While sorting through some watch backs I noticed one had faint almost unreadable markings. (which I Have been unable to photograph.) I was able to make out some words like US Army and Elgin. Further angling with the loupe I was able to extract the following text. US Army A.C. Watch Navigation Hack Type A11 Ser. No.42-9603 Ord No. W535ac-18210 Spec. No 94-27834 Mfgrs. Part. No. 1768 ELGIN. I did a search on this and found a video on one of the You Tube repair sites. Further searching showed what a typical case looked like. That seemed familiar so I went to the drawer of case cores and found one that fit the back. I then went to the box of dials and found a dial (actually 3 dials.) There my luck ended, I do not seem to have any Elgin wrist movements that small. Plenty of Elgin pocket watches, 1/3 of a drawer full. I have plenty of balance staffs (way too many staffs a whole cigar box full. plus one of those bestfit assortment cases. Perhaps something will turn up when I am not looking for it. Have lots of hands too so it is probable I may have some hands. Still it is pretty neat I can match case parts and dial parts. Not sure what I will do with this, Seems these are fairly common and do not sell for much online.
These are the hand and crown I found. The crown is quite worn, but the evidence is that this is a stem for an Elgin 539. I found these in an old pill box too small to contain a watch. (or so I though.) Of course I was not expecting to find any more A11 parts. I looked for this last week with dedication. What I was looking for was a case back that might fit one of the Landeron 48/51 cases. As noted in my recent thread 'Sacrifices to the Floor gods ...' I went down a rabbit hole this morning based on an old post which was recently liked that pointed out the subtle differences in watch calibers, and a link to an archived site which detailed said differences. So when I did spread the parts in that pill box out I got this: The case and dial I found earlier included here for completeness. It is evident though that this seems to be a parts movement. There are two seconds hand bridge, but no wheels. The balance is pivot less, which is not surprising. There is also a lot of oily rust residue, that I would almost state was cosmoline, what a lot of ordnance is packed in. Not sure if this find is a good thing or a bad thing. I have dozens of project watches, with more on the way. (If selling was not full time work, I would probably list the ones I am not likely to get to in this phase of my passion for watches.) Still this sort of feels like finding a bunch of loose change behind the sofa. Perhaps the missing hands will turn up. I have a lot of hands, The loose ones go into empty parts bottles. That though is another thread unto itself for another thread in some distant future. -j
These movements were made in the millions for both military and civilian watches- should be easy enough to find a complete and functioning movement for very little.
It is a good thing these were made in the 10s of millions. Otherwise I would not have found this watch spread through a series of junk drawers and loose parts containers. A lot of the fun in this is finding the parts. little is a relative term though. Finding 'free' parts in the junk drawer is one thing. Finding something online is different. This watch is of low priority. In a lot of ways I stopped collection back in the early 2000s becouse online sites made some of the search too easy. It was one thing to find a treasure that would show up at a mart, flea market or pawn shop. With online one could simply decide what one wanted then press a button. On the other hand a lot of the spam was for cheap watches. I did take another trip down the rabbit hole. Partly as I had this package which is still sealed. I was also able to cross reference what may me the correct balance in my large cigar box full of Elgin staffs. There is also a document 'TM 9-1575.pdf' which can be found with a simple search. This image is also easy to find and is probably posted elsewere on these forums or related ones. Elgin is a curious brand. Probably a textbook example for those interested in business studies. I the heyday of my collecting I loved pocket watches. So to me Elgin was synonymous with 19th century American made Pocket watches. Wrist watches were on the other hand something that was made in Switzerland. Produced in the 100s of millions, one for every US citizen per year. I did not pay them any attention as I was misinformed that these were all imported movements. The art deco stuff was interesting, but the dials are all naff as they usually turned black. It did not help that a lot of the mass produced quartz watches in the 1990s were labeled 'Lord Elgin.' This did even more to tarnish the name. It is probably that I had to take this collection of stuff to get a single part. (Probably a pocket watch balance staff.) Unlike the high value (and equally overproduced chronographs.) A quick cursory search for the parts I would need to fix this example are not as available, even for a price. There also may be a shift happening in availability as well. Only a handful of complete watches are offered with price of the low 100s. I suspect with the you tube videos popularizing this model, that the supply is dwindling. For the same price I can get a junker chronograph with a usable dial. This is not to say the material is not out there. The material houses have store rooms full which are sold as Steampunk art decorations. For the most part it is not worth anyone's time to sort through this. (Why someone will come up with an AI to measure and map this material) Case example the photograph above of the sealed part. It is hard to know what model this fits. Opening the package would only destroy it. Of course it it was the part I need, I would do so, these are not that uncommon. It does seem that we are in a transitional era. What was once low end an common is starting to become scarce. There is a difference between stuff that is rare. (Most book stores and libraries have a rare book room.) Rare just means it is not currently popular, or a common item that sells for a higher price or takes longer to sell. Vintage Elgin watches like this are a good example of a rare item. As @JwRosenthal pointed out these were produced in the millions. Scarcity is what drives market rate. The focus of these forums Omega watches are also rare. Yet if we look a the serial number charts these were also produced in the millions. Probably in the 100s of millions. Which is why the watch industry collapsed in the 1970s. It is also why I was able after a two decade gap to grow my collection by a dozen or so watches or parts 5 of which are branded Omega. Inflation is also a factor. One gets used to paying a certain price. For myself this is 65USD. I do not like paying more than that. This of course limits what one can look at. On the other hand I have a few watches I would like to sell for say 400 to 500USD. But the market states that these may currently be selling for 120 to 250USD. While what I have is rare, it is not particularly scarce. Pretty much everything I have can be found online. None of it is scarce, and there are plenty of other example to supply demand. My interest however are focused learning more about the stuff I do have. Most though is about the dreams for what is to come. Probably why I have so many project watches for which this is probably one of 100. Mostly though I am addicted to information overload, Which I find this forum supplies way to much of. -j
I have been keeping a search open for Elgin 539 parts for this. A few weeks back one came up for auction. I jumped on it and got it for a good price. Usually these seem to go for closer to 250USD and I have seen dials go for 90. This evening it finally came. Looks like it is mostly there. Hairspring got tangled, but the movement I want to restore has a decent balance. The dial looks a bit like it was in a fire. The hand is blued at the root. The numerals are grey and do not pop like they do on the other dials. Since the movement parts I found in the junk drawer has the sweep hand I am surprised the other hands did not turn up. I did find some gold leaf hands online when I was looking for Omega 351 hands. My plan was to paint them white. I think the balance assembly is shared with the 554. I have a number of balance/hairspring combinations which are likely candidates for staff replacement. These may not have been the parts I was looking for, They are the parts I found. Now if I could just find a 2631 or 2637 case for a similar price ...
from the elgin chart I have, the 554 balance staffmatches the 539 but only the 580 has a matching hairspring ... not sure if that matters