The Owners Guide to Wristwatches

Power, Winding and Setting to time

Sources of power:

There are two main sources of power for wristwatches:

Mainspring, which will power the watch for up to two days (generally only 30 hours)

Battery, which will drive the watch for up to 5 years.

Time control:

Watches can use several methods to control their time-keeping

The balance and balance spring (hairspring).

A tuning fork.

A quartz crystal.

These are all oscillators which provide a stable and easily regulated frequency of operation.

Mainspring watches require winding, which may be:

Stem wind, i.e. wound by the winding knob, until an increase in resistance to winding is felt.

Automatic winding, whereby an oscillating weight inside the movement (works) is caused to rotate by the movement of the watch on the wearers wrist and, by a system of gearing, winds the mainspring. If these watches have been left to wind down completely, they may require some stem winding to give them an immediate start.

Battery watches which have a stem:

These may be stopped by pulling out the stem to the first click and then started on the exact second by pushing the stem in at the correct time.

Setting mechanical watches to time:

Wristwatches made in the early part of this century were often set to time by pushing in the olive (see pocket watch pages) and then turning the knob (button). Later watches were set by pulling out the winding button to the first click to put the mechanism into set hands and then turning the hands by the button to the correct time.