I have often seen mention of the gold centre wheel on a Hamilton 992B and the various reasons for it. This Illinois has a gold train yet the watch itself does not appear to be special. Why would you have a gold train on an otherwise fairly standard watch? Illinois

The gold train is a nice touch and Illinois finished their watches nicer than Hamilton, across the board.

The BIG DEAL with gold trains/wheels in Hamiltons is it differentiates one variant from the other. Fewer with gold trains/wheels, the more scarce and more valuable. The gold train doesn't do much per se, just a way to keep score.

I had always been lead to believe the reason low carat gold trains were used was they reduced the amount of friction.

Also some watches had wheels that were gold plated instead of being solid 10Kt as a way to hold down costs.

From a marketing stand point I think a gold wheel always gave the impression of higher quality.

Bob

Here is a previous disscusion you might like to read.Gold Train
Gary