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Hello All, Since my last post about an Omega and a Seiko, I have fallen deeper and deeper into the buying vintage watches and cleaning the putting-back-together hole. So I picked up this guy from one of the auction sites for about $10 I stripped everything down, cleaned everything, and tried to put it all back together. Seems everything went well I am however stuck at the calendar wheel and spring. Seems the last guy that came in here lost the spring and made one of those guitar string type spring. I know that it works as I tested it before I took things apart. Only thing is it does not sit flush and its a juggling affair to get the spring to sit pushing on the calendar lever sitting just so the date wheel without flying into space. Then only I can put this plate on. As far as I can tell, the plate is what is holding this precarious spring lever date wheel sandwich all in its place. I can take it apart, I am amazed at the previous guy to get it all in just so. Can I get any advice on how I can get this done? The options I looked at are 01. Place the spring and lever, have the lever away from the spring, put the plate on, and try to slide the date wheel in. *** Nope does not work that way 02. Try to have the date wheel a little away, place the lever away from the spring and try to adjust after one of the screws are placed. *** Nope The spring does not like to stay in place 03. Have not tried this but I am thinking of super gluing or somehow fixing the spring down. Screw the plate on and then shove the lever into place *** What do you think? 04. Track down the actual spring and get either a donor movement or part. *** seems like an expensive way to repair something that was about $10 05. Black out all the dates and call it a design and also call it a day *** translation Giving up. I would really appreciate the opportunity to learn how the last guy actually did it.

Hi all, Can you help me identify this movement? I think I know what it is (cheap chinese) but just wanted to pitch for confirmation... (so won't say what I think it is) I have measured it as: (I think...) Diameter 26.0mm Height 4.9mm Height with hand pinion 7.3mm I am a complete newbie at even taken a case back off despite being a bit of a collector. This movement is broken and crunches when I wind it. So I want to replace it. The watch itself was a gift (and undoubtedly a fake/replica) but I want to get it working again by replacing the movement. Ideally, I want to keep the current hands (hr, min, sec) and crown/stem. It just has a date complication at 3 o'clock. Just a like for like swap seems the simplest thing to do? But open to any suggestions. I'm not bothered if it's a cheap chinese movement, I just want to get it working so I can wear it now and again. Any advice or help would be most appreciated. Many Thanks, Dan.

I have a watch movement that I have hunting for a case for a long time now. I bought the movement rather cheaply as I absolutely love the patina on the dial. The movement is an Wittnauer 11arg (as 1361). When the rotor turns the automatic assembly slips (or maybe the mainspring). The pictured gear slips when the rotor turns. I can still wind the movement by hand however the automatic assembly slipping I believe causes the mainspring to unwind. Does anyone know what is wrong/ what I can do to remedy it? Thanks for your help, Amateurwatchbreaker

Hello Everyone, I recently bought myself a cheap repair kit and I successfully changed the battery on this watch that was dormant in a drawer for about 4 years! However, the problem is I haven't done something right as the day sub dial is ticking away same as the second hand sub dial!, I'm sure it isn't meant to do that. I'm obviously putting it back together incorrectly and also the two little white plastic cogs you can see in the pics, I can't remember where they go?! If someone please can talk me through the process it would be massively appreciated or any pointers, advice would be great. Thank you

ok so ive recently become obsessed with watches. I have obtained a broken invicta pro diver, and this has led to much research on how to fix it... I'm starving for more knowledge... where and how do you suggest I go about finding this knowledge. I have noticed there isn't as much info on the internet as I had hoped... I plan to get a work bench and do this as a hobby and possibly one day as a means of extra income... I guess u could say im just looking for advice and places books etc that can help me

I am a retired jeweler, not a watchmaker, so forgive me if I don’t speak the correct language. A friend asked me to look at this little old Patek, which runs, drives the minute hand, but neither drives nor sets the hour hand. There are broken teeth on both the ‘barrel gear’(?) which engages in the setting mode, and also on the wheel that delivers power to the hour hand wheel. What to do? Does anyone fix watches this badly damaged? Does anyone have a trove of parts for these old watches? Does anyone make replacement parts? grateful for advice Phillip

Here is my puzzle. I have a watch that I am working on. A Hamilton 987. It has been cleaned and oiled and demagnetized. When I run it on the timing machine the horizontal rates and the pendant down rate are all close and about +/- 4s/day. When I move it to pendant left things get weird. It has the same amplitude but the daily rate goes way off the chart -98s/day or something, also the beat error goes from 0.5ms to 0.0ms. The hairspring is running unobstructed, and he regulator fingers are adjusted correctly. How can this happen? How can a wheel spinning at the same amplitude produce such a wildly different rate? And how does the beat error change with the position change like that? Thoughts? Thanks Rob

Hi all, This is my first post, so apologies in advance if this is the wrong forum. However, I am looking for advice and repair help, so this seemed like the place! I had this watch for about 2 years, brand new, never worn. I took it out today and as I was sitting on a chair, I tried to put the watch on, it slipped off my leg and hit the floor, cracking the crystal right down the middle! It looks to be intact, but obviously I want to fix the watch. It was keeping great time, and I wanted to start wearing it. It is still running, and there does 't appear to be any pieces of glass on the watch face, either floating around or caught under the various hands. I have attached a photo of the watch, and am also including a llink from the zodiac website for a listing of the specs. [ http://www.zodiacwatches.com/en_US/shop/air_planet-ZO8100P.html?searchTerm=ZO8100&imagePath= ] (exclude leading and trailing bracket and space when placing the url in your browser.) My questions: 1) this is supposed to be a dive watch, and it has a perfectly flat crystal. I watched a repair video on youtube that replaced a similar-looking crystal, but I have no way of knowing how similar it was, if at all, except for the shape and the flatness. Where can I find a replacement crystal for this exact watch? 2) is there any way to tell what this crystal is made of? I thought it was sapphire, but I didn't see any indication of that on the website or the watch itself, so perhaps you all might know. 3) is this something someone brand new to the hobby should and could tackle, or if it isn't, can anyone give be a ballpark of what I am looking at in terms of repair costs? I am hesitant to start taking this watch apart for my first repair, since I have very little idea of what to do... I have seen people use a small plastic disk and a mallet to remove a crystal, as well as a small press, which has also been used to insert the new crystal. I am thinking this would be a relatively inexpensive and quick repair for someone who knows what they are doing and who has access to the correct crystal. However, perhaps if I could find the correct crystal and folks here think this is a good, doable project for a beginner, I will consider tackling this one. Thanks for reading this. Also, could someone tell, just by my description of how this crystal broke, if it is a sapphire crystal? Or is what I described of how i broke a characteristic of some other type of hardened glass or plastic material? It seemed like incredibly dumb luck when it broke, but things happen. I don't want to compound the problem by turning an easy fix into a nightmare. Thanks all for your help and advice!