Must an accutron be actively worn to keep time?
Howard Kaplan
like a couple of watches I've inherited.
I've recently had an Accutron (apparently from the 218 series) serviced,
after which I had another watch serviced. While enjoying the
opportunity to wear the second one for a while, I left the Accutron
unworn for a couple of weeks. When I looked at it again, the time was
clearly far off of what it should be. (I don't try to use the date
function, so I don't know how much time it had lost -- I assume it
wasn't gaining.) When I put it on my spare wrist to remember to deal
with it today, it did not seem to lose any more time.
When I went back to discuss this with the watchmaker, he told me that
Accutrons are unusual -- they work properly only when worn everyday, not
when left to sit. This claim strikes me as improbable (especially if
the movement has been used in spacecraft) but not impossible -- has
anyone else heard or experienced this? I've checked the web site from
Rob Berkavicius, and he says nothing about it there.
--
Howard L. Kaplan
Songwriter and occasional performer
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Home page: http://www.thrinberry-frog.com
Richard J. Sexton (At work)
>when left to sit. This claim strikes me as improbable (especially if
>the movement has been used in spacecraft) but not impossible -- has
>anyone else heard or experienced this? I've checked the web site from
>Rob Berkavicius, and he says nothing about it there.
That's because it's not true. That's the whole point of accutrons,
near quartz accuracy period.
It probably has the wrong battery - you can't get the original
mercury cells any more and have to use a silver ocide battery with
a widjet on it to step up the voltage.
Or it's still dirty.
Or there's a weak part, like a bum index wheel or coil.
Get another watchmaker. This one is either lying to
you, making up facts or is just plani incompetant. Go
google "budget accutron repair".
--
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Chris Radek
> Get another watchmaker. This one is either lying to
> you, making up facts or is just plani incompetant. Go
> google "budget accutron repair".
While I'm tempted to agree, I want to point out that a
properly-regulated Accutron will lose 2 seconds a day if sitting dial-up
(or dial-down). They are regulated this way on purpose. It should keep
excellent time (something like within a second a day) when worn. Your
watchmaker *may* have been telling you this.
I don't know how far the watch was off, in how much time, or in which
direction (fast or slow). If it was a couple seconds a day slow, that's
exactly correct. But if it was much further than that, the watchmaker
missed something in the servicing.
Accutrons are incredibly finicky. It's common to have to open one up
twice. If your problems didn't show up for quite a while after you got
the watch back from him, his post-servicing testing could not have
caught the problem.
I suggest you ask him again, making sure he understands the extent of
the error the watch accumulates. It's possible he misunderstood and
nobody wants to lose a customer OR a good watchmaker because of a
misunderstanding. If he was making up a story because he doesn't want
to honor a warranty or something, by all means, dump him and go to
someone else.
Chris
Howard Kaplan
Continuing a discussion of a watchmaker who claims that Accutrons always
lose time if not actively worn ...
Chris Radek wrote:
> I want to point out that a
> properly-regulated Accutron will lose 2 seconds a day if sitting dial-up
> (or dial-down). They are regulated this way on purpose. It should keep
> excellent time (something like within a second a day) when worn. Your
> watchmaker *may* have been telling you this.
>
> I don't know how far the watch was off, in how much time, or in which
> direction (fast or slow). If it was a couple seconds a day slow, that's
> exactly correct. But if it was much further than that, the watchmaker
> missed something in the servicing.
>
Supported in a vertical position by the band, with the 9 side down and
the 3 side up, it lost 35 minutes between 10:00 last night and 6:20 this
evening. That's obviously way out of spec. However, during the course
of about 10 hours earlier in the day, while I was wearing it on my spare
wrist, it did not obviously lose any time. I can believe the
observation that, at the moment, this particular watch works only when
being worn, but not the claim that Accutrons in general are expected to
run properly only when worn (where "properly" means within a few seconds
a day).
Thanks to both Chris Radek and Richard Sexton for their help on this issue.
Chris Radek
> Supported in a vertical position by the band, with the 9 side down and
> the 3 side up, it lost 35 minutes between 10:00 last night and 6:20 this
> evening. That's obviously way out of spec. However, during the course
> of about 10 hours earlier in the day, while I was wearing it on my spare
> wrist, it did not obviously lose any time.
This is a strange failure mode. More common is an Accutron that runs
fast when being worn, but normally when not -- but that usually happens
in 214, not 218 models (due to high amplitude).
Since you say this is a 218 model I suspect it has date or day/date
(most but not all do). I suspect it only loses time during the date
change. Have you maybe mistaken worn/not worn for daytime/nighttime?
This is critical because the gut reaction when an Accutron is erratic is
to work on the index mechanism. If I'm right about the date change
being the problem, it would be a front-side problem (cannon pinion or
date mechanism).
If you set it to the second to a reliable time source, you may find that
in the morning, even though the time displays wrong, the second hand
would still be correct. This would confirm a "front-side" problem.
Chris