Hi all,
My mom bought a small little ladies watch for herself from a antique store and it was running slow so I decided to give it a clean, the clean went well, but when I tried to test the watch for accuracy I got a big surprise, the watch is gaining about 10 mins in half an hour and I think I may have by mistake magnetized it at some point during cleaning because I heard somewhere that watches gain time when magnetized (or I made some horrible mistake while cleaning it) so is there some way of telling wether a watch is magnetized ?

Thanking in advance
Francesco

I would also inspect around the hairspring. Make sure there isnt a hair or something on it, make sure it isnt hitting anything like the balance cock.

Francesco, when it is running that fast the balance wheel cannot be rotating anywhere near its full 250 degrees of rotation. check video at;

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dfGJsaqNjRc

It is probably swinging a shorter arc and running much faster. Along with Jim's suggestions I would also check the Hairspring for two issues;
1. It is touching something (usually the arms) on the rotating balance wheel.
2. The first hairspring circle is stuck in the regulator pins along with the outside hairspring end that goes to the hairspring stud.

Hi Dave, both of those possible problems checked out to be ok, but when putting the balance back in I did notice that it did want to stick to the main plate and the hair spring coils are sticking to each other when the watch is running and their cant be oil on them because I cleaned the hairspring is benzine. So I might gust drop by the place where I did my holiday job and ask if I can demagnetize the watch and if that doesn't work ill bring up the topic again.

Best regards
Francesco