A Sad Story...

[Chainstay]

I have a sad, expensive, miserable and embarrassing story to tell!

As you can understand after reading I have been reluctant to share this horror story but I believe It's time to confess... A little time has passed and now it's just a 'lol'!

In 2004 I bought a fine looking Orient chronograph watch in Prague, an "Orient Chronograph Alarm PILOT watch Sapphire Crystal 44 mm" pretty cheap I think and I loved the look of it and still does. It has a sapphire glass and is equipped with stop watch, alarm, interval time, calculator bezel and so on. Just digged it.

That was when I knew even less of watches than I do now.

A couple of years ago it needed a new battery so I went to my local watch-repair shop to get it fixed saying that I wanted it leak-tested as well. When I came for it he told me it was ruined and couldn't be repaired! I later found out that the stem could be drawn out with ease and didn't engage at all. Put it in a drawer and forgot all about it until I caught interest in watch repair. After studying Marks video I thought it was a piece of cake to simply replace the movement and I still liked the watch you know.

Got a similar movement from ebay (it's a Seiko 7T62-movement) at a non-cheap price (won't tell you as it will increase my embarrassment...)
The new movement came with a new stem and there seemed to be a temporary stem inserted.
I opened the watch and got the movement out, removed all the hands and the dial. Then managed to mount the dial and hands on the new movement. So far so good.
Then it simply was a matter of casing the new movement as I intended to use the old stem and crown. I thought.
The stem can only be removed when it's pulled out to the second (not in the fully engaged nor the first or third position) and that's were when the son of a b**** fake stem with plastic inlay broke!!!
Then used 3-4 hours trying to get that little plastic piece out. Couldn't do it. Broke the old stem trying. Well, found the manual on the internet and found out that the movement could be "stripped" apart so I possibly could reach the small plastic-thing.
As I am of a lazy nature I thought out of the box!
Maybe it was just a matter of the stem not engaging, so I did it all over on the old movement. Fixed the stem (a new one came with the new movement, remember). It seemed to work. Cased it and found out that it didn't work: The stopwatch and re-setting didn't work at all though the interval function did seem to work.
Read the manual and noticed malfunction-corrections.
Maybe the circuit-block was faulty.
Again being lazy and looking for loop-holes I replaced the circuit-block with the one from the now ruined new movement. Wasn't that diffucult, used surgical gloves and wood-tip tweezers to minimize static electricity.
Needles to say I cleaned the case and bracelet, cleaned the two push buttons, fitted the new stem and attached the crown. Didn't disassemble the calculator rotating bezel, just dried it thoroughly with a hairdryer. 
Inserted a new battery and miraculously it now works including all complications: Stopwatch, interval, alarm.

The watch after my "treatment":

Lessons learned:
The list is almost endless but I should have removed the fake stem with caution.
I practised removal and re-fitting of small hands
I practised changing a watch battery

I practised changing a quartz-watch circuit block.

 

That said I do NOT recommend others to practise the same way.

If you have a little fun reading this you are welcome.

 

Pauli

[Geo]

A good result. In the end, and a nice watch to boot! :)

[stroppy]

Nothing to be ashamed of, Chainstay.  It could have happened to anyone.  This morning (remember I am on the other side of the world to you) I decided to get one of my old wind-up watches and give it a day out.  I wound it it up...well and good...then I pulled on the crown to set the time.  The crown was stiff so I tugged a little harder using my nails.  "Click...ching!"  The crown popped off and when I investigated the winding stem had snapped just where it joins the crown!  And this is an expensive watch!  I was heart-broken.  I know that it's meant to be relatively easy to replace the stem but I am far from being a watch maker in any shape or form.  So I just had to lump it.  My own stupid fault!  Now that's something to laugh at.

[frenchie]

A great result, I'm not sure what you're ashamed of!

[anilv]

Skills can be learnt.. sometimes the hard way!

 

What you cannot learn is persistence and patience which is very neccessary in this hobby/trade and is something nobody can teach you and no amount of money can buy.

 

You seem to have it in spades so you're well on your way to success!

 

Anil

[Chainstay]

You're all too kind but thanks.

 

My embarrassment is based on the fact that I intended to change the movement with a new one but ended up with using a brand new movement as spare parts. :pulling-hair-out:  I didn't even bother or think about testing the old movement - that's thick-headed!

I think it's a funny little story and I can quietly laugh of it thinking about the lessons learned.

 

Pauli