Heirloom watches

[omx5o]

Afternoon,

I have a couple of nice heirloom watches passed down to me from my great grandfather and his brother. They date from around 1900. One is solid silver case and the other appears to be a solid 9k gold case, judging by the numerous dents in the case material, and it feels quite different to the gold-filled watches that I've handled recently.

My newly acquired knowledge in antique watches is limited to American types, so these two look unfamiliar to me. I was wondering if any of you folks could help identify the manufacturer from these images. They are in very good condition and have been well looked after. The dials have no text, but one has minute markers up to 60 and the other has minute markers up to 300.

Thanks,

Peter

[wls1971]

The first appears to be Swiss pin set of very good quality and has  whats called a counter poised pallet fork sometimes called a moustache pallet  fork due to its distinct shape these are an attempt to move the center of gravity closer to the pivots it was thought to improve accuracy its more commonly seen on American high end pocket watches, but this type of pallet fork was used for quite a while by high end Swiss manufactures such as Patek in their chronometer pocket watches and Vacheron,  The jewels of both balance and anchor appear to be diamond its a quality watch.

The other is a pocket watch with center seconds stop lever on the side .

Hallmarks on the cases will give you the dates of manufacture and perhaps clues as to who made them more photos would help in identifying them, both very nice watches to have.

 

[omx5o]

Thanks for that. That does sound very interesting. Yes, I noticed the pallet fork was shaped like a moustache. A couple of years ago before I became interested in watches I tried to do a quick check online for watches with a similar dial and I thought Vacheron was a potential contender, simply by comparing photos online.

I'll get some better images when I next visit my father. I was in a bit of a hurry and in fact the movement was running which makes the image less clear.

It's also engraved with my great grandfather's name and the company he worked for in 1911. So it's very much of sentimental value.

Edited May 27, 2018 by omx5o

[oldhippy]

wis 1971, how can you see all that detail? I can hardly see the pallets.

[wls1971]

2 minutes ago, oldhippy said:

wis 1971, how can you see all that detail? I can hardly see the pallets.

If you click on the picture it will bring a larger window up and you can zoom in