(New) Watch Studies

My beloved automatic wooden watch died last year sometime. It was a slow demise that started when I could no longer change the time. Eventually the mechanism stopped working all together. I had an issue before---when it had stopped working---and brought it to a jeweler/watch repair to get it fixed. 

In the end, it gave me false hope. That time, the first time it stopped working, it was because one of the metal chits that marked the hours had popped free and fallen into the gears, halting the watch. It was an easy fix: just pull the piece out, glue it back in place, and go about your business.

I like the automatic watches because they don't need batteries, they use your own body's motion to keep the main spring tight, and the main spring titrates out the energy needed to keep time through an amazing collection of precision engineering.

Anyway, when my watch died again and I took it into the guy, he said he couldn't fix it, or that it would just be easier to buy a new one and replace it (the mechanism), but in the end, it may just be easier to buy a whole new watch. I wasn't pleased with this opinion, and went looking for a second. A separate jeweler/watch repair shop was more candid. (The first guy was Cambodian; the second guy was a Slav of some kind.) He said, "Well, not to make you angry, but this is a poorly constructed Chinese mechanism, which ultimately can't be fixed. It's meant to be thrown out. I could fix it, but I wouldn't guarantee the work, because it's so poorly made. That watch, is, eh, how should we say, not very expensive?"

It was a gift, that I loved, but I understood what he meant, especially after looking at watches. Maybe $250 bucks for an automatic watch mechanism is on the low end.

But I do like to work with a watch on, and I've been trying to find something legit, that I could reasonably afford, that I could actually get repaired, and that I would like. I should really talk to Norm about all this, and he'd be a person I would contact before I made a serious purchase. Corrie told me to find something in a budget you're comfortable with that can be repaired, but do your research about it.

Corrie's dad gave me a watch from his recently deceased navy buddy to see if I could get it fixed. It's a '60s era Seiko automatic watch, with the date and day dials, which has it's charm. It can be fixed, and is at the Cambodian dude's shop. It's gonna cost almost $250 to fix, so, eh, it'll give me some time before I find something else.

And that led to this study. There are a ton of watches out there, and a ton of styles. Norm knows. I learned about the different makers of the different types of automatic mechanisms. I learned about watches that I'm not even sure how to read. I imagine you'd get used to it, but, eh:

I think...you look at the bottom?

The watches from Mr. Jones Watches are fascinating and beautiful. One of my favorites is:

The lady's foot is the hour and the ducky is the minute. A different company didn't have hands at all, exactly, but used a series of dials supported by fluid. Like...what?

If you'd like, check out their website to see how they move, finding the simulator near the bottom of the page. I thought they were interesting and cool, but I couldn't find a price. Then I did. And they're no longer on the list. They set fire to my list and laughed as they walked away to their yacht.

Anyway anyway, I also found some cheapo quartz watches from Etsy that I decided to get as a hold over until I find something that I'm looking for. (This was before Ron's navy buddy's watch finally got on the docket to get working.) I bought three, each with a different van Gogh painting as the dial, and figured I'd give one each to the kids as they got older. For the price ($50 for all three, so...), they seemed like a fun family thing that would help in the short term and not hurt in the long term.

So, action items: chat up Norm about stuff, and keep my dynamic list updated as I see fit.