Stainless-steel cased club-tooth lever wrist-watch with black dial and black leather wrist-strap

Description — British Museum

Wrist-watch. Movement with gilded brass plates and right-angle club-tooth lever escapement. Black painted metal dial with gold minute ring and gold Arabic hour numerals with subsidiary seconds. Hour, minute and centre-seconds hands. Rectangular stainless-steel case with snap-on back. Black leather wrist-strap.

Curator's comments — British Museum

Comment from Richard Good, Catalogue of Watches in the British Museum. Vol. V (Unpublished manuscript) LIP Besançon, France, c. 1950 Wrist watch with a club tooth lever escapement. Signature: On the dial 'LIP'. Case: A rectangular case of stainless steel numbered on the outside of the back 212942. Stamped inside 'LIP 182733' all in a cartouche and beneath 'FABRICATION FRANÇAISE'. Dial & Hands: A black dial with numerals and other markings in gold. A small rectangular seconds dial. The dial secured with two screws. Luminous dots at 12, 3, 6, and 9. Gilt hands of "modern design' with luminous painted tips. Movement: Ebauche Marks. Under the barrel bridge is the number 187780. Frame: A gilded brass frame tonneau shaped with a bridge for the barrel, another for the train. A cock for the balance and one for the pallets the latter in nickel silver. Barrel and Mainspring: A recessed cover to the going barrel. Barrel: I diameter 10.4 mm., height 1.25 mm. Mainspring: height 1.25 mm., thickness 0.12 mm. Barrel Arbor: diameter 3.4 mm., snailed. Hooking: milled from the barrel wall. Train: All the brass wheels are gilded, the centre wheel, third and fourth wheels with five crossings. The steel escape wheel with four. Jewelling: Jewelled bearings from the third wheel onwards, all the jewels pressed in. Ruby endstones to the balance jewels. Escapement: An obtuse angle layout club tooth lever escapement with short lever, double roller and D-shaped impulse pin. The exposed pallet stones have flat acting faces. A steel escape wheel with four crossings. An equidistant locking escapement. No. of teeth embraced 3½. Balance & Spring: a monometallic nickel balance with brass screws. Balance diameter 10.25 mm., thickness 0.7 mm. A 'self compensating' flat spiral spring with 15 ½ turns and a terminal curve. Means of Regulation: An index on the balance cock registers against a divided scale with 'F S' and 'A R' engraved on the balance cock table. Train Counts and Beat Rate: Great wheel 71 (barrel) Centre wheel 64 pinion 12 Third wheel 60 pinion 8 Fourth wheel 60 pinion 8 Escape wheel 15 pinion 6 Beat rate 18,000 Motion work: cannon pinion 12 minute wheel 32, minute pinion 8 hour wheel 36 Keyless work: Conventional positive stem set keyless work. Dimensions: Case length 31.0 mm., width 20.0 mm., h. 8.8 mm over the glass. Movement: length 28.3 mm., width 17.7 mm., height 6.3 mm. Provenance: Donated in 1983 by The Heron Corporation Ltd.