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Put down your hammers and back away....Just kidding . Some members have stated thar's how they service Timex Watches . I picked up this Timex Electronic , back-set , front loader at the swap meet for $8 . It wasn't running and had an AG10 battery still installed , but with no visible damage to the movement . This one has the M87 movement with the date . This is a late 60's model called " The Blue Nebula " with a West German movement that was produced by the Laco watch company that Timex acquired when they bought Durowe-Laco at the end of 1958 to get into the electronic watch arena ..... http://electric-watches.co.uk/makers/laco/ I got home from the swap meet , opened the watch up and installed a new battery . The watch would only tun for a minute or less . I did some reading on this movement and started to disassemble it for a service . If you have ever tried to service a Timex you know why the hammers are used . I got as far as taking off the magnet and then the balance and then a voice from above said , " don't do it . Don't go any further "...so I didn't . What I did do was to clean and tighten any electrical contacts that I could reach , and put a light oil on any jewels and bushing in reach and assembled the watch again . At that point it would tun for an hour or two , and stop . I would shake it and get another couple of hour worth of run time . I left the watch under a light bulb for a while and it ran for approx. 24 hours . Back to the light bulb treatment that I may patent and the watch has been running for 5 days now and actually keeping very accurate time .....Honest . I had a watchband in my stash but have had to file some areas where the lug area of the watch was binding . I still have to smooth and buff those areas so it has a better finish .

I would expect it to be older. The seller mentions ratchet wheels and clicks are rough and appear to be handmade. Also mentioned, he thinks is the word “fecit “which means he or she. I would like to really have a good look at it before I really make up my mind. That is all I can say just by going by those few photos. It is a Dutch bracket clock with Dutch striking.

Cortibert Spirofix. Sometimes you just don't have any intentions to buy any new watches, but then all of a sudden your curiosity hits like a 5 pound meat club. The inner voice says "Spirofix wounder what kind of movement a watch called like that uses" and boom the poltergeist in your laptop has ordered it and it is on it's way. When it arrives I silence my inner voices with the argument that I have to practice to make perfect.... Inside it one can find a Corbert Cal.677 cough fin at 18000A/h. I haven't cleaned the dial and exterior yet (bought it two years ago) but it is in the plans, like with cars my philosophy is "Check the engine first !" if it don't run it's done.

I'm thinking 1914-1934

Axminster is where I went to school and in the town I served my apprenticeship. I can remember when Axminster Power Tools first started. Now they ship all over the world. They supply the UK army with engineering equipment such as lathes and power tools. The chap that started it all up is now in a home in Seaton poor old boy, such a nice person too.

I have purchased some from eBay and I found them crap. I then purchased some from Eternal tools and the difference was remarkable. I also have purchased some larger drill bits from Axminster tools which were also very good. As the old saying goes "you gets what you pay for".

I guess budget is a pretty big factor, no? Also, I mean yes it's gonna be tricky to pin it down to an actual year unless the year of make was well documented with the serial numbers (eg, Seiko) or it had the original dated paperwork perhaps? Like yourself i prefer larger watches, i can handle a 36mm but my ideal size is 38m (40mm at a push). The old Tissot Antimagnetique oversized watches fit my criteria perfectly. Not all that common, nice simple vintage design, 38mm case width and they don't cost the earth (DON'T pay £500 for ones on eBay!). Below are my ones. NB - if you ebay search 'watch 1953 ' you get quite a few results

If you found an ideal watch, would you not have a problem pinning it down to the actual year?

The first massive movement I was thinking of was the Longines 30L (the one in my profile photo) , but it didn´t appear until 1955 according to Dr Ranfft. So I guess you have to look at some of the chronometers from the time, there are a bunch price worthy Landeron 48/51 based watches out there. Otherwise it is like oldhippy says, the sizes were not very big back then.

Gent’s watches of the 1950’s where not that big when it comes to size. Here is a site that I found to give you some idea of what the designs were like. https://www.antiques-atlas.com/antiques/Watches/Mens_Watch?period=20900