Strap Pin Tool

Hi All,

First time poster - please be gentle
Just bought a Smiths PRS29A my first "proper" watch - very happy with it.
Looking to try a few different straps and have come to realise I need some way of removing the strap pins.
I always try and buy quality tools and it seems like Bergeon are highly rated.
However there are multiple models and I want to ensure I get the correct one.
It seems I need some sort of narrow pin end to remove the strap pins and a fork end to reinsert them again.
Can someone let me know which Bergeon model I need - specific part number please.
Alternatively, any other quality options are welcome.

Now to browse the rest of the site....

A paper clip is more than sufficient for a watch like this with drilled lugs.

If you insist on buying a tool though, then the bergeon 6767f.

Hi there, welcome to the forum. As above a Bergeon is the tool of choice, inferior tools and copies use inferior metals so buy right and by once. Paperclip? Not for me, but then I do use Snap On and Park on my bicycles. Buy once and buy right, tools for life, but then I do use an Estwing hammer to knock nails in. You can replace the ends on the Bergeons and buy different size pins and forks to suit. :pig:

For whatever it's worth, OP (SimonM), I think you're carefully trying to do things the right way with your new watch and I think that is always far more the better part of the battle in learning all you might need or want to as regards things like good watches and maybe also a lot of other things one runs into in life.

I also think the second part of Hafie's advice and every word of Magirus's is perfectly said and the best you'll find. The only aspect of the first part of Hafie's advice I might personally find fault with is the paperclip as a makeshift [as in a common household item resourcefully used to accomplish a particular task at hand without the need to acquire and use a perhaps at the moment unavailable task specific tool specially designed to perform that same task] "pin puncher". Paperclips are essentially a piece of wire that is bent to a form and made of steel, and though surely a low grade of it, I would think it would be with some level of "spring temper" nonetheless, and as such might well be harder than the 316L stainless steel case of many if not most decent and better watches sold.

Paperclip ends are also simply cut and left unfinished as they churn out of the machines that mass produce them, can be quite sharp as such, and I would think better suited to scratching your name on the back of your new Smiths than running in the drilled lugs of it to push in the end-pins of your watch's shoulderless springbars for their easy removal.

However, just like Hafie, I like makeshift too when it can't do any damage, so I just use the type of wooden round or square center stock toothpicks chosen for their strength (even still, you'll need plenty to replace all the ones you'll break using even the best and strongest of wooden toothpicks) instead of steel paperclips to effect Hafie's good basic idea without the barest risk of damaging the external surfaces if the case lugs or perhaps even to some extent eventually "routing out" the "bores" of the drilled lug holes that should hold the springbar's steel end-pins with as little play as possible to avoid the pins themselves moving about in the lug holes during use and, by the friction they themselves generate, further "routing out" the bores of the lug holes.

As an aside, you might be aware that the end-pin diameters of the factory "fat [spring]bars" of the famous SKX [i.e. 007, 009, 173, 035, etc.] series "Air Divers" from Seiko seemingly tend to be smaller than the [blind] springbar end-pin holes cut into the case lugs of these watches, so apparently quite often have a degree of play in the lug holes that could possibly, in my mind at least, be responsible for the SKX series watches' reputation for developing opened up [as in "routed out"] lug pin holes over time and long use --- I love my own SKX but I did, first off, fit springbars to it with large enough diameter end-pins that are snug with very little play in the lug pin holes.

As far as reputations go, I think I may still have a bit, or more, of a reputation around here for being long-winded with what I post, so I'll finally put a lid on it, and thanks to anybody who has endured this to the end --- whatever it was worth, I'll leave up to you

Thanks all for the detailed and quick responses.
Always tried to purchase good tools so Bergeon 6767f it is
:thumbsup: