Refitting a loose Chronograph Hand

[Tmuir]

My son today gave me his Seiko Quartz Chronograph that he wears to school with the second Chronograph hand rattling around behind the glass.

He tells me it just fell off, but I suspect the watch took a bit more of a harder blow as the minute hand and the large second hand were also knocked out of alignment and interfering with each other.

This watch I had given my son a year or so ago after I had used it for one of my projects for my watch class and when I got it the chronograph hand had been loose and I had to tighten it up, so I wasn't overly surprised it had fallen off again.

The easiest way to tighten a loose hand if to fit it into the end of a good quality pin vice and do it up so it is just touching the tube and then tighten it a few more degrees so it slightly crimps the tube.

You then take it off and check and if still too loose repeat.

I did this and the first time it was still too loose and fell back off, crimped it some more and it was still too loose, crimped it a third time and yes you can guess it I did it too tight and now it would not fit.

If you do this you then need to broach it back out.

I'm lucky in that I have a full set of watchmakers broaches that were my grandfathers so I had one small enough.

I held the chronograph hand in my vintage hand pliers and broached it out ever so slightly, checked it was still too tight, so broached it some more and it was a perfect fit.

Here is the watch with the hand fitted back on.

It was the second hand sitting beside 9.

 

I'm unsure exactly how small the broach was I used, but for comparison here it is next to the tip on my 0.6mm screwdriver and I only used the first 1/3 of the broach

This is definitely the smallest hole that I have ever broached out and I'm pleased it worked so well.

 

My son has his watch back so he is also pleased.