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Once, when we were recently married, my wife and I wandered into a thrift store. I look up on an odd shelf and spot a familar shape and logo. Without hesitation, I grabbed it from the shelf and went to the front of the store and sat it before the guy at the counter. It had no price on it so I ask how much. He pauses and says $20, and half a picosecond later, he has a $20 bill in his hand and into the register. Its all I can do not to chortle. My wife them walks up and asked how much I had spent. When I told her $20, she looked shocked and complained to the guy that $20 was our *entire* thrift shopping budget for the day and if he would *please* give us $5 back so we could go on to another thrift store or two. He dutifully reaches into the register, pulls out $5 and gives it to her. I was amazed, but knew to keep quiet. If you knew my wife, you would understand how she could get away with this...I let HER do all the negotiating. :-) Oh, and what was it? A Nikon stereo microscope, in excellent condition but missing one eyepiece. We flipped it on eBay for $825, enough to catch us up on our mortgage. :-) Ah, the good old days...

This is my other hobby. https://youtu.be/3dAZQGYhfnk From Canada

Well after stripping and cleaning and looking through my little ebay 60x mono microscope at all things on the movement including, replacing a roller jewel and table, using a staking set for the first time, swapping out jewels, pinning and un pinning hairsprings buying 3 extra movements on ebay for extra parts, realising after lots of checking that the balance staffs are .1 of a mm to short so fitted another, all this plus pegging the jewel holes and rubbing the jewel faces etc etc. only to have the movement work intermittently, very annoying and frustrating, I was going through multiple train checks wheel by wheel the multiple wheels all were moving freely etc. In the end tonight I had that eureka moment after a small washer from the ratchet wheel stuck to my tweezers the light bulb ill e minted above my head, yep get the demagnetiser out and put the whole movement over it, both sides (twice) and yeeess it's now running approx 1min fast on my ticko print app on my tablet, not bad for a movement from 1908 that was presented by a Lt Flathers and men of the 283rd Royal Field Artillery ( to who I don't know as that's all the inscription says) so it's dated from the first world war. I will let it run in different positions over the weekend and see how it runs, its a keeper purely for its history. The only question is, is that it's in an elgin case? I have read somewhere that some waltham made under licence in the UK were fitted to elgin cases but I can't remember where and im sure they weren't but maybe someone here will know different. moral of the story do the simple stuff aswell as the hard stuff in the beginning of a project to save yourself 3 weeks of frustration.

I have been collecting for a number of years. I don't necessarily warn my wife, (of 27 years) , that I have intentions of buying, I just buy it. Having said that, I was at an estate sale a year or so and I spotted a couple of quartz Tags, both men's and ladies. Now they were asking $270 USD for the pair. Both in good shape with minimal wear. So I bought them on the spot. When she got home from work I showed them to her, and of course the first words were "how much?" I told her and needless to say she was a bit skeptical. But what I did do FIRST was check out how much the watches were selling for, BEFORE I bought them. Both stainless 18kt plated links, the women's was a GMT look alike. So, I put the men's out on the bay with BIN of $300, came with box, instructions, etc. and within a day or so, it was sold. Bottom line a "free" ladies Tag. She'll never question my ability to spot a bargain, especially since I'm pretty frugal, (okay cheap) when it comes to buying. So share any stories, good, bad or indifferent with your significant other. Or just bargains you have obtained.

Here you go. Ridgeway Clocks is a division of Howard Miller Company, and is a producer of longcase clocks, mantle clocks, and wall clocks. The company's facilities are located in Zeeland Michigan.

Tell us if it works, I've never done it. In my mind, the lighter fluid won't dent the glue. But you can boil it in water if you don't have a soldering iron. I usually use a pin vise instead of pliers but there is nothing wrong with pliers is you don't move them in the wrong direction...a pin vise won't let you "bend" the stem. Also, I do try to "tighten" the crown a little and then turn it in the proper direction to loosen. It is like a quick tightening movement and back to loosening kind of thing, but you have to practice that or it'll break.

9010 is fine for cap jewels.

Lighter fluid evaporates very quick. You could use a watchmakers blower which will help and use wrapping paper tissue this helps to absorb the fluid, but be careful there are types of tissue that are hopeless. As someone had said you need ventilation or you might end up felling unwell. I had xpelair ventilation. That's good using a try like that.

I forgot to mention the hands style are serpentine.

You can start out using two oils one which needs to be thin for the balance and one slightly thicker for the train,winding parts and mainspring. I retired a few years ago so I'm not up to date on what oils are on offer in this present time.

This is the way to go about it. It can be very tedious, you can't get the results you would expect if you used a cleaning machine.

Hi Richard, welcome to the forum. If you've done a Seiko 7548 then you're OK! Cleaning parts by hand can be done with Zippo fluid (or Ronson...depends on what's available!) and pegwood. Tedious but doable. Anil

i love those DXs. if you get it and are gonna use the stock bracelet, i have one that is too small. you can have it for parts if you need it.

Funny you should mention that...right now, my obsession is with Russian wrist watches...around 2011, only coincidentally about the same time as the Fukushima Daichi disaster, my obsession was...wait for it...geiger counters and related radiation detection gear. I still have a fair bit of that stuff around, though I am not sure I have a complete counter up and running at the moment.. The Fukushima thing, while a tragedy for a whole lot of Japanese folks, was actually quite fortuitous for me...I was unemployed at the time and struggling to keep my house. I spotted a market niche for a Geiger counter accessory...an inexpensive external speaker for the old US Civil Defense CDV-700 Geiger counter, which is very common here and a whole bunch of them got shipped to Japan about that time...they are good old detectors, but they don't have a speaker. So, I invented this: A clone of mine currently for sale, with a cute little CD sticker added... A simple modification to a $.99 window alarm, paint it yellow, add a $5 (ouch) connector to hook to the Geiger counter head phone jack, sell for $25. Sold several hundred of them, mostly to Japan, along with a pile of CDV-700s and parts and other Geiger gear I had accumulated right before the big meltdown, and before the copy cats (like the one above) kicked in. By then, I had saved the house, had a proper job again and the nightmare was over. :-) So...yeah, the Chernobyl-thing had actually occurred to me...lets see if I can get my hot-rodded DP-5V up and running and confirm or refute this theory... http://www.neozap.com/Rad/DP5Bgeigerreview.htm

New old stock from Chernobyl? Do you have access to a Geiger counter? :D

I've been told that this is what some sellers do when they don't have an item in stock. Rather than remove the listing they put a silly price in until they have it back in stock again. Stephen

My advice is ideally get yourself some hand setting levers, not the press type removers. You can get the expensive ones, or you can get these cheaper, Indian/Chinese made ones. http://www.ebay.com/itm/Watch-Hands-Remover-Slim-2-x-Levers-Lifter-Tool-Repair-Fingers-Pocketwatch-Wrist-/281214869349?hash=item4179b65f65:g:u0AAAMXQUmFSk6Sg These are what I have, but as they come they are not appropriate for use straight away (at least this was true for the pair I recieved), when I got mine i spent some time filing and working over with abrasives and polishes to the get the shape and the edge to something precise enough to use. ( as well as the bottom section made mirror smooth to avoid dial marks, though I always use a cut up piece of a clear plastic bag over the dial and hands when removing, to protect from that. ) Alternatively as Davey suggest, once you have the center hands removed it is okay to simply force the movement from the dial, pay close attention to where and how you're levering the force so you don't damage the dial feet, i used to do this with the dial and movement held at level/just below the opening of a small tupperware container to catch the hands.

As a follow up on the Panerai tubes, suggested by Rogart63. I received yesterday 5x sets (pin and tube) out of Austria, for $10 including world-wide shipping. Fitted a tube in my Proxxon (Dremel alike) and grinded it slightly down using a diamond sharpening stone: I found, due to the weight and thinness of the stone, that I had a reasonable control over pressing it flat against the tube to keep the cylindrical form. Even though the tube ended up slightly eccentrically (but still plenty of wall thickness left!), I managed to get 2x tubes (bushings) out of 1x Panerai tube. Even better with these Panerai tubes & screws, the original Rolex screws fit inside the Panerai tubes perfectly and.......the Panerai screws, even though too long, do fit the Rolex! If you need new screws, the Panerai's needs shortening and you have to cut a new slot in the top. To me, these Panerai tubes & screws are, with a little effort, a perfect match !! Plenty of spare screws and tubes for $10.- ! That was a 100% hit Rogart63..........thanks again ! :thumbsu: Roland.

P.S. please don't buy from them. they are crooks, selling crap to unsuspecting people. don't encourage them with your hard earned money. if you want another Seiko 5 i will send you one for the cost of shipping. i used to collect seikos, but now i am a pocket watch guy. but you can't have this one! I love it! todd

I set my ultrasonic cleaner timer anywhere from 3-10 minutes, depending on the dirtiness of the movement. As for a rinse, I just rinse in warm water before blow drying all the parts. I know there is a "rinse" solution out there but my "filtered" tap water works just fine;)