HI FOLKS,
I HAVE A QUESTION OR QUESTONS. I HAVE SEEN A 21 JEWEL PENDENT SET CRESENT ST WALTHAM MODEL 1892 AND AN ELGIN OVERLAND 18S THAT WAS PENDENT SET AND MOST OF THESE TWO WATCHES WERE ALL LEVER SET. WHAT WAS UP WITH THESE TWO WATCHES WHEN THEY WERE MADE AND HOW RARE ARE THE PENDENT SET IN EACH OF THESE TWO ? THANKS FOR ANY HELP.
LEONARD

Leonard, on the Waltham models I will let someone else that is more of an Waltham collector answer.

With the help of a friend of mine I will try to cover your question on Elgin. First part it appears that Elgin felt that pendant set would be acceptable and was acceptable for RR use in the mid-1890's and this can be seen with the release of their 21j grade 150 which was pendant set only.

The RR standards were rapidly changing so there were several situation that existed, the name existed in more than one grade "Overland' or more than one name existed on the same grade "Overland", "GM Wheeler" or marked "Elgin National Watch Co"
You also have grades that started out as a pendant set and were converted to a lever set and given a different grade number, ie 165/265, 166/ 266, or 150/277. If you looked at the movement you would see the same basic look, DMK effect, serial number range but one was pendant set and one could be a lever set.

What Elgin did would be to take pendant set that might be nesting in the stock department because the market needed was now requesting lever sets and Elgin would make machining changes to these pendant sets to convert them.

Also in this situation we are considering only open face models since with hunter case models you did not see this conversion take place because hunters were being phased out of RR service.

So the breakdown for Elgin would be that the 165, 150, 279 were all pendant sets, the 265, 277 ( both converted)343, 353 were lever sets. The 150/277 was never marked with anything other than Elgin National Watch Co but the other grades came in the naming configuration mentioned earlier.

My friends best guess for a grade marked Overland would be that 8500 were pendant set and 4500 were lever set.

On some grades one name marking is more dominant than the other, only the 343/353 appears to about a 1/3 even blend.

Also some grades marked Overland might not share all of the three naming traits, so it might be only Overland, and Elgin National Watch company or Overland GMW, in the case of the converted pendant set to lever sets (265) are all Overlands. In the case of the 150 all 277s will only have the marking Elgin National Watch company with is true for the pendant set 150.

THANK YOU VERY MUCH CLAUDE, THAT WASNT JUST A SHORT QUICK ANSWER, THAT TOOK SOME TIME TO WRITE OUT.
LEONARD

On rarity the grade 265 is 500 total if I am not mistaken, the 266 is also very limited, along with the 277 maybe 200 total (numbers up to debate). I don't have access to my Elgin grade book at the moment so I can't quote exact numbers.

So with Elgin any pendant set grade that was converted to the lever set grade will be very limited numbers.

On the Elgin converted grades they are usually very easy to identify. In the case of pendant set Elgin there is a slot in the pillar plate near the wind pinion where part of the setting mechanism sits.

In the case of the converted lever set version this is not needed but you will see the earlier machining done for the pendant set including the pillar plate slot.

Or simply pull the dial and see this first done/later done machining in full detail.

I know that for 16s 19j Waltham you could get them either pendant set and lever set and this was clearly mentioned in ads during the time they were sold. Also with Walthams what I have seen is if it was pendant set it only had pendant set machining and for a lever set likewise, not like the Elgin converted grades.

side topic, on the 166/266 conversion, this was definitely an up-jewel conversion but without access to my Elgin guide book I may not be totally correct to include it as a PS to LS conversion, I will double check that when I get a chance.

The grade 166 double dipped, PS/LS conversion and upjeweled from 17j to 21j.