Balance Wheel Disassembly

Ms. Rusty’s  balance wheel gear was so full of gunk that almost didn’t notice the three screws that could be removed to further disassemble the balance wheel. After removing these screws I could then take off the balance wheel gear collar. (By the way, if you are wondering how I come up with the names for these things, I’m taking them directly from the  Adjuster’s Manual.)

This is what the back of the balance wheel looks like with the collar removed and after removing the gear

  

Here is a close-up of the gear, or more properly, the Textolite gear.  Because the grease is so old and gummy, the spring and retaining washer came off with it.  I’ve separated them in the second picture so you can better see how it’s assembled.

    

The retaining spring is held in place with a pin on the gear and another pin in the recessed seat of the balance wheel.  The center pin in the recessed area holds the spring and the other two pins can be removed – so of course I did (see photos below).

  

Quoting from the Adjusters Manual “There are three pins in this recessed seat, the outer two pins being eccentric”.  Ok…so the outer two pins are odd and bizarre?  I didn’t think that’s exactly what the manual meant so I looked up the meaning of “eccentric” online http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/eccentric and here were my choices:

1.  deviating or departing from convention, esp. in a bizarre manner; irregular or odd

2.  situated away from the center or the axis

3. Compare concentric not having a common center: eccentric circles

4. not precisely circular 

5. a person who deviates from normal forms of behavior, esp. in a bizarre manner

6. a device for converting rotary motion to reciprocating motion

Well, they are different from the middle pin because they can be removed (option 1) and are off center  (option 2).  Option 4 is viable because the little peg is not in the center of the pin and because of the way it works, option 6 could be the right answer.  All I know for sure at this point – they are not people who deviate from normal forms of behavior, especially in a bizarre manner.  I think that definition applies to me, not these pins