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Revisiting an old hobby


AndyHull

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Well it is rare for me not to find anything at all about a watch, but the "Lijac" brand is proving pretty elusive.

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I did find an example of a 15 jewel ladies "Montre Lijac" and the 15 jewel gents, I've pictured here (which sold for about twenty quid), but it seems the version I have is pretty unique. Another interesting and suitably low cost piece of horological history enters the 404 club.

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Eventually I found a few more. Previous sales on ebay, (the first two look suspiciously like the same watch) but the examples I found were all divers.

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However I cannot find anything about the brand. I presume this may have been a jeweler or store brand name or perhaps a low volume producer.

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Today, the "Regus" dons a new crown.

Early to mid 1960s would be my guess. As well as needing a crown, it has a slightly twisted stem, but I decided to leave that as is, since I don't feel like rooting through my large pile of random stems looking for a replacement, and I am not about to spring for £7.95 for a new one, given the value of the watch.

Only one jewel, so not particularly regal, more of a cart horse than an Arab stallion I would suggest, but a fun little piece none the less, and a bonus watch from one of the batches of junk, purchased for some other more interesting item,  so basically it was a freebie. 

16mm lugs, so either a small gents, or a ladies/kids watch.

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It needs a bit more TLC to remove the scratches, but with little more than a clean and a couple of drops of oil, it is sitting around -40s/day 0.4ms and 240 degrees of amplitude. I'll leave it running overnight and check it in the morning. If it is still fit and well, then it can join the club.

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A few numbers from the "Regus".

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Solid as a rock, dial up/down etc. Admittedly you can hear the thing from three city blocks away, but nobodies perfect.

We don't need no stinkin' Rolex....  although if you offer me one for £4.04, I would bite your arm off for it, obviously.

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The same watch, 12hrs later once all of the lubrication has settled in place. As you can see the amplitude has improved, and the rate has slowed.

Exactly what we expect, and the reason why you don't dive in and adjust and regulate the watch the instant you have put down the oiler.

I'm going to wear it today, and do the finishing touches in the evening.

I'm also going to check to make sure I have the correct lift angle set in the timegrapher before I do that. I'm assuming that this information is available somewhere on the interwebz since it is a pretty common caliber. If anybody happens to know off the top of their head what the lift angle for an EB8800 is, it would save me a bit of googling.

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Dragged from the pile of random, I give you.. a Zaria 2009 based errr... Zaria.

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The missing winder stem might be a bit of an issue. I'll look through my stash and see if any of them fit. If not I have a dilemma since I can pick up an entire similar watch, shipped from the Ukraine for less than the price of the stem.

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There was also a bit of dial dandruff going on, which I have stabilized with a green sharpie. Not very professional perhaps, but since the watch cost less than the sharpie, who's complaining.

 

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It is actually very well put together, and runs reasonably well. You could grow potatoes in the "patina", and it obviously needs a crystal and a suitable strap. I think its probably circa early to mid 1960s, and has "Made in USSR" still visible at the base of the dial.

Another bit of horological history for the collection. As well as being a Soviet era watch brand, Zaria is I understand, a goddess from Slavic Mythology.

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The Seiko Quartz went back under the magnifier last night. This time I spent a little longer on it, and popped off the PCB.

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Not good news.

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The corrosion extended to the circuit board (which I cleaned up), but also to the coil. I could see there was a loose turn of wire sitting on the back of the coil, when I popped it out, so I soldered that back on, however on closer examination, the other end of the coil is also disconnected, presumably the corrosive contents of the leaked battery ate through it,  and since that wire is buried in the middle of the coil, re-soldering it is not really an option.

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Nothing else for it but to button it back up and pop it back in the "needs more work" pile. Time to start watching ebay for a suitable donor.

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Edited by AndyHull
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The two W15 Cobalt Talking Watches made it on to the workbench today. They are constructed using one of the ubiquitous Chinese standard quartz  watch movements, with a small module on top that does the actual talking.

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The two modules are not connected, so you could set the watch to a completely different time from the speech module if you wanted.

This model doesn't have an alarm, but that is down to there being one less pusher/button on this version than on the alarm version, the speech module itself may be common across the range. I didn't go to the trouble of proving this though.

The "speaker" piezo element is bonded to the case back, and there are a couple of spring contacts that connect the speaker to the speech module when the lid is closed. 

One of the watches arrived in mint condition, but the other was missing one of the speaker spring contacts, so that was fabricated by wrapping a few turns of 0.25mm nickel plated wire round a pin, and cutting the resultant "spring" to the correct length.

Both needed a CR016 and a AG1 cell for the speech module and the watch module respectively and now they work perfectly.

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The "new" Casio AQ-230 with the black dial, I posted about earlier in "Watch of Today" got a much needed spruce up and polish.

This one has a metal body, unlike its white dialled cousin I picked up a few months back, which has the newer "matalized resin" body (i.e. plastic).

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I also took it off the stainless steel hair puller (which is now sitting in a small glass jar, soaking in a mix of detergent and antiseptic).

I tried a couple of black leather bands before I settled on this 1990s styled faux carbon fiber fabric band with red stitching and a leather backing.

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All of the major battle scars are gone. What I will say is, while it may not be a chick magnet, it is most certainly a smudge magnet.

The rejuvenated crystal is now so new and shiny looking that every spec of dust or hint of a fingerprint has me reaching for the lens cloth.

Another "new" face in the 404 club.

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Today on the healing bench I had.. no, not the pile of HMT's I keep banging on about, but rather, a couple of vintage Timexes (or should that be Timexi.. you decide).

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The first is a Viscount from 1976, and the second, and my favorite out of the two, despite the more '70s vibe of the Viscount, is a 1973 Marlin.

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The Viscount dial had a really bad case of green cheese disease, which I have more or less remedies. It isn't perfect, but it is a a whole lot better. A gentle rub with a mix of vinegar and a couple of drops of dish soap using the flattened end of a matchstick allowed me the precision needed to remove the green without removing the dial markings. This was followed by some careful application of a tiny patch of damp lint free cloth to remove the vinegar/detergent mix, then some baby oil to seal the surface. 

The result is acceptable but far from a factory restoration, but then again, this is a £4 Timex, not a £4,000 Rolex.

Both watches arrived with the usual issues, having no doubt not come within 100 yards of a service center since the day they left Dundee more than 40  years ago. 

Adjusting the time on the Viscount was sticky, and on the Marlin, was impossible. They were also engrimulated to the max, so what you see are the post fumigation pictures.

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After a lot of lighter fluid baths, mechanism lubrication, case grunge removal and some basic polishing they both look and run a whole lot better. The Viscount still needs some work on its case, and the date change is not 100%, so that will need to be re-visited too. It does work, but I wouldn't bet on it working every time.

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Two more join the Marlin.

On the left is a 99p "10 year battery" Accurist. 

Not much to say, it has a blue dial. I'm a sucker for a blue dial, and the price was right. It has been fumigated and the "10 year battery" replaced with a shiny new CR2012, so hopefully good for another 10 years. The crystal needs work, to show off that very attractive dial.

Next we have a 1979 ladies Timex. I know, I'm wearing women's watches again, people are starting to talk.

It needed a click spring and a service, and is now ticking away like it just left the factory.

Finally the 1973 Marlin, which got a little more work, as it too had a sticky date. All three are clicking and clacking away nicely on fresh leather bands.

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Edited by AndyHull
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Last night I took a quick look at this 1975 Timex (Sprite?) fob watch.

I suspect these were mainly used by nurses, as most of the other examples I found had the typical short chain and pin arrangement which is common on nurses watches.

This one is missing the chain, and the lume is slightly imperfect, but other than that, and the fact that it needed a good service, it was in a reasonable if grubby condition.

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I originally picked it up as a possible donor watch, but it  spruced up quite nicely, and is running well, so I may just keep it intact.

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The Rodeo - What can I say? It is a fashion watch... but I'm not sure what fashion it refers to. 

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I think it has to be from the 1970s.

Probably best worn with huge bell bottom trousers, platform soles a collar the size of Texas and big hair (or perhaps best not worn at all).

Made in France, with a jeweled 21600bph movement, but a strange multi-part plastic case. Is it a gents, as the dimensions and strap suggest, or is it a ladies, as the small dial might lead you to think. Either way, no bizarre timepiece collection should be without one. The movement is remarkably similar to the Lijac I posted about recently, but jeweled.

Strangely enough there were no other bidders so the hammer fell at £0.99p - and cheap at half the price I would say. It came back to life after a quick service and is now rocking away nicely to its own disco beat. I'll see how accurate it is in the morning once the lubrication etc has all settled down and the mainspring has had a good workout.

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Edited by AndyHull
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  • 1 month later...

The crystal looks a lot better. First, the before shot.

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It doesn't look particularly promising, in fact it looks like complete skating rink disaster, but nothing ventured...

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This is the original crystal seen in the first "as purchased" image, sanded with three different grit sizes and finished with 'T-Cut'.

Suggestions for a replacement band.

Should I go for a plain black leather, a patterned dark tan, or something completely different?

Or maybe you think I should stick with the vintage Spiedel, which I have to admit is growing on me, and so far hasn't noticeably depliated my arm.

Edited by AndyHull
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The Spiedel wasn't really doing it for me, so I popped it on a plain leather band, somewhere between rosewood and burgundy. 

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Much more appropriate I think, and a sight more comfortable I might add. I was almost tempted to post it in "Watch of Today" again, since I'm still wearing it. Not a single issue so far, and hovering somewhere less than +20s/day aver the last couple of days. 

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It was another rainy day today, so I took the opportunity to grab the shiniest thing in the horological "to do" pile.

This is a 1980s Timex 392 K Cell - Analog/Digital Alarm Chronograph. 

The watch looked pretty reasonable when it arrived. Not an expensive item at £2.19, but there was an obvious reason for the low price tag.

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The LCD display was not working.

From experience, this can be due to a number of causes. In some watches, the analog movement runs from a different battery from the digital one, so one can be running fine while the other is acting up due to a flat battery. However the seller's picture suggested that there was probably a corrosion issue on the PCB. Now most sensible people would run a mile when they saw this, but given the low price and the fact that the watch is probably repairable, I thought I'd take the chance.

As I mentioned elsewhere, the issue actually turned out to be a swollen zebra strip connector, which I carefully pared down to fit, and now the watch works perfectly. I didn't take any pictures, but like most modern watches, there is not much to see.  I removed six  screws, removed the zebra strip, carefully trimmed about 1/10mm from it, and refitted it.

 

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Here it is cleaned up and on the wrist. The watch has had little wear, and both it and the Timex band scrubbed up very nicely. It looks like new. One more member of the 404 club, and one less piece of landfill. :D

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Thanks.


You might like this video, it dates the watch model's release to some time around 1988, and gives it the Timex designation of "Timex Combination Quartz".

Look at the watch forming the background around the 11 second marker. This could make it about 32 years old, although it may well be a little younger, depending on how long the production run of this model was.

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I picked of a batch of eight assorted watches including a Timex and a Sekonda, and ... this dress Seiko (7N32 0BE8 HR1)..

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I hadn't actually noticed it when I placed the bid, since the Timex was the one that caught my attention. Most of the rest are not really worth a mention.  Total was £3.75 for all eight.

The once high quality strap was a mess, but the watch is a bit of a gem. A fresh battery and a replacement strap was all it needed.

Edited by AndyHull
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