I just finished restoring this Waltham this weekend. It needed a cleaning and I had to replace the barrel assembly and mainspring. The case is 14K green gold and it has a 15-jewel Sapphire-grade 6/0 (Jewel Series) movement. It appears to be from shortly after the watch companies moved away from wire lugs. Instead of spring bars it has two threaded rods that screw into the lugs.

This ad is from a January 1923 Waltham catalog. You can see that I still need to get a stitched leather strap for it.

This larger watch (almost 1-1/4" across) is from around 1921 and has a 17-jewel Ruby grade 6/0 movement in a 14K yellow gold case. Originally a wire lug case, someone cut the lugs so that female spring bars could be used instead. This was also restored this past weekend, with a cleaning and balance staff.

...great watches...particularly like the band on that Waltham 6/0...have several watches w/wire lugs that I'd like to convert to spring bars...just how does one go about converting a male to a female spring bar (no scurrilous remarks here plse... )?...

Jim - I consider the conversion of the watch to be an unfortunate mutilation and would not recommend it for a collectible watch. The spring bars are not readily convertible -- you must buy the female type (if they are still available).

As luck would have it, at my local chapter meeting this past Sunday I found an original Waltham leather strap for my 1923 wristwatch. [it is not as red as it looks in the pictures] Do I dare to occasionally wear the watch with this strap, or should I preserve the strap and find a cheap strap to wear? [that would kind of kill the fun of it]. Here is a picture of the now complete watch. (matches the ad pretty well ).