Expert: Kenneth Saunders - 8/2/2008

Question
I'm into clock repair as a hobby, but have gotten into my grandfather over my head.  I've pulled this movement from the case and have it on a stand - the center weight drops into the bottom of the case.  I can't figure out the proper mesh of the winding wheels/gears (proper terminology?) on the front, which I felt slip once during winding. (each have 25 teeth and a stamped mark on their face and one has two catches on the back and the other has only 1), but when I get them to catch, I can't wind up the cable.  So each time I still drop the weight too far.  I've ordered an Urgos movement manual from Timesavers.com., but don't know how much repair information it will contain.  Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Answer
not sure what you mean by "the center weight drops into the bottom of the case" Free fall?
 The gears on the front are called "stop works" and they only control the amount of cable put on and taken off the drum. They do not slip. So I am a loss on this "slipping and dropping" that is going on.
   Could be the ratchet on the cable drum itself is faulty. Repair of the drum requires total dissasembly of the entire movement-BIG undertaking.

the stop works are set to lock  so that when the cable is wound on the drum with perhaps 9" of cable below the bottom edge of the mechanism plate, the stop gears lock so the drum cannot be overwound--and they can be unwound till they lock again when the weight would be just short of the bottom of the case. The single catch on the gear on the winding arbor locks into the SECOND CATCH on the idler gear that that single tooth encounters as the arbor is wound up.Just arrange that this lock occurs when 9" of cable are left un-wound.