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I picked up a second edition copy of the electric watch repair manual for $20US yesterday. Anyone working on an Accutron 214 or 218 will want the second edition from 1972.

HI. Does anyone know how to remove the coil coating on an accutron? I tried leaving it in pure acertone for a whole day: the coating softens but does not melt. Thank you

Hi All, I thought I would share where I am up to with my latest project. While doom-scrolling Ebay I came across a soon-to-end auction for tidy looking Bulova Accutron 2181 and chanced a bid. The seller was upfront that the seconds hand turned but the minute and hour hands did not move. I had already read elsewhere that this was a common problem and figured I should be able repair or at least replace the seized parts. This is my first Accutron... The project is a simple stainless steel dress watch with a silver face and simple baton hour markers. Should look nice on a black leather strap. On first inspection after opening the case it is obvious there has been a battery leak. It looks mostly contained to one area and Im hoping it will clean up. I checked the "fingers" and while dirty, they look ok. So far so good! I started by disengaging the fingers from the index wheel - apparently any rough handling during hand removal can cause these to break. Once I had stripped the dial side down I came across the reason why the hands were not moving. Indeed the canon pinion had seized - and properly so! The minute wheel teeth had been striped! After wrestling the centre wheel away from the movement it was clear it had rusted solid and the previous owner had attempted to free it up using force applied to the crown. I used a bit of Rodico to clean up the rust and teeth before proceeding as the forks are magnetised and will attract any ferrous material. Also of note virtually all the components were magnetised to some degree or other so will need to deal with that. A couple of shots showing just how thin the coil wires actually are! I finally made it down to the tuning fork and got stuck trying to remove one of the two screws holing it to the plate. I was putting significantly more force in to turning that screw head than I was comfortable with so decided to place a drop of penetrating oil around the screw in the hopes it will have loosened up by the morning. Now I need to start looking for some replacement parts...... I will update this thread as I progress!

Just got this guy from the eBay. Purchased as "for repair." First thing I notice is the contact spring in the battery hatch is missing. My dad recently asked me to repair his non-running Spaceview and it turned out that was the entire problem with his, so I put the world's tiniest ball of tin foil in there and what do you know. Looks like a good service is all it needs! One more quick note: according to the list from myBulova, this is a factory Spaceview. Nice!

Started talking about this guy in the "what watch have you got coming in the mail" thread, and thought I'd add some more pictures and info here. Here's how it arrived to me: @JohnR725 noted that it's supposed to hack, but the mechanism is finicky and best left alone if I'm not doing a full service, which I'm not yet. It runs with a modern silver oxide battery as-is, so I'm going to run it a few days and see how she goes. I took a peek inside to make sure it had the correct hacking movement (214H), which it did. It also had a ton of organic matter all over it, so I de-cased it and gave everything a good cleaning. John also noted that the caseback gasket and grime could contribute to the hack not hacking it, so I replaced the hard plastic gasket that came out with the correct toothed rubber one. It really cleaned up nicely. I notice now when I lift the setting bow that I hear and feel an intermittent buzzing, which I assume is the movement trying to hack but just barely failing. I suppose I'll have to take it apart at some point. For now though, new wrist candy!

Greetings all, I've been working on a few Accutrons of late. It started with one that was gift to me. I find them very interesting, and marvel at their engineering. Who wouldn't, right? Of the two that are on my bench right now, one needs an index wheel, the other needed the index and pawl jewels cleaned better than a dip in One-Dip. Of course I didn't realize that until I put it (A 2242 Accuquartz) back together and it wasn't staying running and I looked at the jewels under higher magnification. Despite some advising against putting the fork/index finger/jewel and pawl-bridge/finger/jewel in the ultrasonic, I was told by an Accutron expert that it would be OK, so I did so. I definitely cleaned off the gunk. I used fresh cleaner and ran a rare earth magnet through the cleaner before putting the parts basket in. The issue I'm dealing with now is that the pawl finger got bent. It must have been sitting too low, or the upper fork screw was sitting too high. When I spun the finger around to avoid damaging it, it hung up on that screw. Then it somehow got lifted over the hack pin as I was trying to get the index wheel in position without high enough magnification to notice it happening. Anyway, I am now working to straighten the finger. It's not terrible, but I guess it needs to be rather perfect to work properly. First the jewel wasn't squaring with the index wheel. Then it was riding over the index wheel. Right now it will get the watch running slightly but it won't stay, at least at lower phasing voltages. It looks pretty square now, and isn't riding over the index wheel. The only obvious issue is that the stress limiter on the pawl finger is not engaged with the finger at all. Since the jewel was sitting so squarely with the index I decided it was worth at try, but the stress limiter may be more important than I hoped. These fingers are so fragile, and manipulation has to be done under pretty high magnification, I just want to know if I should give it up and buy a replacement or keep trying. Any help is appreciated. Thanks ahead of time. I'd include an image but I don't have a good way to do so with my microscope setup. Cheers.

I've got a 219 that I'm playing with. When I hook it up to the 700 test set, it pegs the ammeter, so I'm trying to determine if I need a new coil. I first determined that the previous owner had screwed the battery strap to the main plate, causing a dead short. After I fixed that, it still doesn't run, regardless of how much tapping I do on the side. The ammeter needle stays all the way to the right. My understanding is the 219 uses most of the same bits from the 218, with the obvious omission of one coil. And this is what my 219 looks like: Testing resistance across the two brass prongs of the coil only gives me 900 ohms, where I'd expect 5-10k. But because there's only one coil here, I can't be sure I'm testing the right bits. Is the feedback coil included here? Where are the contacts for it? Are there any diagrams for the 219 out there? I do see that Cas-ker has coils and circuit boards available for $50 each, but I'd love to know if this is bad first. Plus I love learning this stuff. So assuming they just removed the cell coil and left the rest of the circuit the same, this is how I matched my 219 to the schematic: I was measuring between E and G, so across F1. 900 ohms makes a little more sense. I'll try tomorrow between F and E. To tired and too much Scotch to do more tonight

Accutron 214 service . Do you know anyone in the not to far from Sweden that does that . I thought electric watches did accutron . But not any more.

New forum member @ChrisMcKeith saw my previous thread about fixing the electronics in my 219 movement and was foolish trusting kind enough to send me his to work on. It's been an interesting journey and I thought some folks might find it useful or interesting. The capacitor, resistor, and coils were all within spec, and a little pluck got the fork humming, so we were off to a good start. Full tear down, clean, oil, rebuild. Got to break out the Horia clone when the second wheel jewel surprisingly popped out of the main plate. After depthing the wheel, I inly had to tear it down twice more because I forgot to put the hacking lever under the train wheel bridge...then forgot to put the fork under the train...good practice, I keep telling myself. Then I started phasing it. Adjusted the tension on the index and pawl fingers by the manual, applied voltage from my power supply, and it ran...for a half revolution of the index wheel at a time, no matter how I adjusted it. After some more diagnosis and manually moving the fork, I had the hunch that the index wheel has some bad teeth. 45x is as high as my microscope goes, but it sure looks like those teeth are rounded/flattened: I compared it to the index wheel on the 219 I have that runs: Seems like a big difference in the sharpness of those teeth. Literally as I took this picture, I got a message from our friend @LittleWatchShop, who generously offered to try re-pivoting the 4th wheel on my 219. Since it didn't work, he's sending me a spare 219 movement! Hopefully we can use the 4th wheel for my 219, and the index wheel for Chris'. The kindness and generosity here does not cease to amaze and delight.

Hi All, I have just picked up a nice little Bulova Accutron 218. It is humming away but the minute and hour hands are not turning (apparently it could be corrosion on the cannon pinion) so it is likely in need of a service/repair. I have found a (grainy) copy of the service manual on line and a quick read through identifies the required lubricants as: Moebius OL219 - Synta Visco Lube Moebius OL207 - Special Lubricant with Molybdenum Disulphide Im struggling to find any information regarding these lubricants. Does any one have any specs they could point me to? Or alternatively, does anyone know if there are modern equivalent lubricants I can use for this movement? Cheers, Bob

Sorry for the multiple threads. I'll be honest--I just noticed there was a separate forum for tuning fork watches So I'll keep my posts here. I don't have the 344 silver oxide cells yet, so I'm adjusting with the 1.35v Accucell and the model 700 test set, per the service manual, to get a feel for how things work and to have a good starting point. This is really a learning experience. The index pawl is even more sensitive to tension than I expected. So the first question is regarding the last few steps in the process: I'm a little confused on the momentary hesitation part. Are they saying it's permissible while rotating the cam after it stops the first time, but before it continues to run consistently? The other thing I'm wondering about is trueness of the index wheel. I noticed that the one on this movement is noticeably out of true at the rim. Is that normal? I did my best to take a close-up video, and you can see the index and pawl jewels moving back and forth. Edit: I was also using Henny Frystack's excellent video on the 214 here as reference, but it looks like the actual phasing part is cut out of it. He talks about the theory of it, but the practice seems to be cut off at 43:00. Anyone know if the rest of it is out there on the internets?

I think all of us who have attempted servicing an Accutron are familiar with this phasing diagram. But all that assumes that the amplitude of the tuning fork is such that the index jewel travels a distance of between 1s and 2.5s over the entire useful voltage range of the battery. But what all the literature out there doesn't explain is how to make the index jewel travel between 1s and 2.5s. All they say is that there are some tuning forks out there that cannot be phased properly. There doesn't seem to be any test equipment out there that is capable of measuring the actual travel of the index jewel. I think it is important to be able measure this travel distance before even attempting to do phasing. It's like the amplitude of a conventional watch. If the amplitude is too low or too high, proper regulation cannot be achieved. I was at my mentor's workshop and we were playing around with his digital microscope and noticed that if the frame capture rate is adjusted, it can actually make the index jewel appear to move in slow motion. And the travel distance can be actually seen. If anyone out there is into high speed photography or stroboscopic photography, I hope this information is useful to you to develop a "timegrapher" for tuning fork watches. PS. I am tagging @LittleWatchShop here. If you are planning on developing an Accutron service centre, please read this.

While cleaning up the case, I polished out the crystal, then gave it a wipe with a paper towel. And that's how I learned that despite being on the inside of the crystal, the Accutron logo wipes right off with a little soap and water I should have been more careful, but live and learn. I'm not too heartbroken, as the crystal has some pretty bad cracks and deep scratches, and I was planning to replace it anyway. I have to say, I still love the results of a quick polish on the wheel with red rouge. Here's a before and after of two Accutron crystals. This was all of 5 minutes' work. Cleaned up and back together. Unfortunately, the lugs measure 17,mm, while all the straps I have are 18mm. I have a suspicion this watch was treated roughly and the lugs may be bent, but I'm not brave enough to try bending them back.

I know how to measure and fit an acrylic crystal, but how does one choose the type if the watch came to me without one? Can you tell if it needs a gasket by looking at it? Since it has a gasket for the case back, should it the crystal have a tension ring for extra waterproofiness? Low-dome? High dome with step? Without step? With faceted edge? If I choose one with a calendar lens, is there any way to know if the lens is wide enough for the day/date, or are they really only designed for the date? Basically I'm trying to figure out what is an aesthetic choice and what is important. My instinct is to just get a plan ol' low-dome for $3, but I don't want to end up getting something that won't be water resistant if that's what I need.

I bought the 16mp camera for my AmScope trinocular microscope, and I have to say, it's fantastic. While it is a luxury, I do post a lot of photos, and holding a loupe to my phone is less than ideal, and the ability to get close up video will be fun for the Accutron repairs I've been doing. Additionally, I bought the calibration slide to go with it, and the software lets me measure things to within a fraction of a mm. For example, trying to find the diameter and width of a flat case gasket when I don't have the original. It's just super cool and thought I'd share.

I finally feel like I have the confidence, tools, and fine motor control to tackle these tuning fork movements. I've got my 700 test meter here (in beautiful shape with the original box, I might add!) and it seems to work as it's supposed to, at least with one of those 1.35v diode batteries in it. I'm planning to phase the watches for silver oxide cell voltage at 1.65v, so what I'd like to do is use my low voltage power supply to supply the test meter, and so I don't have to keep buying cells. I feel like I saw a thread where someone made a dummy 343/344 cell with power leads on it. Anyone have pictures or a link to that?

The service manual calls for only 2 lubricants: Moebius OL219 - Synta Visco Lube Moebius OL207 - Special Lubricant with Molybdenum Disulfide I understand that they are now Moebius 9020 and 8201, respectively. Unfortunately, I don't have either in stock. I do have 9010, 9104 (HP1300). For greases I have 9501, 9415, and Kluber P125. The manual recommends OL219 on the train jewels where I'd normally use 9010, and looking at Moebius' lubrication chart that seems reasonable. In Mark's chronograph course he also notes that 9010 can be an acceptable substitute for 9020. The grease is a little more tricky. The manual uses it in some places I'd normally use 9104, like the minute wheel post, but also where I'd use 9501 like the stem and sliding clutch. I thought the Kluber P125 might be a reasonable substitute for the 8201, but I think the Kluber is thicker. Basically I'm wondering if there's a compelling reason to buy the lubricants specifically called for, or if I can use what I have here. I don't mind spending the money if I really should, but if I can get away with what I've got and not have to wait with parts on my bench, I'd love that too.

Last week, I bought a bunch of stuff from an NAWCC member. Lots of junk quartz watches, but a few accutron tuning fork watches and some accutron quartz watches. I think whoever worked on this accutron quartz accidentally switched out a solid gold back where a gold filled one probably was. I have seen lots of accutrons where the wording on the back says "gold filled" whereas this one just says "gold." I think it is 14K solid gold. Opinion?

Unfortunately I don't. He was using a Chinese industrial digital microscope. The software was entirely in Chinese. And my Chinese has regressed to nursery school level. I'm am working on that and keeping the technique I've developed to myself for the moment. And as @nickelsilver mentioned in another post, the 218/219 is much easier to phase to a silver oxide battery than the 214. But unfortunately, the Accutron collector community has a preference for the 214, as evident in the prices on eBay.

That is a very interesting idea - do you remember what sort of frame rates the camera was using to achieve aliasing? My question from this is; what do you do if the index finger travel is out of specification? Is there anything to do or are you looking at replacing the fork? In the end, my watch was about 7 seconds out before weight adjustments. Im pretty sure I did not "phase" this thing anywhere near correctly (thanks everyone for the discussion!) so perhaps I lucked out. I did buy a few more accutron projects before realising what I had taken on - I am both more and less confident I know what I am doing going forward now... My next project is to find a case for this movement I found in a lot of other movements. Again thanks everyone for the discussion.

Sounds like a Accutron service center to me.

It happens when the watches not say used correctly. We also get some minor discrepancies between the users mail instructions and the instructions there were taught if you took one of their classes. When the electric watches came out Elgin, Hamilton and the Bulova had training classes because electric watch was a newfangled thing that the watchmaker didn't understand. Bulova studied Hamilton's failure at education and enhanced their advertising and training they learned from the mistakes of others. The problem though with Bulova is the tuning fork is so much different than anything else it definitely would be a confusion problem so they would have a training class that you could take for the basic course was two days and then later on they threw in a quartz class so would be a half day so for 2 1/2 days you to take an extremely intense and yes everyone there said it was the most intense class that ever taken. The two day class to learn how to phase 214 watches. So I do remember that we crossed out some items in the book that they don't do and one of them is with one of the index fingers where I think it says half a tool thickness you basically just adjusted so it's off the index wheel's that's all it needs is basically a reference point where lifts off Now maybe another way to look at all of this is a PDF of some light reading. So there is one of the instructors who was teaching the class of oh and the Bulova class unlike others had a written test and a practical test for which a few past you got a certificate. Where a lot of training classes from watch companies you got a certificate that you attended the class but here if you past you had a certificate with a number. Taxi a very impressive certificate consists laminated to piece of wood it looks really impressive So it understand what's going on I have a PDF. 1996-08-web horological times Accutron silver cells phasing.pdf

So I'm looking to get a replacement crystal for my 1971 Spaceview, case # 2531. According to Jules Borel, the replacement is Bulova part # 1271AYS. This is the crystal the watch came to me with: Searching around eBay and other suppliers, I'm finding variations for the same part number. Also, the logo looks green in a lot of the pictures. Is that because it's lume, or are some of them actually green from the factory? I would think that'd blend in with the green plastic behind it. Here are a few of the photos, all sold as 1271AYS. I would think the NOS one in the first picture is the definitive correct one, but it also has the green looking ink, so I figured I'd ask around. I also dug around on myBulova.com in the hopes of finding a catalog with pictures, but no luck. Sadly, it seems that accutron214.com has gone down, but I found the Wayback machine gives us access to a lot of great stuff. The two genuine Spaceview pictures they have show the Accutron tuning fork logo at 12 o'clock instead of 8. This ad from 1972 shows it without the tuning fork at all. Look at those prices, though! That's a lot of money in 2023 dollars. 1970, again without the fork. I know none of this is really important--it's my watch and I can do what I want--I just like knowing the history. Advertising puffery! 1969.

You've been bitten by the Accutron bug!

Another Accutron 214 found its way into my shopping cart. Not sure how that keeps happening... I've always liked the railroad dials, and I'm a sucker for the blued hands. This one was sold as running, for a nice change of pace.