Reply With QuoteMinutes per day is too much to regulate.
Never had to do it before. Long story short I bought a watch from eBay, a Steinhart GMT, was pleased with the deal, retails at £600 but got it for £400 in excellent condition. But, after a week I’ve observed (and tested) it to be running 4 minutes slow per day.
How easy is that to resolve? I know it’ll have to be regulated and then pressure tested too as is a diver. If it’s not much I don’t mind doing it, but if it’s gonna be £100 or more I may as well return it to the seller and buy a new one!
Have googled it but varying info, any advice appreciated, cheers.
Minutes per day is too much to regulate.
Is it? So what do you about a watch running four mins slow then? Because to me that isn’t usable.Originally Posted by Normunds
Return it.
Def return it. Sub 1 minute is regulatable. The range of adjustment is typically about 1 minute on ETAs but much higher on cheaper Seikos for example.
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Cheers gents this is useful info, I’ve contacted the seller about it. Only had it a week so am covered by eBay, shame though as it’s a lovely watch and I was chuffed with the deal I’d got! Nevermind.
Return or service at seller's cost (might not be anything too serious).
As others have said, you can't (usually) regulate away 4 minutes.
M
Breitling Cosmonaute 809 - What's not to like?
If the watch is losing or gaining 4 mins/ day there’s a problem. However, it’s possible that someone’s tried to regulate it and that’s the cause, the watch may be running OK but needs regulating to correct someone else’s meddling. It needs to go on a timegrapher to see what’s going on, if the watch is running badly (poor amplitude) it’ll need work to fix.
Worth putting over a demagnetiser in case something's happened in transit?
I'd return it too - however I have self regulated a Seiko 66B movement in one of my older watches from around minus five minutes a day to about 15 seconds plus, with a toothpick and steady hand!! It took several tries and for a while it was about 10 minutes fast, but quite good fun in the end. I wouldn't do that on a new watch though.
Don’t magnetized watches run fast ?
I’m not sure saying you can’t regulate it is completely correct.
It depends on the movement. I’ve done 2 minutes slow and there was room for more. This was a Miyota 9015 iirc.
I recently regulated my bro in laws Steinhart which was running from the factory and gnomon at about 30s per day. I had to use most of the regulating range to get it right. If these are typical of steinhart ETAs then they have a v narrow range of alteration.
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It’s possible to make an ETA movement run several minutes /day fast or slow. Moving the regulator itself rather than the fine adjuster will achieve this but I don’t advise anyone to do this unless they have a timegrapher available. On the ETA 2824 the auto- winding needs removing to get access and I don’t advise this unless you know what you’re doing.
There’s a lot more to regulating than simply moving the fine adjuster with a screwdriver, that should only be done after everything else has been set and checked. The hairspring has to be central between the Etachron regulator, this can be checked with a very strong magnifier when the watch is powered down. With the balance just managing to oscillate it the hairspring should be moving evenly between the Etachron stud, if it isn’t the positional variation will be higher and the rate will alter markedly as the amplitude falls. This should be set when the watch is assembled but the hairspring can be affected by dropping the watch or by ‘human intervention’. The Erachron stud itself can be adjusted by turning it with a special tool to ensure the gap between the pins is as small as practicable, again thus should be done when the watch us assembled and there’s no reason for it to change. If the watch is fully wound the beat error can be checked on the timegrapher, this should be v. close to zero but if the watch has had a hard whack the beat arm my have moved, if this happens the rate will alter too as the hairspring rotates slightly relative to the balance. Trying to regulate a watch to compensate for beat error is a mistake and that’s why a timegrapher is desirable and its the only way to be certain the watch us in beat.
If the watch is running with good amplitude and is in beat can now be regulated. The fine adjuster should be set to the central position with a screwdriver. The rate is then adjusted by carefully moving the regulator, thus requires care as it’ll sometimes by quite stiff, a strong magnifier is essential and the aim is to move it in the smallest possible increment, it usually takes a few attempts to get the rate close to zero (I aim for approx +4 dial- up). The watch can now be tested by wearing for a day or two, noting the rate ‘ on the wrist’ and the rate dial- up overnight. Small adjustments can be made using the fine adjuster, 1 division equates to approx 6 secs and if I see a watch with the adjuster moved by more than, 1 division I get suspicious.
If a watch us running fast or slow by more than 20 secs it’s likely there’s a problem. It may be caused by a previous owners attempt at regulation but there are several other reasons. Timegrapher will quickly reveal what’s going on.
What a comprehensive reply there Paul - serves as a reminder to mere clumsy mortals like myself, that this sort of thing is best left to others with knowledge and experience!
I’ll put my screwdrivers away now then!
If you're confident in your skills there's nothing wrong with moving the fine adjuster with a screwdriver if a watch is running slightly fast or slow, especially if you know the history of the watch and know it doesn`t have underlying issues. However, with an unknown quantity such as a used watch there are more variables, the older the watch the higher the risk that it's been messed about with in the past.
Don't do anything. Return it. Anything you try and F up is an excuse for the seller to deny the return or charge you for repair.
Not running right. Let them be responsible for it.
Don't know what movement or last serviced, but probably going to cost + watch purchase price = new
DON
Watch is now on my bench waiting for me to spend 10 minutes removing the back and regulating it. Turns out the OP lives in my locality, he dropped it in with me this evening and I put it straight on the timegrapher.
The watch is in near- mint condition, clean as a whistle. Amplitude is over 300 degrees ( dial up, fully wound) so the movement is running v. well. However, the beat error is 3.5 msec, which is a lot, and the rate is - 250 secs/ day. I can't see any marks to indicate that it’s been opened, I suspect it’s had a knock that’s caused the beat arm to move slightly. This would be consistent with the rate being out too. However, there’s no cosmetic damage to support this, possibly its been dropped onto a soft surface, but that’s conjecture on my part.
The watch needs setting back in beat, then the rate needs setting correctly. If positional agreement is good I’ll do no more other than keep it a few days to fine- tune the regulation. If I’m not happy with the agreement I’ll whip the balance out and check the hairspring, it’s possible that it's been slightly distorted and it’ll need carefully truing back up. If this is the case I’ll remove the auto- winding block, power it down, then re- align the hairspring as I’ve described earlier today. None of this is a big deal, the cost to the OP will be modest, the watch is still a good deal and everyone will end up happy. The seller has been a bit naughty, I’d be surprised if he didn’t know it was running slow, but it’s also possible the watch has been wrong from new......we’ll never know.
Well done, Paul. Forum spirit prevailing in challenging times! :-)
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In a light of latest news I'll correct myself :)
Minutes per day usually is too much to regulate.
Looking forward to reading about Paul’’s final thoughts here.
Lucky touch for OP to live near enough.
Nice gesture and offer to help.
Yes Paul very kindly got in touch with me via DM before he posted on this thread, explained the likely scenarios and then we worked out he only lives about 20 minutes from me which is a happy coincidence!
I dropped it off yesterday evening, had a nice chat and will be picking it up in a few days. Definitely a great advantage of a good forum like this - had I not been a member here I’d have been sending back a watch I really like and that I got a good deal on unnecessarily.
What a great story.
Is there a sticky or similar with members who have skills as it were and will do jobs/servicing or whatever on watches a sort of directory of forum watch makers who offer services?
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Little update to this - after dropping the watch with Paul last week I picked it up today, it now seems to be keeping excellent time - Paul reckons about -3 seconds a day, so a huge improvement on the -4 minutes a day before he got his hands on it!
And Paul’s help cost me the price of a few jars down the pub. I’m really grateful, both to Paul for reaching out and lending a hand, and to the forum for enabling it.
Here’s a pic of the watch in question back on my wrist this sunny evening!
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It's great that it's back up and running but a few pints with Paul seems a very steep price.......
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Lovely watch, and great gesture/help from Paul. Now you can relax & enjoy.
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