I have a question for you Railroad watch buffs.In order to maintain the 30 second per week or whatever,how often were these watches wound?I have several so called railroad approved watches that with the regulator in the center,will gain or loose a couple of minutes in a winding.When I carry a watch I wind when I get up and again before going to bed.I find by doing this, that nearly any watch will keep near perfect time.Is this how the Railroaders wound their watches?Thanks.Norm

I think most people wound the watches out of habit and that is why you hear the comment regulate the watch to the way you carry (habit). This is also the reason for wind indicators to show how much wind was left and I think about 40 hours was fairly typical for more early watches and 60 hours and later was typical for later watches. I normally wind out of habit about the same time every day (24hrs) and I would regulate my watches a bit different than someone that would let the wind down to 48 or 60 hours. Most of my watches will gain a few secs at full wind and then lose those few secs as they wind down so the net result is no gain/loss, as long as my habit of winding continues the watch would be properly regulated.

One of the adjustments, isochronism, is designed to have the watch time the same at both the tight and slack end of a mainspring wind.

QUOTE [Is this how the Railroaders wound their watches?Thanks.Norm]END QUOTE

Just to add for general knowledge and being a RR employee at the time mechanical watches were deployed;

The RR worker generally would wind the watch when he was called to duty and the watch was part of his required dress. This would generally be once every 24 hour period for a worker employed in the yard facility since his normal shift would be for 8 to as long as 16 hours per day.

The RR worker who worked in "road" service was a bit different. Upon reaching his/her home terminal or away from home terminal, upon retiring would take his/her tools off. Upon being recalled for service, be it 8 hours later or 12 or 16 or 24 hours later he/she would at that time wind said watch upon gathering and dressing for work. This time frame was never the same for the road employee/worker vs. the yard employee/worker.

As Ed pointed out isochronism should of come into play especially on such a fine and regulated instrument that was required to be maintained by the employee and was also part of the RR worker/employee's "tools" of the trade

Lastly , upon reaching the RR facility or depot said watch was compared with the RR standard clock by all employees who worked together as "crew" members. Any problems had to be corrected ASAP since it was a matter of perfect timing in coordinated traffic moves. Also the management could and would check your watch and maintenance watch card at any time that you were on-duty. If your watch or inspection watch card were out of sync then the management had no choice but to pull you "out of service" without pay until you and/or your equipment came into compliance

That should answer your question as to RR's and their winding habits

regards,
bb

Just so people understand that isochronism is not fully linear. My 992B will easily maintain 30 secs over not just one week but over 3-4 weeks but it will gain a few secs at full wind and loose those few at or near the time frame I typically wind at. An explanation of isochronism is captured below. Getting back to the original post gaining/losing a couple of secs is much different that gaining/losing a few minutes during a wind sequence which sounds like something is not quite right.

Finally, there is isochronism. The aim of this adjustment is to make the watch's rate immune to amplitude of the balance wheel's swing. Obviously, when the mainspring is fully wound, the balance wheel swings very wide, on the order of 270 degrees end-to-end. As the tension of the mainspring ebbs, the amplitude decreases, until it is on the order of 105 degrees end-to-end near the end of its useful power reserve. Isochronism adjustment involves a variety of specialized techniques, the most effective being the Breguet overcoil on the hairspring, which makes the system act to the best degree like a simple linear oscillator, whose frequency in theory is independent of its amplitude. It should be noted that automatic watches are far less dependent on adjustment for isochronism than are manually wound watches, since automatics are assumed to be always at or near their mainsprings' full usable power. Manually wound watches, on the other hand, can be regulated to compensate for the totally predictable isochronism curve, assuming the watch is wound at the same time every day.

Thank you all for the info.It seems like there is always someone who has the answer.Regards to you all.Norm