve, You are right earl proto. But the only way to run the watch, advance the seconds hand is backwards! So without a doubt the project was shelved. LOL

Hi James , sounds like a good cleaning for a starting point , the running slow then not at all sounds like something is seizing up or binding , as for the sparks and running backwards - don't smoke that stuff before watch repair ! , seriously a lot of problems are sorted when cleaning and inspecting , I like what Roger said about checking the balance first and then setting it aside .

While poking around something lead me to a YouTube vid for checking a mainSpring. So, there are several ways to check one some are done in and some are when apart.

This fellow shows using a toothpic and applying slight pressure on the center wheel while doing a wrist twist. If the balance keeps running the spring is probably gotten to weak to sustain movement. As soon as he let the pressure off, his balance stopped.

I’d say this would tell whether a CLEAN AND OILED watch needed a mainSpring and not so much a cleaning. But wouldn’t anyone first clean or first do this test?

Kevin, have You looked at Avoiding Pitfalls recently? LOL

As far as checking the mainspring , let me refer to Roger's method of watching it expand 2 1/2 times it's size , there is a few other methods of checking , but I can't recall a mainspring so weak it would not run , most often loss of "power" is a gummy pivot , debris between gears , I have even seen the wrong spring barrel a couple times ! That is where I was going with a good service and check everything , just replacing a spring may make it run , but for how long and what cost , pivots and jewels . I have to admit I did this just last month - bought a movement for parts it ran so nice out of the box I just let it run for a couple days , when it stopped I was lucky to save the balance pivot with a little polishing , I guess someone cleaned it and did not oil it, the whole thing was "dry"