Stems crowns and spacers--oh my!

LittleWatchShop · July 31, 2021

I posted about this watch quite a while back. Was trying to find a new crown because the one I had was missing the waterproof insert.

Well, I tried to navigate the process of fitting a crown and failed. Oh well.

Recently, I bought a collection of random crowns on ebay and today I tried to find a suitable one for this watch. I found one that was "mostly" suitable, but the issue turned out to be that the stem was too short using this crown. Way too short. Ugh.

I decided to search for a new stem so that I could get a "long" start!! After about an hour of internet, I went back to the watch bench and pulled out a box of old stems. Not many there...maybe 20ish. Got kinda lucky. Found one that had the right cut for the clutch but needed some turning on the lath to reduce some diameters and open up the slot for the setting lever pin. YES...it worked! Installed the new stem and crown and was pretty happy about that.

I noticed that the movement was flopping around in the case. HUH? Why? This is a watch I bought on ebay many months ago. Paid really good money for it too--probably too much.

So, back to the 3D modeling software followed by a couple of 3D printing tries and voila!

In the picture, the copper colored ring is the printed spacer.

Today I employed...old stock...lathe...3D printer and some old fashioned LUCK!!

I will keep my eye out for a C11ks stem to do this job right!