Omega Speedmaster stem question

[Watchtime]

Hi guys,

 

I have this Omega Speedmaster with a 1666 mvt. After replacing the battery it worked fine until I tried to change the settings by pulling the crown. The crown and stem came out. I gently pushed it back but unfortunately it did not work. The watch keeps running but the settings can't be changed and the stem can be pulled out. It seems to me the stem is a bit short(broken)? When not broken can anyone help me pointing out the release ?

Cheers

 

[Chopin]

It doesn't look broken to me, at first sight but are you sure that you inserted it correctly ? Sometimes components inside the movement move around which won't allow you to properly put the stem back on.

For mechanical movements and, perhaps, some quartzes, this means that you have to take it apart and put the parts back where they should be.

Usually this doesn't happen on quartz watches and it shouldn't be hard to re-install the stem and crown. Have you tried gently rotating it a bit when it goes inside ?

PS: I see a screw with an arrow pointing towards it. Usually this is the screw that you can loosen (not too much though) to remove the stem and when you put it back in you tighten the screw back.

Edited January 27, 2018 by Chopin

[khunter]

2 minutes ago, Chopin said:

 

PS: I see a screw with an arrow pointing towards it. Usually this is the screw that you can loosen (not too much though) to remove the stem and when you put it back in you tighten the screw back.

Agreed, I believe you'll find that that screw has loosened, replace the stem and tighten the screw a little, pull out slightly on the stem to see if it's secure. You can watch some of Marc's videos and see this process in detail.

[MrRoundel]

I have to admit that I missed that arrow the first few times I looked at the image. I was looking on the movement, not the spacer ring. I'm sure that the experts are correct, that the screw loosened up. I'm also convinced that there's a good chance that someone loosened the screw a touch too much and it lost contact with the set-lever, thereby virtually necessitating the removal of the dial to reattach. Hopefully that's not the case. But if the screw keeps turning without tightening into anything, that's what you're probably looking at. Good luck.

BTW: You're lucky that you have a normal quartz watch that has the stem-release on the back of the movement. I'm working on a friend's watch that has an Hattori Y121 movement in it. The dang thing has the stem-release under the dial ! This makes it so when fitting a new stem, one must remove the dial on each trial fitting. Dumb design. I get the feeling watches with this movement aren't really made to be worked on. Live and learn. Cheers.