Had this watch for a COA. With the position of the regulator and the fact it looses seven minutes a day makes me wonder if this guy knows what he is doing. Some opinions please. Forgot to post picture

David, if I got a watch back from a repairman and the regulator was not centered and it was not keeping time within/around a minute +/- per 24 hour period, and there was no "before" communication between the repairman and myself to tell me why the regulator would not be centered and why it would be more than a minute off per day,

Then that person is not a good repairman and does not know his trade/craft and would get no more monies from me in the form of future business or commendations.

If the watch was a RRA/RRG watch that was designed to keep time in 5 or 6 positions, I would not hold the repairman's feet to the fire on the 5-6 positions since these watches are 100 to 40 years old, but I would expect it to keep the time described above in 3 positions, pendant up, face up, and face down.

Any fully jeweled watch can be made to run within the standards I described above. Now it may take more money to get there, and that would be where the "before" communications would come into play if it did in fact require more than a clean/oil/adjust [COA]. A lot of the lesser watches such as 7/11/13/15 jeweled watches which some have no/less jewels in the plates themselves, may have problems such as "egg" shaped holes wallowed out on the plates over time from bent pivots etc., may never keep good time and may be many minutes off per day, but, these problems should be communicated before/during/after the repairman finishes up.

If there is no mention of problems before you take back possession, then I would return the watch to said repairman for a "redo", or I would not use the repairman in the future.

(This thread may get more accolades/attention in our "Watch Repair Forum" Dr. Debbie ??)

regards,
bb

I would like to agree with Buster. With the exception that I would not except a minute a day. There has to be a reason why it's running so slow. That should be fixed during the COA. Sounds to me like he just cleaned and oiled it and put it back together, but he still should have recognized the fact that the regulator was off and tried to find out why. I would like to put it on my machine and see whats wrong.

A better Photo

The micro regulators don't have a 7 minute window in them, perhaps 2 minutes +/- would be max. When your watch was new or freshly COA'd, the regulator would be centered, when it lost/gained time it could be adjusted by the regulator to keep a slightly better time. But when it would be pegged out towards fast/slow then it was past time for a fresh COA or repair.

Your 17J H/C 18sz Illinois watch was marketed and sold as a mail order watch by Sears, Roebuck & Co. in 1905. It was a single roller watch and adjusted to 3 positions. It was a nice gentleman's watch for everyday wear and timekeeping. It wasn't used on the railroads. These were "PL" watches and the dials should match the movement, be double sunk and say Plymouth Watch Co, also. I believe it is a Model 5 and grade 79 which was a mid grade watch made by Illinois and sold to Sears for their mail order outlets.

regards,
bb

Hi Dave,

Very odd he should have adjusted regulator to the slow setting if its now running 7 minutes slow,
The amount of adjustment available by the regulator will vary greatly for different models/makes, some can be several minutes (making precise setting difficult and erratic) to less than a minute. Often throughout the arc the hairspring will have been “adjusted”! over the years and as it swings will not follow, distorting the hairspring, changing beat and dynamic timing I would imagine we would find a good few more problems with this watch than simple timing. I just had a freshly serviced watch from ebay sent to me it was ticking, some 20 minutes slow and with several minutes out of poise.

Note to self: get a timing machine and learn to use it.