Best Way To Remove 'Pecks'?

[GeneJockey]

In the last month, I've encountered THREE watches where someone had used the old trick of driving a graver into the pillar plate under the balance cock to adjust the balance endshake.

Like this...



In all three cases, it led to a poorly fitting balance, perhaps because the staff had been replaced and no longer needs the extra (or reduced) endshake. What I've been doing is to use the butt end of a pair of tweezers to flatten down the lifted metal on the pillar plate, which fixed the endshake problem. However, it left scrape marks on the pillar plate. The movements are pretty common models, so it's not like I permanently disfigured a unique piece of history, but it would be nice to be able to remove them without the cosmetic problem.

Any suggestions?

 

[technitype]

In the last month, I've encountered THREE watches where someone had used the old trick of driving a graver into the pillar plate under the balance cock to adjust the balance endshake.

Like this...



In all three cases, it led to a poorly fitting balance, perhaps because the staff had been replaced and no longer needs the extra (or reduced) endshake. What I've been doing is to use the butt end of a pair of tweezers to flatten down the lifted metal on the pillar plate, which fixed the endshake problem. However, it left scrape marks on the pillar plate. The movements are pretty common models, so it's not like I permanently disfigured a unique piece of history, but it would be nice to be able to remove them without the cosmetic problem.

Any suggestions?

I recently worked on a Gruen 754 pocket watch that had this problem. I used my staking tool to flatten the burrs (or pecks).

I used a flat solid stump, and a matching flat solid punch. Light taps on the punch were applied.

It worked well- the best part is that no metal was removed: the metal was compressed instead, and the polished faces on the punch and stump left few marks.

Check to make sure that the opposite surfaces of the pillar plate are PARALLEL before trying this.