Reply With QuoteThe general consensus and my view these days is that it's better to let a watch run stop when not being used rather than keep it on a winder.
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I have just acquired my second mechanical watch and was just wondering what the consensus was on watch winders ?
Should you keep a mechanical watch 'ticking over' on a winder or is it perfectly OK to let it run down the power reserve and stop, if so how often should it be run ?
Graham
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The general consensus and my view these days is that it's better to let a watch run stop when not being used rather than keep it on a winder.
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My 8 are worn in rotation, 2 to 3 weeks at a time, and are run down in between. Works fine for me. The only exception is my Archimede deck watch that I wear several times per week which is a manual winder.
F.T.F.A.
Do you keep your car running over night ?
you have an answer ;-)
It depends on your priorities. If you want the wear it out without using it, then put it on a winder and forget about it.Originally Posted by POGraham
If you want your watch to last, then run it when you wear it and give it a rest when you are not. It should run as often as you use it.
I'll offer a counter to some of these replies. I have two watches that need to be advanced 24 hours to change the date by one. (An Explorer II and an IWC UTC.) I keep both of those on a winder, as I think that the wear and tear of running constantly is less than the wear from me ham-fistedly cranking the thing forward every time it's stopped and I want to wear it again. But apart from those two, yeah, I let them run down.
I suppose looking at it like that....
The one I would keep in a winder/let run down also needs to be advanced 24 hours, I suppose you'd need to be really 'ham fisted' to damage it.....I hope.
Cars are exactly the same as watches, and furthermore....
Anyway, as if any of us keep a watch long enough to be an issue.
Modern watches are designed to run fine for many years of daily use so probably doesn't matter one way or other in terms of wear. A watch needs a service every so often (say between 5 or 10 years depending on how it's performing) but not annually like cars. A car is not a watch whatever people say.
We WIS tend to baby our watches.
Assuming yours are both automatics (not manual wind) and that they have any form of complications - like date, moon phase, day month year display etc. - then second question - if you want them to be ready to wear without faffing about setting the date and time etc. then get a watch winder.
Just saw your your comment - one needs to be wound by 24 so no quick set date. I do have a vintage airking like that and do worry about the strain on the mechanism winding forward many days - and it's a pain. So I do consider that would be my one that would live on a winder.
Martyn
Last edited by MartynJC (UK); 15th May 2016 at 10:00.
Is the advice still the same with dive watches? Would wear and tear on the crown and seals from handwinding once a week be more or less of a concern than keeping the movement running on a winder?
These days my advice to people is to avoid those complications. They are pointless in this day and age of smartphones. I would be very annoyed if I had to keep wearing my watches out on winders, just to maintain some useless complication.
I suggest you keep it simple and just wind it up when you need to use it.
Are dive watches not normally quartz or automatic? There are not many manual wind dive watches around, are there? Keep it off the winder and just set it when you actually wear it.
I was thinking about an automatic dive watch. Whether letting it run down then manually setting the time and giving it a hand wind to start it on a weekly basis would cause undue wear and tear to seals.
Paaaarp!
I leave mine stopped - cant see how it does any harm
How long do you think they have been hanging around in a warehouse or dealers for like this? Or at the back of a draw in someones bedroom before you bought it second hand?
Take a personal view.
I am down to three regular wearers. One is quartz, so not in the equation, one is my main weekly wearer and the other for weekends.
I pop my weekly wearer on the winder over the weekend and it’s ready to go Monday.
Unscrewing crowns all the time can be as problematic imho.
If something isn’t going to be worn, then I would just let it run down.
I use a winder for 4 of my watches, it's convenient for me.
The wear and tear is no different than wearing a watch, so no issue to me, one of them has been either on my wrist or on the winder for 20 years.
Unless you have one of these. Actually all watches are redundant jewellery so I prefer mine as complex as possible.
Is the search function broken again?
[QUOTE=MartynJC (UK);3966123]Unless you have one of these. Actually all watches are redundant jewellery so I prefer mine as complex as possible.
/QUOTE]
That's just plain wrong. Millions of people use their watches because it's the easiest, quickest, way to tell the time. Mobile phones are usually in bags and pockets. A watch is still the most common form of timekeeping...because it's the most convenient.
Which is why watches still sell in tens of millions every year. The day they cease to be useful they will begin to die, and posing simply as another bit of jewellery won't save them.
Last edited by paskinner; 15th May 2016 at 19:53.
Also a mechanical watch will work in parts of the world where there isn't electricity, in areas where a mobile phone would just become a paper weight
Yes, but would you want to wear a watch that costs many times the average annual salary, made of a soft metal and festooned with all manner of pointless complications in an area like that?
There is some data on this. In 2011, of 1200 people surveyed by YouGov, 37% said they normally told the time by looking at their watch, and 37% said they told the time by checking their mobile phone. The remainder either looked at clocks, or were "rarely concerned about the time".
I'd only use a winder for a perpetual calendar watch if I was ever to get one.
Andy
Wanted - Damasko DC57
I tend to wear in rotation and allow the watches to run down when not being worn. They never get left for more than a month without being wound.
My reasoning is that a watch sat in the draw with no torque running through the drivetrain, will suffer less wear than one sitting on the winder with the mainspring under tension.
Mainsprings themselves are cheap enough to replace, I think most watchmakers reccomend replacing them at service time. However, pivots and staffs on older watches can be more expensive repair and difficult to locate/fabricate parts for.
Torque wrenches always come with specific care instructions to release spring tension when not in use. Would the same apply to the mainspring of a watch to ensure consistent power delivery and longevity? Interested to hear the watchmakers perspective.
To the OP. I don't use a winder for any of mine, including the 5146J pictured - which is very easy to set using the recessed four push pieces for each of the complications. Mechanical watches are marvels of mechanics considering the physical constraints.
Some manufacturers continue to develop grande complications far beyond the annual calendar - watchmaking becomes an art form.
Of course basic time pieces serve a purpose - to tell the time to the wearer. However, we do live in interesting times - if the big bomb (be that economic, military, revolution) comes, within two days without power all our electronic gadgets will have run out of power - leaving mechanicals behind. But even those will degrade in 10-20 years as their oils seize or parts fail and fixing watches probably won't be top of the list. Is my name Marvin? HHGTTG.
Have a great day everyone!
Lots of good advice on this thread. I also tend to let the watches wind down when not in use, but have never really come up with rotation pattern that I stick to, a few days here then a few days there etc.
After reading through this I am going to try the full week at a time approach and change watches in a strict order every Sunday - part of the fun is lifting the next one out and setting it.
That’s exactly my line of thought so I let my watches run down between uses. Adjusting the ones I want to wear has never been a problem anyway. I would only consider a winder if I owned watches with extra complications.
I think not, from the point of view of the physics of springs, anyway. It used to be thought that keeping springs under compression shortened their life. You were advised to decock the bolt of your rifle, for example, prior to storage.
Experiments have shown that's not the case. The only thing that causes wear or damage to springs is compressing and uncompressing them. A static spring suffers no wear. If mainspring wear were the only factor to consider with watches, it would be better to keep them running all the time.
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