Mechanical Watch (2022)

This post is what got me into mechanical watches as I've always wondered how the analogue clocks/watches work but couldn't bother myself to actually read upon it. But after the article, I even got myself a clean Seiko 5 automatic, not because I wanted a fancy watch, but I wanted to own a piece of mechanical wonder.

lvl1022• 3 years ago

Grand Seikos are some of the best mechanical watches. Their quartz line is also exceptional. Very underrated and much prefer them over overpriced Rolex.

neor• 3 years ago

The Spring Drive movement is amazing, very accurate, very high quality and that smooth sweeping seconds hand is mesmerizing. Availability is good, and the price is a lot better than the high-end Swiss brands.

Rolex these days is a joke, even the authorized dealers will rip you off shamelessly. They will either refuse to sell you a watch they have in store, or they will force you to buy 30 grand in extra jewelry just to get the Rolex you want.

criddell2• 3 years ago

Many Rolex models seem expensive, but they are easy to sell and you will get much of your money back or even turn a profit.

pyr0hu2• 3 years ago

Never was interested in Rolexes, too flashy for my taste. Seikos are sporty, can match with everything and does not want to show off to everyone

bigie35• 3 years ago

I feel like most watch folks have at least 1 Seiko in their watch case at least once in their collecting journey. Fantastic watches, enjoy!

ddingus• 3 years ago

Seiko fan here. Seconded.

quickthrowman• 3 years ago

Seiko SNK807 and Seiko SKX009, reporting for duty.

samgranieri• 3 years ago

This was the most engrossing article I’ve read in a while.

quakeguy• 3 years ago

Check the whole blog, the amount and detail of JS animations on all the different topics is awesome.

dallyo• 3 years ago

Incredible as usual. Like a visit to a science museum. Wikipedia should commission this guy to explain all the things in this intuitive, interactive, visual way.

amitp2• 3 years ago

He's not taking commissions, although maybe he'd make an exception for wikipedia.

jamestimmins• 3 years ago

Do you know where he says he's not taking commissions? Just curious bc I wonder who is trying to commission this kind of stuff, and what his reason is for not doing it.

gwbas1c2• 3 years ago

My favorite watch ever was a self-winding mechanical Swatch. I suspect they (Swatch) acquired the company that made it. Disappointingly, when the pins that held the band on started to slip, there was no good way to repair it.

I've since switched to a smart watch, but I keep getting tempted to go back. I generally use my smart watch as a very gentle alarm, and for fitness tracking. I just don't want to be the geek who wears two watches. Maybe I should only wear it at night?

ghostganz• 3 years ago

A self-winding watch needs to be worn for hours each day to not run out of power. A manual-wind watch will be a better choice for a night-only mechanical watch.

jgwil2• 3 years ago

You can get a watch winder to keep your automatic wound even if you don't wear it all the time.

gwbas1c2• 3 years ago

I took off my self winding watch at night and it worked fine.

night-only mechanical watch

I said that I was thinking of only wearing a smartwatch at night, because I really like the gentle alarm in the morning.

What I didn't say was that I use a smartwatch for tracking my sleep patterns.

massenpunkt• 3 years ago

The Swatch brand was founded 1983 by ETA CEO Thomke and his Engineers. ETA is a watch movement manufacturer.

Speaking of Swatch and mechanical watches: the Sistem51 is an interesting watch, since it's the only mechanical watch ever fabricated in a 100% automated production line. The parts are welded together and held by a single screw. https://www.swatch.com/en-us/sistem-51.html

steezy132• 3 years ago

I have been torn between wearing mechanical watches and smart watches. I don't need/want/like notifications on my wrist, but I really enjoy the activity and heart rate tracking of the Apple Watch.

I have been reluctantly wearing a Samsung Withings watch that looks mechanical but is actually smart, but a mediocre compromise (you need to wear it higher up the wrist than I usually do, and I don't believe it gives accurate heart rate and activity measurements). 30 day battery life is pretty cool though.

I may just start going back to my Vostok and Seiko watches full time at this point. (I don't like spending a lot of money on watches, anyone who is curious on getting into them should check out both brands as economical starters - the Vostok Amphibia has a storied history!)

mattkopecki• 3 years ago

Consider something like a Whoop or Oura Ring which monitors health metrics but doesn’t rely on a watch? That’s what I’ve settled on so that I have the best of both worlds.

FirmwareBurner• 3 years ago

Those are subscription based though.

akshayrajp• 3 years ago

Try Garmin Instinct? It's a digital watch (not analog) and more of a fitness tracker than a smart watch. You can disable any notifications you don't want.

Ginguin• 3 years ago

That's where I ended up. My Instinct has replaced my mechanical watches for every occasion except for the most formal. The app is decent, the metrics are awesome, and the accessories work without fuss (I pair mine with the Heart Rate strap when doing kettlebell stuff). I love my other watches and still have one or two I will eventually convince myself to buy, but the Garmin Instinct 2 has been on my wrist for 90% of the last year.

atmosx• 3 years ago

Mechanical watches these days are primarily about aesthetics. Although I must say that I find myself reaching less and less for my mobile these days to find out the time because I wear a mechanical watch.

A smartwatch is about data, primarily.

You can have both. Use the mechanical watch for occasions that require a formal attire and use the smartwatch as your daily driver and sport companion.

wkat42422• 3 years ago

For me it's the opposite. Notifications and payments are my main benefit. I would never wear a watch that shows only the time (hence I never wore one since the late 90s until mid 2010s). Sleep tracking with SpO2 is a big thing for me too though.

I think mechanical watches are much more about being jewellery than function, even though it's impressive engineering. But I'm not a very flashy guy (I don't even own any shirts that fit anymore, just T-shirts lol) so I don't really care.

But it's good to see everyone can get what they like. I'm personally really happy with how far smartwatches have come.

lawn• 3 years ago

I'd like a watch that does two things:

- Shows the time (and possibly date)

- Vibrates when I get a call (or maybe other notifications)

Other than that I'd like it to be small and have a long battery life. Is there anything like this?

I currently use a Garmin smartband, but there are so many features I don't use.

DriverDaily• 3 years ago

For me it was an easy choice. First, I was starting to worry about heart health. Second, my mechanical watches could be sold for more than I paid for them.

al_borland• 3 years ago

I wear a smart watch at the gym to track my heart rate, but when not at the gym I wear a mechanical watch (or some other normal watch... I recently got a Casio World Time I have love way more than I probably should).

I had an Apple Watch, but sold it, as I felt guilty not wearing it more, with all that it can do. I ended up getting the cheapest Polar watch option, that does everything on-device (I don't have an account or anything), and can wear that to the gym if I just want to check out my heart rate.

I_Am_Nous• 3 years ago

I had both a Pebble v1 and a Pebble v2 and loved them both. Pebble went defunct though, so I switched back to a Seiko 5 automatic dive watch once I found I didn't really care for any of the other available smart watches at the time.

There's something beautiful to me about a mechanical watch being tied to my personal relativity. Compared to an NTP synchronized smart watch, nothing should update the time on my watch but me. The actual usefulness of this feature is merely philosophical but it makes me happy to consider.

The only thing I miss is weather at a glance on my Pebble. I used a watch face with the temperature on it and to this day I still look at my wrist when I'm thinking about the temperature lol

HPsquared• 3 years ago

I have a Pixel Watch and I must say, I enjoy the sweeping second hand.

shepherdjerred• 3 years ago

Is there any reason you don't just disable notifications? That's what I've done on my Apple watch and I've loved it.

macintux• 3 years ago

I disabled all but the most important notifications (calls, texts primarily) and it's been great. I no longer have to drag my phone out of my pocket when someone calls me, and all unnecessary notifications can wait until I'm bored.

bayindirh3• 3 years ago

I was wearing a MiBand and getting ready to get an Apple Watch. Then my wife got me a Longines auto. I'll never go back to smartwatches again.

I'm not a collector when it comes to watches, and I can happily wear that Longines until the end of time, and will be happy.

Having a tactile watch with real hardware with no electricity inside brings me more joy than some capable electronic toy which needs constant tending and replacement.

If I was climbing mountains, maybe but mere outdoor activities I have a ProTrek. More than enough.

pklausler• 3 years ago

In a similar story, my wife gave me an Omega calibre 1861 Moonwatch years ago, and I nearly always wear it. But a few years ago, I got an Apple Watch for running, and now I often wear both, because I like the heart monitor, the haptic hints while driving, and don't always have my phone along. I wish the Apple Watch had a face that didn't have a time display.

bpesquet3• 3 years ago

Personal and subjective opinion ahead.

Any smartwatch will become unusable, polluting garbage a few years (months?) from now: a canonical example of planned obsolescence. Their self-tracking functions are a double-edged sword, a source of stress as much as relief.

Any well-built and well-maintained mechanical watch will last you decades. No dependencies on electricity and network connectivity, it's a self-contained and entirely autonomous piece of human engineering. Mine was built in 1975 and is one year older than me. In a world where everything fades away so fast, wearing it everyday feels like owning a precious relic.

Easy choice if you ask me.

naremu5• 3 years ago

No dependencies on electricity and network connectivity, it's a self-contained and entirely autonomous piece of human engineering.

This already veers straight back into the marketing territory that everyone in this thread remarks was an eye opener when they actually got a mechanical watch.

I have a mild prepper tendency and I had to eventually kill my romantic views of mechanicals when I realized it just time drift and wouldn't last long without regular maintenance from someone with the tools and knowledge/skill, not to mention someone in this very comment section mentions a mechanical watch suffering a death from drop onto carpeted floor.

Mechanical watches are cool, but I easily spend less time without my PineTime (which I'm surprised nobody else in these comments has even mentioned) working than my friend spends manually syncing his seiko back to time/maintaining it.

runeb• 3 years ago

I wish I could buy an Apple Watch without screen, crown and button. Just a smart disc to record all my Health and activity data, worn under my wristwatch

Volrath89• 3 years ago

wouldn't this be the perfect use case for the hybrid watches? I am looking forward to buy a Kronaby for next year.

cloogshicer• 3 years ago

I've been a long time admirer of the interactive animations on this site.

What tool/library would you pick to create similar ones yourself?

Looking at the source [1], the author seems to hand-craft them using the canvas API, but man, that seems really difficult!

[1] https://ciechanow.ski/js/watch.js

naet• 3 years ago

Bartosz does an amazing job of making custom interactives and animations to support his articles. It looks like he uses custom canvas with webgl for the 3d renders.

There are 3d engines in JavaScript like three.js (https://threejs.org/) that can abstract some of the 3d rendering work for you.

amitp2• 3 years ago

I agree with naet that threejs might be the thing to look at if you want to make 3d animations. My own interactive diagrams are 2d, and I often use svg with reactive data filling in the parameters. [1] I've also tried hand crafting and it's not so bad for pages like this. They're mostly write-once pages, not software that's being maintained for many years. Some of our intuitions are out of whack when they tell us that we need abstractions and frameworks for maintainability.

[1] https://www.redblobgames.com/making-of/circle-drawing/

amelius• 3 years ago

I was hoping this is based on an open source physics engine, but apparently it's all handcrafted.

bejd• 3 years ago

Nice to see this again. Such a clear breakdown of a complex topic, presented beautifully.

Tangentially related, the documentary The Watchmaker's Apprentice [0] is a captivating look at the dedication it takes to create a mechanical watch. It's amazing that it's possible for a single person to craft each tiny cog and spring from scratch and put it all together.

[0] http://www.thewatchmakersapprentice.com/

lloeki• 3 years ago

Same fantastic format, different topics:

- bicycle: https://ciechanow.ski/bicycle/ https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35343495

- sound: https://ciechanow.ski/sound/ https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33249215

fellerts• 3 years ago

This blog is what got me into the fabulous hobby of watch repairing. Well, this blog and Marshall's awesome repair videos over at Wristwatch Revival: https://www.youtube.com/@WristwatchRevival

Watch repairing is a very rewarding hobby. It requires copious amounts of patience, but there's something fundamentally satisfying about disassembling something to its individual components, cleaning them and reassembling them meticulously. These things are designed to be taken apart, and it shows. I'm hard-pressed to think of other modern day objects that are meant to do this.

sricciardi• 3 years ago

These things are designed to be taken apart, and it shows. I'm hard-pressed to think of other modern day objects that are meant to do this.

A mechanical film camera (say, a Leica) is similar. They are also meant to be opened, cleaned up, lubed, etc...

j4yav2• 3 years ago

Espresso machines, as well, and vintage stereo equipment. I have really come to appreciate the zen of user-serviceable physical stuff.

eggy2• 3 years ago

Lenovo vs. Apple notebooks. My ThinkPad T430u comes apart simply and you can remove subassemblies quite easily. I replaced the touchpad and battery on my daughters MacBook Pro and it was a nightmare.

mikestew• 3 years ago

A co-worker keeps a blog of his watch restorations. I have no interest in the hobby, but I do have an interest in viewing the work of someone that does. Of particular interest to me is that what he restores isn't high-end stuff, but common watches that might have one particular bit of history that makes them interesting. Radium dials, for example.

https://www.westcoasttime.net

graphe3• 3 years ago

Guns, small engines, and 3D printers are its larger modern cousins.

bluescrn2• 3 years ago

3D printers have very little mechanical complexity. It's all in the software.

If it wasn't for the computing power/software complexity required, hobbyist 3D printers could probably have been a thing in the 70s or 80s

CamperBob22• 3 years ago

'1337 watch-repairing skillz qualify you to work on nukes: https://apnews.com/article/nuclear-warheads-military-bomb-pl...

   There are thousands of tiny parts inside each warhead, 
   so steady hands are key. That’s why technicians go 
   through a skills assessment that includes disassembling 
   and assembling a mechanical wristwatch.

MeImCounting2• 3 years ago

Pocket knives! Nice modern pocket knives should be disassembled and maintained regularly.

maxerickson• 3 years ago

I have a Kershaw Leek, which while it isn't particularly expensive, is easily on the "cost exceeds direct utility" side of things, is easy to take apart, and I can't imagine what I would regularly take it apart for.

jrockway• 3 years ago

That is a great channel. It's definitely made me consider getting into that hobby. Seems very relaxing.

tomchuk• 3 years ago

Very relaxing. Until impossibly small $15 Incabloc springs start flying around the room. I'm convinced these sublimate into a vapor the moment they fly out of view of your loupe.

shostack• 3 years ago

I wish there was a good beginner level entry point with a kit or something. But most of what I saw was "you need to build your own tools and then you can start" and that's too high a barrier for me.

Is there by chance a simulator of this on Steam if a good beginner hobby kit doesn't exist?

kQq9oHeAz6wLLS• 3 years ago

Bah, don't listen to 'em. Inexpensive set of jeweler's screwdrivers, and pair of precision tweezers, some sort of magnifying device, and a couple oils (use Liberty oil for the pivots, it's cheap but good enough to start). Cheap oiler tools off eBay or amazon. I have maybe $50 in tools.

Buy some cheap movements off eBay, and dive in. Yeah, you'll lose parts and break things but you'll learn a bunch.

I have a couple Westclox watches from the 60s that I bought for $10/each on eBay, and they both now run at +/- 2 seconds a day.

Double_a_923• 3 years ago

A set of small screwdrivers (at least one 0.8mm and one 1.2mm or so), pointy tweezers and a movement holder should be all you need to try the hobby out.

The screwdrivers and tweezers should be of good quality though, at least get the ones that cost 3-4$ each from China.

And you don't even need a mechanical watch. Cheap quartz watches also have tiny interesting parts in them that you can try to disassemble and reassemble.

webnrrd2k• 3 years ago

I think that older film cameras have a very satisfying-to-use quality to them. I find that an Olympus OM-2 with a good lens feels sooo nice to use.

I know, not exactly the same as repairing fine watches, but I think it might be similar.

systemvoltage• 3 years ago

Marshall’s channel is amazing. He is so humble and always curious about learning. It got me into watchmaking as well, primarily because his attitude of “If I can do it, so can you!”.

Double_a_923• 3 years ago

These things are designed to be taken apart

This is so true. I used to repair phones and other gadgets before starting with watch repair... and I was kinda scared to take apart something filigree like a watch because it surely would never go back togheter properly.

But no, everything goes back togheter fine without having to apply any kind of force. If it doesn't it's 99% my fault. E.g. even tiny screwholes are slightly tapered so the screws kinda fall in there automatically.

saiya-jin• 3 years ago

Watches are pretty amazing, a mechanical engineering marvel crammed into tiny compartment that can easily keep working for 100 years with minimal upkeep, very sturdy, looking great at almost any design era and helping with time. I never got the lure of 'smart' watches of these days, they all look like plastic toys for kids including most expensive ones, definitely when compared to good mechanical watches. Also in formal environment its one of few 'jewelry' items that are always allowed along with wedding ring, anything else may raise eyebrows and give negative points depending on location/company.

I've seen people's OCD around me or similar issues getting worse with arrival of smart watches and nearly constant interruptions from notifications. Yet those folks don't turn them off even if I mention visible degradation on their part, I guess then they would end up with charging-needy expensive-yet-soon-obsolete gadget without much else (sport monitoring is cool for some folks, again I simply don't get the desire for constant measurements and comparisons - for me it takes away most of the fun that sports should be in first place, I focus on being challenged at my current level, not chasing some meaningless numbers).

I guess if one is 'free' from such things the described effect is less bad, but why the heck would I ever wanted to be notified instantly on my hand when something happens? Peace of mind and clear focus are rare and precious things these days, and this destroys it for few seconds of dopamine kick.

randomcarbloke• 3 years ago

wearing a wristwatch with full formal is still a bit of a faux pas.

Rudism• 3 years ago

I have a relatively inexpensive Seiko 5 mechanical watch that I really like, but as much as I love the idea of mechanical watches I simply don't have the patience to tend to it. Accuracy is a big problem (at least with my specific watch). Half of the time it's magnetized and running a few minutes fast per day, and the other half (shortly after de-magnetizing it) it's running a few minutes slow per day, meaning I needed to remember to adjust it every morning and always had to assume there's at least a minute or two margin of error one way or the other any time I read it--almost completely defeating my reason for wearing a watch in the first place.

For a while I wore a solar-powered Casio that self-adjusted every morning using the NIST atomic clock radio signals, and the peace of mind knowing that my watch was always accurate was such a pleasure in comparison. It was kind of cheap build quality and eventually fell apart, but I don't think I'll ever go back to a mechanical watch again after that.

alpaca1282• 3 years ago

Accuracy can vary a lot even within one price segment. My Seiko 5 was pretty inaccurate too, while my current watch cost 30 bucks more and has less than 3 seconds deviation per day. So I set the time once every 1-2 months and that's perfectly fine for me. But it's definitely not the most practical tech.

almost completely defeating my reason for wearing a watch in the first place.

Maybe it's just me but I don't need perfect accuracy on a wristwatch. If one minute more or less matters I'm already too late anyway.

shimonabi• 3 years ago

I'm the same. I had several Seiko 5 watches in the past and even modded one of them with a hacking mechanism. I would monitor the accuracy every week with a timegrapher app on the phone and try to make small adjustments.

The convenience of having a modern Bluetooth-syncing cheap Xiaomi fitess watch is so great I don't believe I'll ever go back.

WillPostForFood3• 3 years ago

Half of the time it's magnetized and running a few minutes fast per day, and the other half (shortly after de-magnetizing it)

Wow, that's bad. Do you know what is magnetizing it? A cheap Seiko 5 should be able to keep time within a few seconds a day. Minutes a day means it is broken. It isn't a just tuning issue, there is something else going on.

bayindirh3• 3 years ago

Yes, it sounds a degaussing and calibration. My simple Seiko 5 with 7S36C is within +/- 4 seconds per day, and I never adjust it except short-month skipping.

drivers99• 3 years ago

I also got really into learning about watches and watching a watch repair stream on twitch (in 2020), and I even pulled out my great-grandfather's pocket watch from the 1890s and got it serviced/repaired (or at least running again for a while but now it won't run again; I suspect the person I took it to didn't do a great job).

When it came to buying a watch for myself I also ended up also getting a solar powered Casio with NIST synchronization ("Waveceptor"), the type with hands (for the looks). I love the idea that it's technology without software updates or battery changes (hmm, does the battery you charge with solar wear out?), and always keeps perfect time to the second without any effort on my part. This one (price seems a lot higher than before): https://www.casio.com/us/watches/casio/product.WVA-M640D-1A/

Somehow, watching all those meticulous adjustments to make sure the mechanical watches kept good time made me prioritize that to the point I didn't even get a mechanical watch.

jerlam2• 3 years ago

Even though my mechanical watch wasn't as inaccurate as yours (mine was only a minute or two off a week), the act of regularly adjusting it to match the true time slowly changed my impression of it from a "serious timekeeping device", the image cultivated by marketing, into "this is a silly hobby for people who have too much time and money". Doubly so when you look how much it costs to repair a mechanical watch.

This single-use timekeeping device was literally the least accurate timekeeping device on my person, compared to my phone and computer.

aredox2• 3 years ago

It's also the only timekeeping device that will still work after three days away from an electric plug, and the only one you would wear all you life.

1 second/day is 10 PPM. Reaching that accuracy with only mechanical means in a device small and robust enough to be worn on the body is something to admire, not to fault for its limits.

93po• 3 years ago

People (including myself) often wear mechanical watches because they really enjoy the engineering/history/whatever of mechanical movements. To me, I enjoy getting to wind my watch/set the date and time/have a reason to interact with it. I enjoy that it's a conversation starter for some people (hey, nice watch!) and for others it's an opportunity to talk about something I enjoy. It's also nice that it's aesthetically very pleasing compared to a random seiko or electric watch.

eggy2• 3 years ago

Well, when the collapse happens and you have no batteries, satellites, etc., you can use the stars[1] to tell time and reset your mechanical watch to within a reasonable estimate given the circumstances. I own a relatively cheap mechancal watch I adjust every week. I bought a Garmin vs. an Apple/Samsung watch too. My Garmin battery lasts about 20 to 24 days depending on how I use the watch vs. 24 to 48 hours. It does more than I need, but has come in handy in my line of work.

[1] https://www.timeanddate.com/astronomy/tell-time-by-stars.htm...

LegitShady• 3 years ago

I own a cheap seiko 5 as well. It's basically so close to perfect you need a specialized device that measures its error to a ridiculous degree to figure out its running slightly fast. It's like average 3 point something seconds a day.

There's something wrong with your watch.

rounakdatta• 3 years ago

It's almost about time that Bartosz releases his next illustration, excited!

allsunny• 3 years ago

There’s no doubt that smart watches offer way more functionality than a mechanical watch which is appealing to most consumers. However, what you’re buying with mechanical watches is more a form of art these days, and, for certain watches (eg Rolex) a status symbol. As someone who has always been drawn to watches (of all kinds), I really enjoyed this article. I even took off my watch (Omega Planet Ocean) and peered through the exhibition case back to take a look at the balance wheel and double barrels. Thanks for sharing!

ktt87882• 3 years ago

Fanstastic animations!

ktt87882• 3 years ago

Fantastic animations!

denton-scratch• 3 years ago

A beautifully made web-page, fitting for a watchmaker. Lovely animations. I'm impressed!

KaiserPro3• 3 years ago

There are semi-electric versions of mechanical watches based on "tuning fork" movements. They are cheap and accurate, and are a stepping stone between mechanical and quartz from the 60s/70s

I don't have the skills or machinery to make a wristwatch sized version, but I did make a _big_ sized version: https://www.secretbatcave.co.uk/projects/electromechanical-c...

aidenn03• 3 years ago

For a clock, could a worm drive provide the necessary reduction without the microscopic teeth? Tamiya sells small drives with a 150:1 reduction ratio.

dexwiz• 3 years ago

I imagine the increased surface area of the worm drive may cause more loss to friction than desirable.

KaiserPro3• 3 years ago

Possibly, its less the reduction, more the "stroke" of the vibration (ie how far the tuning fork moves backwards and forwards.)

I think for a large tuning fork, you _could_ use normal watch gears. However I don't have the skill to try that, yet.

Aaronstotle• 3 years ago

I have an Oris Aquis Date that I purchased for myself a few months ago, I love looking at the flywheel movement and hearing the tick when I put it up to my ear.

nicholasjarnold• 3 years ago

Hugely popular original posting of this - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31261533

m3kw9• 3 years ago

Hard to beat this for explaining how a mechanical watch really works

g9yuayon• 3 years ago

This reminds me of Dave Sobel's book Longitude, which tells a fascinating story on how John Harrison created the first reliable marine clock. Such stories humble me and make me deeply appreciate the ingenuity of mankind to conquer the seemingly impossible challenges to build the civilization we enjoy today.

nobulus• 3 years ago

Great article!

jstanley• 3 years ago

My project at the moment is to try to make a mechanical watch.

The concept is that it will only have one hand (the hour hand), and the mainspring barrel will encircle the entire movement, you'll wind it up by rotating the bezel (and therefore the outer part of the barrel) clockwise, and the mainspring will drive the inner barrel clockwise. The hour hand is mounted directly on the inner barrel (which therefore completes 1 revolution per 12 hours), and the rest of the movement only exists to regulate the speed at which the inner barrel rotates. So the rest of the movement will be a series of gearings-down, with an escapement at the end.

And to set the time, the movement will be mounted into the case with a ratchet, such that when you turn the bezel anticlockwise, the entire movement (and therefore the hand) rotates anticlockwise allowing you to set the hand. You'll only be able to set it as precisely as the ratchet (i.e. you'd need 720 positions of the ratchet to set it to 1-minute precision), but the watch will never keep particularly good time anyway so I don't think this is a problem.

Yesterday I got an escapement at almost-watch-scale ticking for the first time, albeit erratically and requiring enormous drive torque: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xvNODOp6uBc (3d printed for expediency, the real one will all be machined; and I say "almost-watch-scale" because although it fits inside the 50mm diameter that I am aiming for, it is obviously too thick to go inside a sensible watch).

I have more info in this post: https://incoherency.co.uk/blog/stories/the-watch-project.htm...

knodi123• 3 years ago

wow, that's really impressive for 3-d printed and being built from first principles!

fuzzfactor• 3 years ago

Looking at drawings 3 & 4, these linear vs rotational springs are analogous considering they are each at rest in the center of the user control slider. They can act like a spring in either direction, and are basically sitting there in the neutral or non-energy-storing condition (zero-sprung or zero-wound respectively) until you move the slider away from the center position.

Take a look at the 9th or 10th interactive drawing, where you can move the slider to the right to wind the mainspring, then release the slider to watch the mainspring unwind.

When the energy is depleted, all the bands in the coil are bunched up around the outside of the barrel. It's not much of a spring any more.

This is the same type of torsion spring as in drawing 4 but with the mainspring being used for primary energy storage there is no desire for recovery to a neutral position from both clockwise & counterclockwise directions like you see in drawing 4. Instead you only need to ever draw energy from storage to use in a single rotational direction. Opposite rotation is used only to store externally applied energy.

So you wind it in one direction to store energy then it releases the energy in the opposite direction.

But without the precurvature shown in drawing 11 the torsion spring would tend to be exhausted when it was "zero-wound" like the one in drawing 4, with the coils widely spaced away from each other, free to absorb & recover energy from either rotational direction. And since we only need to draw energy in one rotational direction, that amounts to only half of the energy the spring is capable of storing for our purposes. Notice how about half the length of the spring is coiled similarly to drawing 4, with the upper half of the loose spring coiled less tightly and in the opposite direction.

Because when our mainspring is exhausted, we want it to be bunched up along the outside of the barrel so we get the most out of it before it needs to be retensioned. And when it's fully retensioned we want to get maximum energy storage from the hardware so at that starting point we want the coils to be tighly wound, bunched up around the arbor.

But not too tight.

Or it could be overwound.

As long as there is some space in between the coils, when recovering rotational energy you have access to what is stored along the entire length of the free portion of the coil. But once it's wound tightly enough for the coils to be in significant direct concentric contact, the free portion of the coil becomes so small it does not contain enough energy to drive the timekeeping mechanism.

It could get so tight that it's not much of a spring any more. Closer to a solid cylinder with a slight tab hanging off.

Which is more of a problem when both ends of the torsion spring are permanently attached to their substrates.

Instead in these drawings, the color-coded metal strip is used to provide a friction grip between the outer end of the coil and the barrel, strong enough grip to drive the timekeeping mechanism but designed to slip counterclockwise within the barrel if manual winding proceeeds more than necessary, slipping before the coil can get wound too tightly.

Basically, overcharge protection for a non-electric hardware device.

asylteltine• 3 years ago

This guys blog is crazy how does he have the time and knowledge to make all these intricate animations

incahoots• 3 years ago

Did anyone notice the animated example was giving the proper real time, right at the precise second too.

vietvu• 3 years ago

Damn, when I decided that I don't want a mechanical watch anymore, you convince me otherwise with this.

bvan• 3 years ago

These animations are just phenomenal - best I’ve seen by far.

redbell• 3 years ago

This is the type of content that never gets old.

The original post [1] was ranking #4 as the highest-upvoted story on Hacker News before it got kicked to #5 last August by Bram Moolenaar's death announcement [2], then to #6 after Altman's saga ranked #3 a few weeks ago.

Over all, this story is classified as #1 in creative content that is not in the genre of news or announcements.

_____________________________

1. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31261533

2. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37011324

mikestaub• 3 years ago

Bitcoin is like a virtual Swiss watch, with the base layer being the center wheel and PoW mining being the mainspring. The third wheel is the BIP300 protocol and the fourth wheel is LN and other L2s. The nodes are the balance wheels. https://youtu.be/9_QsCLYs2mY

aswinmohanme• 3 years ago

I bought a mechanical watch after reading this blog post and it's been my daily driver since. It always brings a smile to look at it and see what fine craftsmanship and mechanical intelligence can achieve.

lldoraMay• 3 years ago

Diving into watch repairing? It's like the DIY version of a puzzle game - tricky but super satisfying. Hats off to the internet for turning casual viewers into budding horologists. And for those who just enjoy restoration blogs, it's cool to be a fan without getting your hands dirty. As for beginners seeking an easy start, a watch repair simulator game sounds like a fun, stress-free way to dip your toes in. Whether you're a hands-on tinkerer or a digital-only enthusiast, every tiny screw and spring brings its own adventure.

waltwalther• 3 years ago

I worked at a local-owned jewelry store for years (starting out as on-call computer guy). The kind with an old fashion in-house jeweler who did all repairs himself (setting stones, resizing rings, cleanings, etc). We did everything EXCEPT most watch repairs. We changed batteries in the quartz watches, and replaced and repaired bands, and performed some minor repairs of mechanical watches, but we sent out most watch repairs to a watchmaker several cities away.

The boss, who was an old jeweler who had started out in the business as a boy in the fifties working under a jeweler and watchmaker, always said that watchmakers are a dying breed, and could pretty much name their price.

When I started working and learning the trade we had two watchmakers that we shipped to. Within two years one of those had retired, and we were unable to find a replacement for him.

I loved working and repairing jewelry (even more so that my fulltime job in IT for local gov), and wanted to become a watchmaker, but my life took me elsewhere. Now that I am older and in a better place in life I often think of those three years, and have been considering obtaining the tools to start up a hobby in one or the other...or both.

Thank you, OP, for an awesome post and link.

hotpotamus• 3 years ago

Like any hobby, there is a YouTube culture around mechanical wristwatch maintenance/repair these days if you want to learn more. If I remember correctly, there’s a channel called Wristwatch Revival that is quite good.

yolkedgeek• 3 years ago

OMG this was such a beautiful and interesting article. I was so impressed I HAD to leave a comment

jmclaughlinhn• 3 years ago

Thanks for reminding me to wind my watch.

Mechanical Watch (2022)

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