This is a 999B and I would like to know why it has 3 hands? Sorry for the bad pictures.

oops, wrong side,

Shelia, the red hand is a common second timezone hand found on many watches. They could be set at any other hour position and moved in unison with the standard hour hand.
Not all all different from the modern day rotating bezel on a wristwatch
Larry

If an operating crew member worked a long run where the train crossed time zones, the hands were used to quickly show the time in the current zone. They would be set to reflect the two zones and would be one hour apart.

Other than railroad service, they could be set to anything.

Larry, Tom,
Thank you, I have seen three hands before but they were different than this one.
I couldn't even tell that one hand is red! This computer needs to be shot!

Thank you for the information, I always wondered why some had these types of hands.

Sheila
Rather than shoot your computer, perhaps you might try adjusting the video output, or adjusting the monitor color?

Sheila,
Don't shoot that PC yet. Those additional time zone hour hands were sometimes gold finish and sometimes red to denote the different time zone from the standard blue or black hour hand that matched the minute hand. I believe they are found in either gold or red (I've had both types)--the main thing was to make an easy, instant contrast from the first hour hand when entering the neighboring time zone and then keeping time by the other distinct color of hour hand.

Wayne, Larry,

Well, when I had a new hard drive installed fromt he last crash, they never re-installed my sound, DVD, CD, or anything they were supposed to re-install from the change, so nothing has worked right since I got it changed over, including the darkness of the screen. It's up all the way now, so I have to get them to adjust it for the Hard drive and new programs they installed.
Oh well!

This is wonderful information about the hands and the time zones, I really didn't know about that before, although I did assumed they had a good reason to be there, and had a spacific purpose.

Thank you.

PS I have had my eye on a high end laptop, but since it's so much, I will have to wait a little longer before I can get one. Until then, I will just have to use the one I have, and work at not shooting it until then. lol

Question - How is this third hand set? Is there an extra position on the lever?

Pat McCarthy

Pat, the third hand is actually part of the first blue hour hand. (At least the one I have is) It moves synchronus with the primary hour hand.

Pat,

Aaron is correct. The two hour hands are actually crimped together as one and spaced one hour apart--so the watch's time is set like any other watch.

Aaron and Larry - Thank you. I misunderstood "Larry S #1"'s response indicating the second hand could be set to "any other hour position".

Thanks for the clarification.

Pat

In principle, you could set them to any angle apart by releasing the crimp and turning one hand, I think. Some of them may have only a single hub. In practice, they only need the one hour separation.

Dual time zone watches or "Captain's Watches" do have a separate means to set the hands in the two time areas they display. These usually have two smaller chapter rings with both an hour and minute hand in each. They are mostly older watches that predate standard time.

Here is an eBay auction with timezone hands.

I believe the sets in the upper right and the lower left of this picture are adjustable without the uncrimping method as Tom McIntyre has explained in his reply. These sets are connected by a snug friction fit and are adjustable. I once had a set like this on an Elgin pocket watch that is long since gone to eBay.

I don't understand why the auction offers 2 sets of hands and shows 4 sets in the picture.

2 sets of Hamilton pocket watch dual time zone hands

It is possible that Sherry is confused and believes you need both hour and minute hands for the dual time zone set. The heavy spade hands could be taken for hour hands and the light spade hands as minute hands. They are, of course, all hour hands for different styles of dial.

It is interesting to note that the lower left set is for an westbound run while the other three are for trains originating in the west and traveling east. The "home" hand is conventionally the blue (or black) one.