Debaufre Escapement:- also known as Ormskirk - Club foot
verge or Chaff-cutter.
Invented in 1704 by Peter Debaufre it is the first frictional rest watch
escapement produced. It consists of two saw tooth escape wheels of the
same count mounted on a pinion, their teeth staggered, driven by a
contrate wheel. The balance staff has a pallet in a form of a disc mounted
with its face set between the escape wheels level with the pinion. The
pallet has an inclined face on which the teeth of the escape wheel act and
provide impulse to the balance. When the tooth of one wheel drops from
the incline a tooth from the other wheel falls onto the flat face of the pallet
where it stays at rest until the balance swings back under the influence of
the hairspring when this tooth provides impulse in the opposite direction.
The Debaufre escapement tends to wear quite rapidly and places
considerable end thrust on the top pivot which always has an endstone or
polished steel plate.
It is a considerable improvement over the verge escapement but did not
become popular, even though it was more than twenty years before the
George Graham produced the cylinder escapement which also had the
merit of being a frictional rest type. 18th Century examples are almost
non-existent. The escapement started to come into use about 1800 in
Ormskirk, Lancashire (by which they are often called) and production of
them ceased by about 1830. Many appear crude in their manufacture as
the watchmakers took advantage of the frictional rest nature of the
escapement and dispensed with the fusee. In its place five or six strong
brass pins were used to form a "resting barrel" leaving the mainspring
exposed. | 
