Princess Dial 8A

[LarryInMichigan]

I have a spare NE 8L dial here which seems to function properly.  It would probably work as a replacement.  Let me know if you are interested.

Larry

[TelePlay]

I've described the operation of the governor spring clutch in this topic:

https://www.classicrotaryphones.com/forum/index.php?topic=28730.0

It seems someone damaged the square coiled governor spring on this Princess dial.



The following image is of an undamaged governor spring



The damage on the Princess dial spring is most likely preventing the spring from tightening around the silver governor shaft to engage the clutch operation.

There is no way to fix that spring given a replacement would be impossible to find and then taking the press fit components apart to install the new spring would be very difficult to do, may not be reassembled correctly to spec.

NOTE: The #8 dial is designed differently than the #7 dial but the operation of the spring clutch is the same, the gear causes the coiled spring to grab the governor shaft, to engage the governor.

[HowardPgh]

Would damage to the pictured spring cause the dial to be hard to pull around to the fingerstop?

[TelePlay]

Would damage to the pictured spring cause the dial to be hard to pull around to the fingerstop?

The purpose of the clutch is to allow a number to be dialed without engaging the governor. I have a 4H dial with a frozen governor and when trying to dial a number, the finger wheel can only be rotated at about 10 PPS, the frozen in clutch is governing the dialing speed. When the finger wheel is released, the dial returns to its stop at the spec speed, about 10 PPS.

Since the OP said the dial returns to 0 when holding the governor still, that means the clutch is not engaging the governor shaft when returning to zero. And since the clutch is not a frozen problem, the governor clutch normally would and will not engage the governor when dialing a number.

----------------

Opened up a Princes with an 8A dial. This dial is in perfect working condition.

The image from above and one taken of my phone are attached.

The damage to the topic phone's governor is obvious and had to be the bad result of someone trying to manipulate the clutch spring. The small hole that appears on the silver shaft (yellow circle) seems to have the end of the clutch spring going into it. I think that is an optical illusion.

The good governor clutch shows what appears to be a hole in the silver shaft (red circle) under the wound square spring but the governor clutch spring passes right over it and ends (green circle) to the left of it.

I see  no reason for the end of the clutch spring to be so anchored and it would be difficult to assemble like that. The damage to the spring appears to have exposed the hole but it has nothing to do with the clutch operation.