Essentially, in collecting vintage and other watches, you are the master of your ship, so to speak.  This means that depending on your spending ability, you may choose to focus on buying watches that you simply like for one reason or another; whilst paying some attention to functionality as well.  It won’t hurt to also keep a close eye on acquiring watches which are likely to increase in value over time.  Often, these are associated with more expensive watch brands and in some cases, rare models of these.

Many people prefer to buy and collect watches containing precious metal like gold, silver or platinum.  (Interestingly, silver watch cases were popular with watch collectors in the early decades of the last century.)  Some vintage watches also include poignant  inscriptions and dedications from a time before.

 

Many great collectable watches were manufactured during and just after the Second World  War.  Their cases tended to be made of chromed brass because of restrictions and the difficulty in obtaining steel, post-war. These can still be fine looking watches if found in reasonable condition, while also having an intriguing history, in some cases, military.  They may also prove to be good choices for basing a watch collection on.  The ROLEX  TUDOR  watch that features in our Home Page is a good example.

ROLEX  TUDOR (Reference Number 250) (circa 1947)

At the heart of the watch is the movement, that amazing, complex arrangement of parts that enables the watch to tick and keep time.  Watch movements have indirectly controlled the worlds of commerce, exploration and marine and aeronautical navigation, since mechanical watches were  invented hundreds of years ago.

Watch movements can be loosely grouped into modern quartz battery operated ones and traditional mechanical movements, some of which are manual and some automatic.  Manual watch movements need to be hand wound regularly, whereas more modern automatic movements have a rotating, finely-balanced rotor inside the watch case that winds the watch automatically according to the movements of the wearer’s wrist.

There are currently many manufacturers of mechanical (including quartz) watch movements.  Many manufacturers closed during  the  “quartz  crisis” of the nineteen seventies and eighties, when cheaper quartz movements flooded the market.  Many of the older watches were powered by Felsa,  Adolf Schild  and ETA ( still prominent  today)  mechanical movements, amongst many others.  These movements can still be found in a variety of watches, including some  high end vintage and contemporary  watch brands today.

There are essentially  4 “levels “of watch movement, with increasing levels of accuracy as one goes up the “scale”. These are namely, the Standard , Elabore, Top and Chronometre, which range in “inaccuracy” from perhaps 5 to 10 seconds per day to only a couple of seconds per day. The word “accuracy” is in some respects  “what it is all about” in watch terms with some watch ‘geeks’ believing that this is the “be and end all” of things watch.  However, accuracy is often a function of  how a watch is worn,  positional variations and temperature being  but a few  of the factors that may  cause a watch to “drift” slightly and so  affect its accuracy from time to time.

Many manufacturers quantify accuracy according to various certification processes, with the COSC certification process perhaps being the best known amongst about 8 other certification processes, all of which specify accuracy specs. ranging from between about  -8secs to +8 secs up to -1s to +1s per day.

FEF 270 BUCHERER BROOCH WATCH

A collector recently asked us to repair a BUCHERER brooch watch.  The crown (winder) and stem had become misplaced and the owner was unable to re-insert them.

We undertook to repair the watch and this required a re-assembly of the keyless works.

So, once we had removed the dial and the hands to expose the works, we discovered that somehow, the sliding pinion had slipped out of position and was jamming the re-insertion of the stem.  This does happen from time to time and is generally a time consuming and complicated repair process.  During the process, management of the parts themselves, including the spring, is always paramount, as replacements are sometimes unobtainable for older watches.

The tiny parts are always a wonder to those fortunate enough to be able to actually view their watches being repaired.  The photos here include two matches in order to  indicate the small scale of the work. They show the  parts and tiny screws that comprise the keyless works. The keyless works were disassembled  allowing the stem of the watch to be re-inserted, so that it could be wound up and the hands adjusted to function normally. (The keyless works are the  mechanism in the movement that allow the watch to be wound up  and also move the hands to set the time when the stem/crown is pulled out one click.)

Needless to say, one overjoyed owner resulted and the BUCHERER brooch watch is running well  again.