How many parts can a pocket watch actually have. I was reading an article online this morning that said a Waltham pocket watch could have up to 180.

I also saw on someone's website that advertises cleaning and restoration a comment on how they work on watches with 200 parts.

Really?

Is it because if you were to break down an individual part, like a pallet, then you have the jewels, the arbor, the fork, the finger...all as separate parts?

Dale

I have never actually counted each piece but I believe it is more or less like you said, for example each wheel consists of 3 parts, the wheel, the pinion, the staff. So if you were to count each separate part & each jewel & cap jewel & screw then I would think you get near 200 parts.

Back when you could order replacement parts from the factory you could buy each part separately from the smallest screw or jewel on up.
Tom

Thanks Tom.

I imagine it sounds like you're getting your money's worth as a customer when you're told there are 200 parts in a watch that have to be dealt with!

As there are many extra parts for wind and set, and for the extra jeweling above balance wheel jeweling, we could "chart" the progression of common watch parts starting with a 4 Jewel (or even no Jewel) Keywind and go up from there. Also where does one draw the line? Does a 4 foot 16s Hamilton double sunk dial have 7 parts?

btw lets not even go there with fusee's

As for the difference in time and cost to clean and restore a watch, the greatest issue is "replacement parts".

Personally I think a watchmaker is justified in using a statement about the approximate number of parts, mainly due to the fact that when they get a watch in for repair any of those 200 parts could be broken or missing. So even though they might actually handle each separate part they could end up replacing a few. Now if they claim they break the watch down to each part including removing the pallet fork jewels, the roller jewel etc. to clean the watch I think that is an exaggeration

Tom