How Watches Work | Hacker News Reader

How Watches Work

fratellowatches.com

254 pointsnstricevic138 comments

I recently fell into this rabbit hole. I bought a cheap automatic watch - a Seiko 5, for both practical reasons and otherwise (will work after an EMP attack/solar event, but it's also just cool as hell mechanical engineering using 200 year old technology). Then I started putting watch repair youtube videos on in the background as I did chores or wrote code. Then I started actually watching the watch repair videos. Last week, I got a box of books, tools, and expendables. Today, when I get home, I'll have a box of broken pocket watches to tear into and probably irreparably mess up.

When I was a kid, my grandfather and I tore down some old watches as a rainy afternoon activity one day. I was fascinated. It wasn't until I listened to the podcast Shit Town (S-Town) that I thought about horology as a hobby again.

One interesting thing I learned, is that if you're looking for a career change, you can become a certified watch maker for free. Many of the schools are sponsored by the big name watch manufacturers, and tuition is free. It's a full time education, so you'll need enough financial runway to survive for a year or two, but you'll come out with no debt as a certified watch builder/repairperson.

That’s how it starts!

For me, my mechanical watch obsession started when I inherited my father’s mid-70s Rolex. Back then, they weren’t as insanely out of reach as they’ve become; they were a very robust watch that would Just Work for a long, long time, and which looked nice. (Remember, this was only about 15 years after Sean Connery wore a Submariner in Dr No; Rolex was even LESS upmarket in the 60s, which was a time when very few watches were waterproof AT ALL.)

Then the dot-com boom happened, and I had a little money, and I bought an Omega (which I’m actually wearing right now). It’s a late-90s Seamaster, like the one they put on Pierce Brosnan’s wrist for Goldeneye around the same time. (Incidentally, snooty jewelers do not think you are funny if you ask how to make the laser shoot out.)

There are others, too, but the Omega is the nicest one I own. They are all EMP-proof, spring-driven marvels. Most have dates, but none show days or months. I do enjoy that there ARE mechanical movements with perpetual calendars, though, even if they do cost as much as a cheap house.

About 5 years ago, I fell down the AppleWatch hole after buying one to use while running and biking, and finding it so useful that I wore it to the exclusion of all the other watches. I have a nicer Apple Watch now (titanium S6) that I wear MOST of the time, but several times a month I’ll pull one of the others out to wear. With this usage pattern, they’re all “oh, shiny!” to me, too, which is neat.

I too fell off my mechanical watch obsession when I added a smartwatch to my life. My current Fitbit keeps better time, is as waterproof as my dive watches, and give me so much more.

It makes me sad sometimes, as the mechanical marvel of watches is beautiful, but in the end, I had a Seiko SKX-007 that needed some maintenance, and I was quoted $600. It was a $200 watch and they were going to swab the movement. That watch has emotional value, but I can't keep it running at 3x the replacement cost.

Maybe someday I'll find a way to wear another mechanical, and get all the health tracking I appreciate otherwise. Or maybe, technology finally replaced history for me. The funny thing is, I almost never would have considered a quartz watch lol.

    I had a Seiko SKX-007 that needed some 
    maintenance, and I was quoted $600.

That price is awfully high. They were either trying to rip you off... or simply drive you away, which is possible if they were a shop that prefers to work on high-value watches for wealthy customers. Maybe they are an authorized Rolex service center and prefer to collect those hefty prices.

But, there's definitely not $500+ of labor involved at any reasonable market rate.

Those Seiko 7S26 movements are something like $50 new and even an amateur can perform the swap in a short amount of time without specialized tools (edit: well, maybe a hand puller, but that's cheap) and there are plenty of videos showing how.

There's no actual watchmaking knowledge required. That would only be required if trying to repair a module rather than simply swap it out.

The SKXxxx models are something of a classic but are hard to find now that they've been discontinued for a while; if you still have your broken model it may be worth more than you paid for it.

It was definitely a high end watchmaker. A large part of the issue is what they considered the service requirements, that they wouldn't budge on - things like polishing all the scratches out of the band, and whatnot, when all I really wanted was maintenance on the movement. I didn't want to swap the movement, and that wasn't an option either.

I once serviced a Rolex Datejust with diamond dial and gold bracelet for almost the same price. (Depending on exchange rate)

I’ve looked into this and the only recommended tools were a hand puller and hand press, otherwise it’s pretty straightforward to replace the movement with another stock one, or switch it out to 4R36/NH36 to add hacking and hand winding. I plan to swap the movement for one of the hacking/handwinding ones when the movement when my SKX009 dies.

I think about this problem often. I think it's caused by economies of scale and is an escapee of Pandora's Box that we're not going to be able to put back. Instead, we need to think carefully about what we build and how we build it - educate consumers, regulate to price in obsolescence and recycling costs, and place greater value on long-term quality as a society - to prevent this from growing even worse.

I build industrial automation equipment, so I'm in part to blame for the problem, however, I'm also in a position to advocate for easier repair processes and more sensible assembly stackups. It's simply a fact that the six figures in initial equipment capital divided by, hopefully, a similar number of unit sales, plus the few dozen seconds of operator hands-on time per unit, always going to produce an end product which costs less than hours of diagnosis and maintenance by a local, high-skill repairman. The math simply doesn't add permit any other arrangement, no matter how standardized your tooling is, how open your repair manual is, or how efficient your aftermarket parts ecosystem is.

Repairing and maintaining something for more money than it cost to produce it puts those activities firmly in the realm of luxury goods. The better we get at producing useful things cheaply, the more we have to multiply the value of human labor, and the less it makes sense to repair cheap things with this expensive labor.

One interesting option today is that you can get an electronic watch and get access to all the internals as well:

https://open-smartwatch.github.io/

However, its operation depends on electrons and bits instead of springs and escapements, and you can see those bits moving about in PlatformIO code instead of under a magnifier.

I got into it after my smartwatches, oddly enough. I didn't wear a watch between the mid-90s young kid with a Timex Expedition and the late 2010's adult with an Apple Watch. It was getting in the habit of the smartwatch that made me desire to wear something different again.

I got a Seiko 5 as well, non-sports model. SNK809. I absolutely adore the little thing, it blows my mind just how little energy it needs to operate. Even when fully unwound, the slightest nudge gets it ticking at exactly the right speed. What an incredible work of engineering for so cheap.

in the event an EMP knocks out all your electronics, is having a functioning watch something that really matters?

also, where are you that an EMP is a realistic concern?

I do a fair bit of camping. One solo trip, I opted to leave behind all the normal gadgets and discovered I had no chronological tooling with. Skies were overcast -- and I suspect I ate breakfast early, lunch by 8, and supper by noon. Was surprisingly disquieting to have a few days in a row without knowing where the sun was in the sky.

My go to practical watch is the casio terrorist watch. Only costs a few $, gets 10 years on one battery, can take a beating. And I don't care if I break it.

On normal days I just wear an Apple Watch and I can't ever bring myself to wear one of my fancy watches because I love the fitness tracking features.

If you are the only one with a working watch, is your time definitionally correct, off by a bit, or completely incorrect?

As long as we haven't lost the sun too, we can sort it all out again reasonably quickly.

Now you have introduced an additional variable (location) to the equation.

Especially as mechanical watches drift a few minutes each day.

A few seconds each day, unless you have a really bad or poorly maintained watch.

It must be exceptionally bad mechanical watches you are used to

The drift is affected by movement right? I imagine sitting on a table they are much more accurate than swinging around on an arm all day.

Perhaps, but they're engineered to minimize such effect. I noted in another comment I started with a Seiko 5, one of the cheapest, most inaccurate movements (being the name for the timekeeping mechanism itself), and I see multi-minute differences after weeks without adjustment. I'm not a daily runner or anything (in which I'd use my smartwatch anyways), but my job does involve a fair amount of getting up and walking between places, as well as the temperature shift of controlled environment rooms for computers and SoCal outdoor heat.

    in the event an EMP knocks out all your electronics, 
    is having a functioning watch something that really
    matters?

If you know what time it is, you can use your watch as a fairly accurate compass in an emergency.

https://www.citizenwatch-global.com/s/support/exterior/direc...

Even as the world ends, I will enjoy a few last perfectly soft boiled eggs over my camp stove, and contemplate the meaning of existence. And a major US metropolitan area, near several military bases, airports, and missile launch sites. So more than most of the population.

On a more serious note, as a bit of a "prepper" - it's not hard to cover the essentials. Once past that, working timepieces greatly simplify coordination and other group efforts. Additionally, I would expect decent trade value out of them, should the unlikely but tragic circumstances occur.

I live near the centre of a very large city (London) so I feel like the best I have to look forward to in that kind of scenario is to set up some environmental storytelling in the form of wall graffiti and then die in some comical way like having a black cab fall on me

I too live in inner London. I figure the only way you have a chance of surviving if stuff really went to hell is to bicycle as far away as possible - probably towards Wales.

You can make a solar clock in your fictional scenario.

not precise enough to soft boil eggs, and not as easily as remembering to wear my automatic for an hour a day, or wind my manuals once per day.

I'm failing to understand why this is so contentious outside of "anti-prepper" attitudes.

I’m just saying that if you’re choosing a lower-tech time piece so that you’re ready for an apocalypse you might as well know all your post-apocalyptic options like a sand timer for your boiled eggs.

I was in the hole about 3 years ago, I bought a book, some tools, and a couple of broken movements off of eBay with the thought that I’d just “ dive in and learn how they work “, but I stalled out. Without a set direction I found the space of things that could be wrong with my sample broken movement to be too large. Hell, I didn’t even know if all the components were there.

It’s something I’d like to get into, hopefully with some hand holding. I’m curious what resources you’re using, and if there’s some kind of loose curriculum to ease the beginning efforts.

A bunch of youtube, a strong mechanical sense, and the book "watch Repair for Beginners", which was not noted in this comment https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28116525

So I'm likely down the same path as you, eventual "failure", if looking at it as a career choice. But I'm also ~a year behind you, starting a similar path with no handholidng and likely no profit. I watch this guy on youtube, occasionally, and his paid series has been mentioned here and elsewhere, as being worthwhile, but I have not paid for those videos (yet). https://www.watchfix.com/ (formerly known as http://watchrepairlessons.com/ )

“ One interesting thing I learned, is that if you're looking for a career change, you can become a certified watch maker for free. Many of the schools are sponsored by the big name watch manufacturers, and tuition is free. It's a full time education, so you'll need enough financial runway to survive for a year or two, but you'll come out with no debt as a certified watch builder/repairperson.”

Side note: you do have to relocate yourself/your family to the school’s location.

To be fair automatic watches drift substantially over time.

Yes, they do, and that is a very poetic thing to consider.

On one hand, you can marvel at how little they drift during a single power reserve. Could be seconds, which is barely noticeable in everyday life.

On the other hand, some others (Seiko 5...) can drift minutes in a single reserve... And so what? In a day and age when we measure everything with maniac precision even during a random person's day, it's beautiful to lose some control and gain back some leeway with regards to time.

I love that it is "about 22:00" rather than 22:03:37.

https://www.moma.org/collection/works/81074

'Initially set to the same time, these identical battery-powered clocks will eventually fall out of sync, or may stop entirely. Conceived shortly after Gonzalez-Torres’s partner was diagnosed with AIDS, this work uses everyday objects to track and measure the inevitable flow of time. When one of the clocks stops or breaks, they can both be reset, thereby resuming perfect synchrony. In 1991, Gonzalez-Torres reflected, "Time is something that scares me. . . or used to. This piece I made with the two clocks was the scariest thing I have ever done. I wanted to face it. I wanted those two clocks right in front of me, ticking."'

Ah, yes. Gonzalez-Torres. I first saw his work at the Centre Pompidou in Paris. It was a string of dollar-store Christmas lights stapled to the wall. I think there were 24 lights, to represent the age at which is partner died.

I'm usually the guy willing to defend contemporary art, but there's not much I can do here. The work lacks any craft and the insights are shallow, better expressed by the label than the piece.

Clearly the curators of these very famous museums disagree with me. But when people mock "modern art" (which this technically isn't), this is what they're thinking about.

Sure, you could trace this meaninglessness back to the obvious Duchamp Urinal example, but I could read it as being forever haunted by a specific number to the point where even the banality of dollar-store Christmas lights takes on a new and painful meaning.

If I glimpse another consciousness and walk away a different and more empathic person, then who am I to mock it?

>I love that it is "about 22:00" rather than 22:03:37.

Agreed. I view myself as a pretty casual person, someone who's not overly concerned with the minutae of modern life. But with a digital watch, it's "12:47" and not "a quarter to one", which to me sounds infinitely cooler. With a slightly inaccurate mechanical movement, I fall into the latter manner of speaking, which is more what I want to be. Weird psychological preferences, but something that counts, to me.

I don't really find it beautiful being 15 minutes late because I haven't adjusted my watch in a while. This is really a big thing that put me off.

The watch I have is rated to +-2 seconds a day. It'd take 15 months of not adjusting my watch to be 15min late.

That's pretty amazing to me that basically a spring and some gears can be that good at keeping time.

Yeah, I don't deny there is a certain natural fascination to them.

In this modern age, you'll often come across synchronized digital clocks. Whether on your computer, phone, workplace, bank, etc. For me, it has become second nature to adjust my watch's time once every few days. I end up comparing my watch vs a clock a couple of times per day, and deciding the difference is great enough to fix, once a week or so (on a cheap, inaccurate Seiko 5, I would expect less frequency with a better timepiece)

I suppose it depends what you want out of your watch, but to me having a time I can't trust is frustrating. Even the best automatic watch is less accurate than quartz (which itself can eventually drift too...).

To be fair that's like half my love of them. Like a fresh blank canvas, perfection is boring.

What's the point of an imprecise measure of time as a backup in case of EMP attack?

Precision is relative. It's more precise than me looking at the sun, for instance.

How many office meetings do you have after an EMP attack?

Not many but I’m not the one who proposed an automatic watch for this situation.

I love mechanical watches too, but surely some cheap digital watches stashed in a shielded box would be the more effective post-EMP timekeeping device, right?

Shielding itself is not perfect. Probably enough for the simple circuitry of an analog quartz. But it's not guaranteed. It's a buffer that reduces a wave by a few to a few dozen dB. A EM pulse through even a properly grounded faraday cage will still replicate another smaller wave internally.

Just let me collect my tiny mechanical toys, dammit, don't ask questions.

Oh, I didn't mean to rain on your parade. I love my diver's watches. In a similar vein I love having 200M of water resistance even though I'll never take them any deeper than the bottom of a small swimming pool, lol.

It's OK collecting them but "protection against an EMP" does sound a bit weird as a reason :)

Really interesting to hear that last bit about the certification. As a high school I joked around with the idea of being a watch maker despite not caring about watches at all but just being interested in the mechanics, but a few mechanical engineering degrees and a burgeoning photography hobby later I'd realistically consider learning camera repair.

I fell sort of sideways, after tearing apart a bunch of old pocket watches and working my way in various directions, I've ended up in love with 18th and early 19th century tall case clocks. I've got about eight of them now, and spend much of my weekends at a little local clock museum sucking all the knowledge I can out of the curator there.

I seriously considered this as an exit strategy at one point too. Also S-Town was fantastic, highly recommended.

Is there any mechanical watch like the Seiko 5, but thinner and hopefully not much more expensive? I have a 5 and like it, it does feel a bit chunky at times.

Seiko 5 is probably the cheapest, worthwhile mechanical watch. You can always get cheap Chinese and Russian watches as well but they will be of lesser quality and reliability than the Seiko. So to answer your question directly - probably not. But I would recommend checking out Orient watches. They have a decent set of mechanical watches of all different styles, not much more expensive than the classic Seiko 5, but definitely a step up in quality. https://www.orientwatchusa.com/

Thickness is always going to be an issue with automatic watches. You can get thinner watches if they are manual wind since they don't have a rotor. Usually, the thinner they get, the more expensive they get though, so keep that in mind. You can get super thin manual wind watches but they will cost hundreds to thousands of dollars usually.

This is funny because Seiko has notoriously terrible quality control, from misaligned bezels and/or chapter rings to dodgy bracelets across their entire lineup, even the more expensive ones.

About Orient: they are pretty much poised to take the spot that Seiko has occupied for entry level mechanical watches, as Seiko themselves move further up market. I love the design of their Bambino and some of the OrientStar offerings but they have a few quirks I'm not fond of.

I definitely recommend also trying a hand-wound watch because the slimness is wonderful and the winding has a charm to itself as well. I have RSI issues so the lightness and slimness is certainly a big plus, combined with the fact that most vintage or vintage-inspired manual wind watches have small dials and cases too.

It seems to me that the the QC issues are largely cosmetic, but are mostly with the Prospex models (some of their priciest models!) and seem to have intensified in the last few years.

I've heard from watch geeks with friends in "the business" that Seiko is aware of the issue thanks to the negative online word-of-mouth these issues have generated, but I don't know how reliable that hearsay is. (Really, though, Seiko would have to be blind not to be aware of the issues...)

We'll see if Seiko is actually aware and if that actually results in an improvement. If so I suspect that it will take some time for results to be seen given the lag time between manufacture date and watches winding up in consumers' hands.

> mostly cosmetic

Agreed, but then again much of the point of wearing watches nowadays is cosmetic. Plus, their terrible hollow rolled-link bracelets and press-clasps aren't really cosmetic issues, just poor quality that they haven't bothered upgrading. The movements themselves though seem to still be solid, and they are a huge provider of movements (eg the NH35/36) to several microbrands.

> Seiko is aware of the issue

Yeah, it's weird. They not only seem to be aware of it, but also say they have "hand-checked" units sent out to reviewers or units that are purchased from boutiques if you ask specifically- only for them to have the same issues as always. Not sure what it will take. The Just One More Watch YouTube channel does a ton of Seiko reviews but he's been extremely jaded because of these issues.

At this point is probably anything they produce except Grand Seiko. Not sure why would they choose to ruin their reputation that way. Yes, SKX007 or 009 were cheap, but their Prospex line replacements aren't really.

I'm baffled by their choices as well. I'm no manufacturing expert but the misaligned chapter rings seem so comically easy for Seiko to avoid - why not design the case and chapter ring with a notch or something so it can't be misaligned? If that's not feasible, how is this stuff passing even a cursory QC inspection?

It's not like they're a public company being squeezed for profit at the cost of quality by a private equity firm or something. I have some faith they will right their ship but who knows.

QC does cost a lot because it's not also about checking but rebuilding your manufacturing to avoid it. So they probably prefer to close their eyes on it.

My understanding is that NH35-powered watches are generally 13mm minimum (the divers at least) because the Seiko movements are generally on the thicker side as far as three-handers go. I'd look for something PT5000-powered on AliExpress like the offerings from Escapement Time [1].

[1] https://www.aliexpress.com/item/4001053227921.html

I’m very fond of this watch, I picked mine up during a Macy’s sale for $300: https://www.hamiltonwatch.com/en-us/h69439931-khaki-field-me...

There are few different dial and strap combos, I just ordered a steel bracelet for mine.

It’s a bit thinner than the Seiko 5 SNK803 or SKX007, is a reasonable size (38mm) and the hand wound movement reduces the thickness since there’s no rotor. There isn’t a day/date complication either, just a three hand watch.

This is definitely not cheaper but just wanted to share this link on the Piaget Altiplano Watch so people can see how thin it can be:

https://www.hodinkee.com/articles/piaget-altiplano-ultimate-...

The degree mechanical watches push the boundary of miniaturization (outside of lithography) is amazing.

The Seiko 5 movement is reasonably thin but often packaged into a large case. You might not have the thinnest Seiko 5.

Vintage soviet watches tend to be pretty thin, from what I've gathered. They also tend to be less well made/reliable than modern equivalents, and many of the ones you see on ebay are maxed out on their typical adjustments to stay reasonably in time.

You can usually find used Hamiltons for less than $500. They're a solid watch with an ETA movement and a sapphire crystal.

Also, some of the microbrands are pretty interesting at the $500-$1500 range. I like many of the designs Farer is doing.

Christopher Ward is another good value mechanical.

Be warned I was looking at a sub from them, and got sucked down the rabbit hole and now have a Tudor BB58 Pepsi GMT.

Tudors the feeder brand for Rolex BTW.

My SNK807 feels thin at 11mm, but there are Seiko 5's that go up to 14mm. The flatness of the field watch design probably makes it feel thinner too.

Perhaps some vintage manual wound watch? For example Seiko 6300-8009. There are models from other brands, too. Just look for a steel case.

I made a WebGL mechanical clock simulation if anyone wants to look at it in motion: https://clock.leshenko.net/

This is very cool. Thanks for making it.

Superb, thanks for sharing!

Super cool - thanks!

Another type of movement which is fun is the tuning fork movement: https://www.watchonista.com/articles/bulova-accutron-tuning-...

For those of you of a patriotic persuasion, its a US invention, something they did better than the swiss.

I like them (even though I'm not american) because they are good looking movements, and have some hilariously tight engineering tolerances

They also used to power planes and satellites before cheap low power robust quartz and eventually atomic clocks.

I had a Bulova Accutron with tuning fork movement, which I lost. Some months later while napping I hear a quiet hum, and find the watch rolled up in a carpet .. it was a watch with inbuilt locator function!

Gerald Sussman[0] (of SICP fame) gave an interesting talk[1] on mechanical watches awhile back.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerald_Jay_Sussman [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TWQN8Yf1g70

Whoa he has hair. This must be early career.

I got pretty into watches during the pandemic. It's definitely one of those expensive hobbies.

Can be, for sure.

One thing I’ve enjoyed is a focus on just a couple of brands of old watches. I have about 10 Enicar watches; they made everything from simple hand-wind no-date watches (my favorite) to complex chronographs. They have a whimsical logo (a shark jumping at Jupiter) that matches the whimsy of their founder - his name was Racine, but he had an uncle in the watch business with that name, so he spelt it backwards.

Not necessarily! You can get plenty of nerd mileage out of Orient, Seiko and Vostok automatic/mechanical watches for a reasonable amount of money.

Exactly this. There are tons of essentially new old stock mechanical watches from all over the world (Vostok and other similar brands) that can be had in the $100 range, and the $300-500 range has lots of solid watches (maybe also Hamilton?).

I'd take an equally functional and/or reliable Japanese movement over an ETA that is used in the "luxury" categories where you're just paying for the label on the watch.

But quartz watches (~90% of my collection) are way more practical. They last longer (most mechanical watches need servicing every 5 years at $150+ per pop), keep better time, can be picked up and put on without setting if not worn every day and are only like $3 to swap out a battery. The key is finding a neat "gimmick" with quartz watches from quality brands. Things like Tritium luminescence are good if you like field watches. Or Citizen/Casio atomic watches that are super accurate through the use of the WWVB signal. Or "other uses" -- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casio_F-91W#Usage_in_terrorism

My first mechanical watch was a Seiko SKX007. I wore it almost everyday for ~10 years and it was a complete delight. There is something so wonderful about having something on your wrist that feels like magical engineering.

+1 for orient.

I have a sexy 70s quartz omega, but my daily watch is an orient ray raven II. I've regulated it myself, so its now about +- 35 seconds a month (which is better than most rolexes.....)

even cheaper are pocket watches, and they are much larger and easier to play with.

I'm a big fan of Hamilton watches. I like the simple design and the one I have is amazingly accurate, like within seconds of NTP over weeks when the weather and temperature are ideal. They definitely don't break the bank.

It depends what your style/preferences are.

I've got two boxes of watches, one contains old soviet pieces from the 60s onwards. Each of those watches probably cost no more than €100, and usually they're far cheaper than that. (I buy them used.)

If you want to look at that kind of thing I wrote a comment here showing the process I use, roughly, to find them:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27167654

Sure my second watch box has a few more expensive pieces in it, but you don't need to spend money if you like the form, history, and utility of the other pieces.

I started to get in to watches but then I got an Apple watch for fitness tracking and I just never wear any of my other watches because I love having the features of the AW more. Feels kind of like I wasted my money on the other watches.

At the very least, you other watches will hold a value more than your smartwatch, long term

Glad I'm not the only one. It was one of my ways of coping with the pandemic. For me it gave me an incentive to take care of myself and get dressed every day even though I wasn't leaving the house. You?

I would like to suggest "the history and mechanics of the self-winding mechanism" from the subtitle as a more informative title for this article.

Watches work in a lot of ways, after all; some are solar-powered quartz with a radio listening to the atomic broadcast!

Also, it appears "How Watches Work" is the name of the series, which would be awkward if another post from the series ended up on Hacker News.

Also I can recommend taking a look at Seiko's spring drive technology. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HoEorK6elZM

Spring drive's are cool. I'll try my best fast explanation: it has an ordinary rotor and spring barrel, but replaces the escapement with a flywheel, an electromagnetic break (like you have on an ebike) and a quartz controller. The rotor winds the spring barrel, the spring barrel powers the flywheel, and the break generates electricity for the controller, which keeps track of the time and then in turn tells the break how fast to allow the flywheel to spin.

The fact that they sidestep the need for a battery (the spring barrel pretty much is the battery) is the clever part here. It's more efficient than using a rotor to charge a battery and run a stepper motor, and more accurate than a purely mechanical escapement. But it's still fundamentally a quartz watch, which turns some purists off.

Slight tangent but I thought this guide to Rolex labels and features was pretty interesting - even for a non-watch-head: https://www.gearpatrol.com/watches/a539980/the-complete-role...

May I also recommend this excellent video[1] from Hamilton made in 1949 that thoroughly explains how mechanical watches work.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rL0_vOw6eCc

Mechanical watch is a mesmerizing device. Makes you wonder though, why there was so little progress around mechanical technology (not only watch specific) lately? My car can talk to me, steer, retain speed by following other vehicles, but the most amazing mechanical innovation it has is a frustratingly slow, whining seat memory function. It’s not only boring, it also relies on a century old tech. Watch are the same, auto wound mechanism was introduced 98 years ago, was slightly improved 60 years ago, still is expensive to produce and maintain, still has reliability issues.

    but the most amazing mechanical innovation it has
    is a frustratingly slow, whining seat memory function

What do we mean by "lately?" The humble old internal combustion engine has made some really impressive progress in the past several decades.

Engines are roughly 2X better now in the categories that matter: power output, fuel efficiency, and expected lifetime. Some of the fuel efficiency gains have of course been canceled out by increased overall vehicle weight, so it's easy to overlook how much more efficient the engines themselves are.

In 1986, a Ford Mustang GT had a 5.0L V8 that produced 200HP.

In 2021, a Ford Mustang GT has a 5.0L V8 that produces 460HP.

A 2021 base model Ford Mustang has an engine that produces 310HP from only 2.3L of displacement.

(Not that Ford is special in this regard; I just picked the Mustang because they've produced a 5.0L V8 for most of the brand's lifetime and it's fun to compare a 1986 5.0L engine versus a 2021 5.0L engine...)

A 1.6 V6 Formula 1 engine with turbo and hybrid components produces around 1000HP.

That's all you need to know about the progress in engines.

Excellent point! Combustion engine did see a fair bit of progress.

Seiko's "spring drive" is a pretty cool innovation, though it's not purely mechanical.

I think at the very core of the issue is that mechanical watches are really art pieces at this point. Quartz watches are just cheaper and more reliable. So, if you wanting a watch for the pure utility of it all that's what you should be going for.

>Quartz watches are just cheaper and more reliable.

And more accurate. Better in every measurable way, honestly. Which just makes me love mechanicals even more.

For the most part I agree with you. I think the popular watch companies (Omega, Rolex, etc.) are resting on their laurels, but perhaps in part because that's what their consumers want. I credit Zenith and Seiko with making their more recent advances accessible to wider audiences. However, most innovation in mechanical watches, unfortunately, is currently too expensive or niche for wide diffusion. Check out companies like MB&F, Urwerk, HYT, and Ressence to see what's being done.

They aren't resting, they are proactively building on that legacy they had. In fact, Omega suffered a lot because they tried going too deep with their quartz models.

Because a mechanical watch is inferior old technology and exists for non practical reasons. A quartz watch is better in essentially every single way. It is the technical progression beyond a mechanical watch.

I'm not saying the mechanical watch is bad because obviously people like them for historical and emotional reasons but there is basically no reason practically to use them.

I love this. As a watch enthusiast myself, it's always great to see the history of watches and how their internals came to be.

For anybody interested, there's also an awesome video from Hamilton made in the late 40s that shows a lot of the information in this article!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rL0_vOw6eCc

Since I bought my first Apple Watch it's really hard for me to find a reason to buy mechanical watches. They are less useful, less accurate, and this gap is only going to continue. Yes, they are beautiful. But even their straps and bracelets are superior and more comfortable than any leather or steel I experienced.

Imagine if in 10 years Apple Watch would measure your blood glucose and pressure. And what that could do to your health.

And mechanical watches aren't eternal by any means. Servicing a premium watch (recommended every 5 years, 10 years for Rolex) costs about the same as an aluminum Apple Watch.

I just think of my mechanical watches as an intricate form of jewelry rather than as something purely functional.

One of my favorite videos: a Japanese watch repairman repairs a watch https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EbpgNSvWHOo

Mechanical watches are fascinating, but to be honest, they don't serve any practical purpose. Time is a solved problem. They can be cool and often are also status symbols. It feels a bit giving up on participating in the betterment of society if one concentrates on those.

Can current physics simulation software or library fast enough to simulate such watch in real time ?

A great read, but animations would have been soooo much better than the static diagrams.

To those that are interested in Watchmaking.

1. All books by Henry Fried. (A. many books overlap info., but if reasonably priced are work buying.)

2. All books by DeCarle. (see A above.)

3. George Daniel's book.

4. All past issues of AWCI magazine.

5. Oh yea, get Questions, and Answers for AWCI test questions.

(Don't pay a lot for these books, pamphlets. They can be found, but you need to hunt.)

6. Decide if you want to use a loupe, or stereoscope.

7. Yes--it does take a few years to get good.

8. You will not get rich repairing watches, but you can do it forever.

(If you are in the need if a watchmaker in the bay area, in a few months I will have a small shop. The business will be under the name of Jacob Decosta. I'm honest. There will be some very complicated watches I won't work on though. My prices will be vastly lower than factory prices.)

Kind of a niche for HN, but there's a few watchmaking programs catering to US military veterans that began after WWII, dried up a bit but seem to be making a bit of a resurgence.

https://www.veteranswatchmakerinitiative.org

I really enjoyed the courses at: https://learnwatchmaking.com/

Do you have a Google Form or something where people can sign up for an email notification when you open your shop?

Not yet, but I'm on FB. I have a neglected page that tries to teach Watch Repairing--It's called "Watch Repairing". My page has a b/w picture of my bench.

You can message me here--I believe:

https://m.facebook.com/profile.php?id=732457960219638&ref=co...

If anyone is interested in this I highly recommend Longitude by Dava Sobel. It's about the creation of modern timekeepers by a carpenter with no training at all in watchmaking. Brilliant guy who created something which truly changed the world.

For those who are interested in superior technology, start reading about quartz movements and the piezoelectric effect. Citizen Watch Company recently release the most accurate quartz watch ever, accurate to 1 second per year. Contrast that to the mechanical watches that Rolex—one of the best mechanical manufacturers—produces and the best they can do is an accuracy of about 1 second per day. Hundreds of times less accurate. Yikes! And then you can get into radio-controlled and GPS-controlled solar watches that you literally never have to set or change the battery. So neat!

Mechanical watches are an emotional rather than rational technology, and hey if that's what you're into: mechanical watches and horse-drawn-buggies and gas lanterns then that's totally cool.

> Hundreds of times less accurate. Yikes!

Everyone knows this; you're making it seem like it's some kind of conspiracy.

Mechanical watches are awesome. I bought my first "semi-luxury" one (a Longines Diver for like $3,000) two years ago and I love everything about it: the style, the complication, the fact that I need to wind it if I want to wear it. Everything is so interesting and neat. Everything has so much history: watchmakers were the pinnacle of human engineering for centuries!

It's something special I'd love to leave to my hopefully future kids. I like my Casio F-91W for different reasons[1], but it's certainly not as special.

[1] https://dvt.name/2019/06/03/hacking-the-casio-f-91w-to-handl...

Longines makes a high-accuracy (± 5 seconds-per-year) quartz watch called the Conquest V.H.P. that is respectable. Both your mechanical and their quartz movements are produced by ETA (Swatch Group).

I respect Quartz watches. In fact, I've thought about getting a Citizen eco-drive. I've had a timex for years.

But I got into mechanical watches earlier this year - a Hamilton Pilot and a Field. There is a beauty in the combination of accuracy, complexity and the lack of reliance on electricity that I find fascinating, just as someone can appreciate a sailboat or a record player for their amazing engineering.

I haven't figured out how to express it clearly, but things like mechanical watches, pour-over/press coffee, record players, coal grills. They all involve a lack of electricity and lack of network connectivity. The heat is right there from the coal. The coffee was ground and made by /me/. The power comes from the sails. The watch moves from my winding it - it depends on me. The sound is imprinted on the record - The source of the sound, right there on a platter, vibrating a needle, not from a coded bitstream I can only access with an internet subscription, a computer and a music subscription.

Anyway. There is a better essay somewhere in here. My point is, I get the superiority of Quartz over mechanical re: accuracy and maybe even ruggedness, but there is a lost romance.

Got a Citizen Eco/RadioSync. Never been happier. Had to use an RPi to fake the YYJ/WWVB signal (I live outside the reception area for any radio timesync signal)

Sunshine for watch power is gods gift. I have a minor-brand Seiko mechanical with a self-winding mechanism, love it to death but it loses time like a grandfather clock from the victorian era.

You left out fountain pens, which is something that often goes hand in hand with these other things.

If this had not yet occurred to you, well, let me be the first to welcome you to that particular club. ;) A Lamy Safari is a great place to start.

Analog vs digital! I feel similar to you. There's a certain feeling with analog/mechanical instruments that is hard to replicate.

That being said, I think there is something fascinating about eco-drive movements, or just plain quartz movements in general. In the eco-drive case, you're harnessing the raw energy of the sun! Right there on your wrist! And they're using piezoelectricity to accurately keep time!

It's so simple nowadays that we all take it for granted, but centuries of scientific improvements have gone into making that relatively inexpensive and accurate wristwatch accessible to everybody.

> Mechanical watches are an emotional rather than rational technology, and hey if that's what you're into: mechanical watches and horse-drawn-buggies and gas lanterns then that's totally cool.

You could say the same thing about people who are into classic muscle cars. "Hey, if like driving around in a model T and braking down every 5 miles then that's totally cool." Everything is emotional. Does anyone really need a GPS synced watch that is accurate to the nanosecond? No, people want it because they think it's cool. Some people want mechanical watches because they think they are cool.

You must be so fun at parties.

>Does anyone really need a GPS synced watch

Need? Maybe not. Want? Yes. I find it very useful when my watch can switch times as I cross timezone borders or when daylight savings time switches.

> You must be fun at parties.

My favorite thing to do at parties is to poke fun of hobbies in Hacker News comments.

> Everything is emotional.

No it really isn't. HN is not the correct forum for this sweeping psychobabble.

> Does anyone really need a GPS synced watch that is accurate to the nanosecond? No, people want it because they think it's cool.

No, we buy these accurate watches because a) there are only a few such watch makers, and b) they all use an even smaller pool of GPS chips. And its these chips that have the precision that bugs you so.

> You must be so fun at parties.

Not your finest comment

> And its these chips that have the precision that bugs you so.

I never said it bugs me. I own a Citizen solar powered watch. I also own a mechanical watch and a smart watch. I would probably by a GPS synced watch.

I stand by my comment that everything is emotional.

I stand by it too, as someone who drives a manual car that's older than I am and uses a film camera that's older than either of my parents. There's no point if it's not emotional.

> everything is emotional

I guess I “emotionally” choose the most precise tool for the task of telling time.

Mechanical watches are a fashion accessory that also happen to show time.

This does not prevent them from being feats of engineering, because of the technology limitations, and the need to show off (ever saw a tourbillion watch?). I would compare them to Fabergé's eggs of our time.

My daily driver is an Apple Watch. It does a dozen small things which add up to a great deal of utility. Sure I have to charge it every day, but it's worth it. Needless to say the time is always accurate, and I can display it however I want just by flicking a finger across the surface.

When I dress up, I put on one of my mechanicals (I have three and will probably add more before I'm done). There's just something cool about an intricate gear-driven machine on my wrist, and they look good: a dress watch is jewelry which happens to tell time.

Quartz watches kind of fall into the middle for me. It runs on electricity, but it won't tap my wrist with two different patterns which tell me if I'm turning left or right when I'm driving, and I can't tell it to remind me in an hour to take the laundry out of the dryer. It won't track my heart rate and I can't play 2048 on it.

So, boring. But that's just my taste, I'm glad you enjoy quartz watches even though they're obviously inferior as technology to a good smart watch.

Are you me? Because this is me:

- Apple daily driver; fancy mechanicals for dressing up

- Utter boredom at the prospect of quartz watches

> And then you can get into radio-controlled and GPS-controlled solar watches that you literally never have to set or change the battery

I got into watches last summer. I was watching a watch-repairman on Twitch ( twitch.tv/mr_horologist ; looks like he has been just working on cars and stuff lately. Darn...) which is relaxing and educational. I dug up my great-grandfather's pocketwatch and got it repaired.

After looking around, I did get a Casio watch exactly like you described (actually, no, it's not GPS, it's so-called "atomic" over-the-air signal from NIST, or other sources in other continents), because in the end I wanted it to do two things: always keep perfect time, yet never require software updates. Not needing a battery is a great additional feature.

One of these, the one with the analog hands instead of (ugly to me) purely digital, although those are cheaper: https://www.casio.com/products/watches/wave-ceptor

To me, that's the perfect type of technology. Sorry you're getting downvoted for bringing up a related, by not exactly the same, topic/opinion.

A mechanical watch is a piece of jewelry that happens to tell time. It’s more like a film camera or record player, things people still actually use.

That Caliber 0100 really is amazing. Looks great too. I like HAQ, but there's something about Seiko designs that just doesn't do it for me.

All that said, I still think you get more for your $7,500 from a luxury mechanical watch. The accuracy of a watch matters so little to me at this point, that's it's almost gone negative; I kind of enjoy setting the time every once in a while. :D

> there's something about Seiko designs that just doesn't do it for me

Totally agree. When it comes to solar-radio the best looking I've found is this, which I bought:

https://www.seikowatches.com/jp-ja/products/seikoselection/s...

Junghans released a solar-radio version of their Max Bill:

https://www.junghans.de/en/collection/watches/junghans-max-b...

... but apparently the hands aren't self-correcting like the Seikos and Citizens and that would bug me way too much because they wouldn't line up perfectly with the markers.

> I still think you get more for your $7,500 from a luxury mechanical watch

I used to agree and then my mind changes; can't say exactly why but I sold my 2 Rolexes and haven't wanted a mech. since.

Anyhow, all my teasing of mech. fans aside, it's all frivolous fun!

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