Anchor brand

[Waggy]

I'm looking for those boxes of random spare parts and I see that they are supplied to the company I bought my las one from by Anchor Brand:

Anyone know the website for this company so I can buy direct?

[Neverenoughwatches]

2 hours ago, Waggy said:

I'm looking for those boxes of random spare parts and I see that they are supplied to the company I bought my las one from by Anchor Brand:

Anyone know the website for this company so I can buy direct?

Eyup waggy. These are the ones that i picked up a few weeks ago. Not from cousins but from someone on ebay that had bought them and pulled from the trays what they wanted for arts and crafts. I cant exactly comment on what would have been in them originally, but what i received were predominately HMT in particular calibres that were Citizen copies. But there were others inc. Some swiss.  A break down would be 40 % Indian, 30 % Chinese,  10 % Russian , 10 % Swiss and 10 % Japanese.  For what i paid and i did get something like 15 Kg was very little. I am not even a quarter of the way through sorting and have spent hours and hours so up to now. Over a thousand barrels complete ( if only to practice winding in a mainspring  ) probably 500 balance shock settings, literally thousands of jewels to choose and pick from. Keyless works, screws, clicks sprins hands crowns stems cap jewel plates ( which helped restore a watch already ). For me the material alone to make parts from was well worth it as i said i got such a lot for very little. But there is so much more in the way of stock, i dont know how much is interchangeable yet but some of it may be very usable with most movements. Things like the screws hands springs jewels etc. Unfortunately there were no balance wheels , i was hoping for timing screws and washers so this maybe what the original buyer of them has used. I was in the throws of making another post to recommend these to embryo watchmakers . They are a fantastic way to improve hand dexterity and learn the handling of parts and manipulation of tools. I've always been pretty good with this from the start, my first month of the hobby i bought something similar but all quartz movements a bucket load of them. Stripping them apart was like an intense crash course on tweezer and screwdriver manipulation. These boxes can achieve the same goal, as an example after hours of sorting yesterday and becoming rather bored. Every now and then i would find a rough looking shock setting and strip it down. I like a good challenge so i timed myself on eight different settings i found ( some very unusual ). The task was to release the shock spring lift or remove it depending on its design take out the cap jewel spin it over 180° put it on the bench spin it over again pop it back in and reinstall the spring. I ranged from 32 seconds for an incablock to just under two minutes for a wierd looking inca copy that had front tabs that had to be released twisted and lifted and then slid out from the back end. This was a single handed shock removal the other hand held the cock down with a finger. No Rodico, no pegwood assistance no breakages and most importantly no pinging, just one pair of dressed and polished no.5 titanium tweezers alternated with a bent accuncture needle to tweek the spring's tabs if needed ( some were quite rusty so i was also being careful not to break them ). I will put only 40 % of that result down to skill the main contributer to this was confidence.  Knowing if i broke or lost the spring that it didn't matter in the slightest gave me a massive edge in my challenge. So i can highly recommend a box of this material even if its just for some intensive nerve free practice. So enjoy the ride any newbies reading this as it seems we can actually buy a skill and ego boosting experience now. Cool . 

[Waggy]

Is there any clues in the boxes of the original suppliers contact/web information?

[Neverenoughwatches]

6 minutes ago, Waggy said:

Is there any clues in the boxes of the original suppliers contact/web information?

No mate nothing, just material. Looked at cousins and i see your pain,  30 quid plus long distance shipping

[Waggy]

3 minutes ago, Neverenoughwatches said:

30 quid plus long distance shipping

Yes, then import duty and VAT....makes an already expensive hobby even more expensive. Can you do me a favor and let me know if the eBay seller re-lists any, or (even better) drop me a PM with their seller name so I can keep checking myself, thanks 

[JohnR725]

10 minutes ago, Waggy said:

Is there any clues in the boxes of the original suppliers contact/web information?

you would think a company that's proud enough to put their name on the products might put a link to where we could find them. Oh and another product they make is lubrication is very popular because it's very inexpensive. It also has really interesting properties for lubrication but who cares it's really inexpensive. Maybe they really don't want their customers to find out where they live.

My best understanding is anchor is a product of India I don't suppose India registers trademarks you might find them that way.

 

[Waggy]

The quest continues - I've done every search I can think of and my mouse scrolling finger is tired and calloused trying to find them, maybe their web site goes under a different holding company or something?

[JohnR725]

yes but how can it not exist don't they have a day there very proud they been in existence since a specific date? It's like trying to find the manufacturers of the 1000 or the 1900 timing machine. I think the best is able to do was to find a building and China where I think it came from but it is a very peculiar building that look like in house a lot of stuff and even then I suspect that's not actually where they came from. Pursuit reason a lot of companies just don't want you to know where they exist at all.

Oh and is also an anchor brand of watches no idea whether they're related to this company or not. I just noticed that when I was searching to see if they did have a website and know they do not.

[Neverenoughwatches]

20 minutes ago, Waggy said:

Yes, then import duty and VAT....makes an already expensive hobby even more expensive. Can you do me a favor and let me know if the eBay seller re-lists any, or (even better) drop me a PM with their seller name so I can keep checking myself, thanks 

Certainly matey i will look back and find it, she wont have anything yet. The listing was for just one box of 300 gram for 4.20, it looked interesting so i made her a cheeky offer to take everything she had which was around 30 boxes which she accepted. She had taken certain components out and not sure what would have been in there, i have only found 2 balance wheels so far and no train wheels. No way to identify those anyway,but the washers etc would have been useful.  But the jewels stems crowns shock springs can all be measured and matched up, the keyless should be identifiable also the click and keyless springs are handy.

17 minutes ago, Waggy said:

The quest continues - I've done every search I can think of and my mouse scrolling finger is tired and calloused trying to find them, maybe their web site goes under a different holding company or something?

They are India based as John says.

[praezis]

Anchor brand belongs to Cambridge time spares in Mumbai.

They are wholesalers and supply Cousins and others. I bought from them many years ago, shipping was costly then. Maybe they sell to end users today, an email request may show.

CTS is one of the serious sellers who look (a bit) on quality. But eventually they are merchants, no watchmakers.

Frank