I want to learn to do it.
Anyone Doing Mechanical Watch Repair?
- Thread starter Al
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I'd check with a local jewler to see how they learned the trade. I'll be your first customer with my 1960 Hamilton Automatic.
YouTube is your new friend. Then visit Jules-Borel for tools and ways to lighten your wallet.
AZjeff
$50 Site Donor 2023
Check out wristwatch revival on YouTube to get a feel for it, lots of videos and easy to listen to. He also sells watchmaker tool sets to get started. I'm interested in watchmaking as well but being brutally honest not sure my hands are steady enough for it now. Large parts are tiny and small parts are invisible.
Right there with you - I barely have the patience to change watch batteries any more. Me diving into a mechanical watch repair will not end well.
I like this video. ETA 2824 is high quality, and quite popular, you should be able to find a good sample for cheap to learn on.
I want to try, but my hands shake some. Not sure I could be successful.
I want to try, but my hands shake some. Not sure I could be successful.
That's actually terrible advice, as this and other pin-lever escapements were generally not desiged for repairability, are challenging for even experienced watchamkers to fix, and the skills developed are not really transferable to proper watches.
I think the best place to start is a 16 size, 15 or 17 jewel American pocket watch. The parts are big enough to see what's going on, but all the same principles that work on smaller watches are still at play. Hamiltons are easiest to put back together, but really you can't go wrong with any big name. I'd suggest at least initially avoiding full plate 18 size-they're what I learned on and it's served me well, but some parts of reassembly are more difficult than a more typical 3/4 plate or bridge design.
To the OP: I started watch repair as a hobby in 2009. I'd like to think I'm pretty good at it, especially as it comes to fabricating parts from scratch(like balance staffs, which I had to roll up my sleeves and learn to do out of necessity).
There's a lot of free information on the internet, but unfortunately even in the last ~15 years I've watched the quality of information decline. There's some good content on Youtube, and there's some content that shows butchery to put it mildly and for someone just starting you're not going to know how to separate the good from the bad.
There are Facebook groups where watch repair is discussed, and I've been banned from at least one for being critical of some common current repair practices used by people who don't want to buy the proper tools. I will say one thing, and please remember this-don't even think about replacing balance staffs unless you have a lathe. 20 years ago, no one would have taken you seriously for suggesting it could be done without. In the current climate of Facebook echo chambers, telling people that certain high-level repairs also require having and using the appropriate tools is apparently "gatekeeping" and the like.
That rant over with, I'd HIGHLY recommend some older print references. Both Elgin and Bulova ran correspondence courses, and even though the correspondence portion is long gone(you can't send your work in to be graded) the textbooks and reference materials are still every bit as good as they use to be. Both are available online. For someone lighter reference, "Practical Watch Repairing" by Donald DeCarle and "The Watch Repairer's Manual" by Henry Fried are both standard references and are readily available.
Daniel's "Watchmaking" is more current than the others(~2014 IIRC) and is worth having on your shelf but it's both more of a theory book and you have to wade through Daniels telling you how he's the best who's ever lived and also his apparent offense that some(including me) consider one of his patents to be a copy of a 150 year old design...
References out of the way, you need tools. Your watch tools are used for watch repair and nothing else. Honestly, most of what you need can be bought used. I see people now spending money on Chinese staking sets and the like when good old American sets are both less expensive and the quality is there.
For a basic toolkit, I'd recommend the following:
1. Quality tweezers are the single most important investment you can make. Good tweezers are a joy to use, and bad ones are impossible. Don't compromise on this-Dumont is the name here and don't settle for anything else. These are also worth buying new, as sprung Dumont tweezers(which you may not be able to spot without some experience) are as frustrating to use as cheap ones. I have fairly long fingers, and find the #2 pattern ideal for most uses. Others will like the #3C, #4, or #5(these are all different shapes and sizes). The standard stainless steel alloy is a fine starting point. Eventually you will want several pairs of tweezers-I generally keep #5 on hand for fine work and curved-tip #7 for specific jobs, as well as a heavy set of #1s, but really a single good set will serve you fine for now. Keep the tips dressed and sharp-the texts above will walk you through this
2. Almost as important are screwdrivers. There are better drivers out there than the basic Bergeon set, but I'd suggest that as a starting point. I like the "Lazy Susan" holder for them. Whatever you get be sure it has replaceable tips, and learning to dress the tips is a necessary skill.
3. Hand pullers-there are a few styles of these-I like the "squeeze" type but you may end up using a few before you get to something you like
4. Movement holders-there are a bunch of these, but I like just basic plastic or wood rings. If you're handy, these can be made out of PVC pipe(I'm pretty sure that's what some of mine are, even though I didn't buy them that way).
5. Parts trays to keep track of everything
6. Assorted pithwood(basically super soft wood disks) and pegwood(hardwood sticks that are sharpened to a point). The pegwood in particular is one of those things that you'll be lost without.
Tools like staking sets can wait, but you will want them eventually.
That's my advice at least. I started repairing watches when I was 20 years old, and am 37 now, so that's closing in on half my life I've been doing it...
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