I have a 552 Cal Movement in a SM 300 case. The watch stopped dead after a few weeks wearing it. Sent it nack to the watchmaker who informed me that the mainspring barrel top had come loose due to a hard knock. My watches are not usually subjected to knocks of any sort so that was a bit surprising but that is another story for now.

So back on the MS barrel went and back the watch came only to stop dead a day or so later. Send back. Turns out the MS barrel lid is worn so new one ordered fitted and watch returned. Lo and behold the watch stops again. Now its the actual barrel that is also worn thus the new lid does not get enough purchase to be tight enough. New Barrel ordered and fitted watch comes back to me. (3 months down the line this time around)

I wore it all of 2 days and you guessed it. It stops again. Send it back, watchmaker calls and says he replaced the sweep second pinion because there was a bit of a wobble, re overhauled the movement and couldn't find anything else wrong and has tested it for two days and it appears fine. He mentions that he can't see that the wobbling Sweep Second Pinion could cause the watch to stop dead like that (it actually stopped and then somewhere along the line ran for an additional six hours or so) but as he says he overhauled it again and couldn't find anything else wrong.

So this is a bit of a mystery to me. The movement granted was bought as is from an e-bay vendor and was overhauled by the authorised Omega watchmaker with my full expectation that all manner of parts would need to be replaced. For those in the know, is it reasonable to expect the worn parts such as the mainspring barrel and cover and the wobbling sweep seconds pinion to be picked up during the initial servicing or is this typically something that could be expected to only manifest after the watch has been worn for a period of time?

I'm feeling a bit frustrated at the moment about this. Since I changed from the date to the dateless dial this watch has been in the workshop a lot longer than it has been on my wrist!

 

Yes, absolutely. After complete disassembly and cleaning of the movement parts, all parts should be inspected thoroughly for wear or damage, and anything suspect should be repaired or replaced as is appropriate. This includes checking parts for wear under a microscope, checking that wheels are true, etc.

When assembling the mainspring barrel lid to the drum, it's pretty easy to tell if the lid is very loose. I replace barrels more for worn holes in them rather than loose lids, but still if the lid goes on too easy it should be picked up at the time of service.

No one does perfect work all the time, but after the first instance of the lid coming off due to a shock then I would be looking very closely at the barrel condition if it had come back to me...

Cheers, Al

 

Thanks Archer. I agree 100% with your comment about nobody doing perfect work all the time as no one and nothing is infallible. I was quite surprised about the second and third time and it started to look a bit shoddy to me to be honest and like some corners were being cut.

As to the shock issue, the watch came back with the straight grain refinished and a little reverse divot along the polished back edge of the lug. Must've been a hard knock to displace the metal like that, I certainly never knocked it with a fraction of the force required. Anyway what to do, its not like I can prove that it left my possession perfect nor what happened in transit even though I package this thing like the Mars Rover landing module. Thanks again