Good evening all
today had to be a Seiko
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today had to be a Seiko
## WRUW on Friday 17 March 2023? ## TGIF Edition !
Good Morning Watch Fans everywhere !
We've made it through our working week, well, almost
I'm thankful to the Man above for guiding me safely through another week of hell on earth.
Let's kick off Friday's Shenanigans, shall we?
I'll start off with my 1960 T-Bird.
WRUW?
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We've made it through our working week, well, almost
I'm thankful to the Man above for guiding me safely through another week of hell on earth.
Let's kick off Friday's Shenanigans, shall we?
I'll start off with my 1960 T-Bird.
WRUW?
1 - 13 of 380 Posts
What a collection Sir ,1955, one of the last of the bubble backs - I wanted an early movement and bubble back case to go in my 'technology corner', where I have various examples of the journey to the modern wristwatch starting with a Demier Fr. wristwatch with soldered lugs (Demier Freres registered the design for a watch worn on the wrist secured by a captive one-piece strap threaded each way through wire lugs in 1904 IIRC correctly). The registered idea was basicaly to take a hunter movement and dial (crown at three), put it in a savonette case (which usually had the crown at 12) and solder on a pair of lugs - the watch strap was open both ends with a circular pad under the case back, and a ladder buckle retro-fitted to one end after fitting to the watch - I nearly bought an old watch just for the strap!
Here's my Demier Fr. from 1918.
View attachment 17323281
You can see it had hinges - Rolex were early wrestlers with the problem of water ingress, and here is an improvement they had already manufactured by 1914 - the knurling on the bezel has almost worn off, but you can still see the traces at 9.00:
View attachment 17323295
Once Wilsdorf spotted a workable patent for a waterproof crown, the Oyster case was born - screw front and back and crown - this is late 20's early 30's, still with wire lugs:
View attachment 17323311
It needed a tricky de-coupling of the winding stem so you didn't overwind the watch when screwing it in - it doesn't wobble like the Vostok crown because it has a spring to push the crown out (you have to exert the outward pressure yourself to wind a Vostok - everyone thinks they have bought a broken watch ha ha ha ha ha). Anyway, Harwood had the same problem preventing his automatic watch from overwinding once full, his first 'clutch' effort was his own, but later movements used a slip bridle that released the spring from its pinion at a certain torque - later put in manual watches as 'an unbreakable mainspring'. Anyway, here is my Harwood, still working, say 1929, first series production automatic wristwatch:
View attachment 17323323
Th marque on the dial was owned by Victor Gisiger (Selza SA) who Harwood stayed with in Switzerland - must be one of the eariest watches to say 'Automatic' on the dial (the Harwood branded versions etc. said 'self winding'). It has no crown and was supposed to be waterproof - he was trying to create a waterproof watch, ended up 'inventing' the automativ wristwatch, because he wanted to get rid of the hle in thecase caused by the winding setting stem. You set the hands by turning the bezel. No hand winding.
Nearly forgot my Services watch about 1925 - nothing special about the movement etc. but the case is very much purpose designed to be a wristwatch, with the integrated strap bars:
View attachment 17323349
Meanwhile, here is another Harwood designed automatic, the Autorist - the movement of the lower strap bar as you wear the watch winds the main sring by a hing, pawl, ratchet type thingummy.
View attachment 17323357
Here is a very early example of a watch with a date wheel - the wheel was not concentric with the dial, its pinion is somewhere top right, but well before the Datejust.
View attachment 17323369
About 1937, the clamshell case was supposed to be a rival to the Oyster, it wasn't, although it survived longer as a solution for rectangular watches:
View attachment 17323376
But most famously used in the 'Wandfluh' chronograph.
View attachment 17323379
About 1940, Taubert's (who bought Borgel) waterproof case with special cork stem seal:
View attachment 17323388
1941 - first watch with a time recording bezel, although in this instance the idea was to set zero to the seconds hand in conjunction with the radio time signal (because no hacking seconds)
View attachment 17323390
and so I obviously needed a Rolex Perpetul - purportedly the first automatic watch to use a 360 degree rotor (as opposed to a bumper or hammer auto that rotated this way and that between stops). If you don't count this:
View attachment 17323395
If you are interested, you can read more here:
Hope you like my techno watches!
My Harwood automatic watch
I'd been researching John Harwood as he was also born in Bolton and is the inventor of the automatic wristwatch. Unfortunately he has never received the widespread recognition he deserved. Amongst his other inventions are an early impact screwdriver, an automatic pistol and a card table with a...www.thewatchforum.co.uk
View attachment 17323397
OUTSTANDING watches,
G
I know that ( gutted ) feeling Keith,
I did the same , dropped MRS G gold Rolex all the way down the stairs 2 years ago, stopped working, took it to Rolex for service and repair, £1200.
guess what, She did it as well last week, dropped from tall bookcase and one of the INDICES has dropped off, but still working, going for another trip to Rolex next week.
at 9pm on picture
Ha ha , some of my friends will be like that today😂😂To all our Irish contributors who may be celebrating today:
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G
1 - 13 of 380 Posts
