FOUND Hamilton 992b Pocket Watch with Model 11 case and porcelain dial

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So... what next?

an 18s Bunn Special with a gothic dial perhaps?

or maybe a nice Ball.

you’ve well and truly fallen down the rabbit hole now buddy... @Canuck and I will set a chair by the fire with a cold beer for when you join us in the loony bin.

LOL, yes, please put a six pack in the cooler for me. Maybe a Vanguard with up/down indicator? A good goal for 2022/23
 
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LOL, yes, please put a six pack in the cooler for me. Maybe a Vanguard with up/down indicator? A good goal for 2022/23
LOL, yes, please put a six pack in the cooler for me. Maybe a Vanguard with up/down indicator? A good goal for 2022/23
Nice choice... i happen to be wearing my 1928 23j 6pos Vanguard this week

and yes, it has a wind indicator.

there’s Newcastle Brown Ale chilling for you both.
 
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The previously mentioned Waltham... ran great until this thing fell out...
 
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The previously mentioned Waltham... ran great until this thing fell out...

Dang, isn’t that a beauty 😀 Or sure why a power reserve indicator wasn’t more prevalent - it looks dope and serves a purpose. And yes, put the springy bits back in...
 
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Dang, isn’t that a beauty 😀 Or sure why a power reserve indicator wasn’t more prevalent - it looks dope and serves a purpose. And yes, put the springy bits back in...
Put it back? Naw... i’ll get my watchmaker to wedge a quartz movement in, then i won’t need a wind indicator just a few batteries

i think wind indicators are rare because they added to the cost of an expensive tool that a lot off the users resented having to pay for to begin with.
 
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Put it back?
i think wind indicators are rare because they added to the cost of an expensive tool that a lot off the users resented having to pay for to begin with.

That sounds about right. Other than you and @Mad Dog , who do you suppose the buyers for these power reserve indicator watches were? RR execs?
 
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Many railroad time standard forbade the railroad employee from re-setting his own watch. That was supposed to be done only by the railroad watch inspector if re-setting was necessary, each time the employee visited the inspector.
(Often, every two weeks!) That way, it was supposed to be the role of the inspector, to allow him to monitor the accuracy of the watch. So the up/down indicator was handy in terms of not letting the watch run down. Talk to an old time railroader, and he’ll likely tell you that these people re-set their own watches, all the time! Sometimes, the inhuman shifts these people had to work, made it a regular occurrence that his watch was allowed to run down.

Because railroads operated on strict time schedules, it was vital that a crew operating a train, didn’t find their watch (or watches) had run down, part way through a trip!

I have one of those Vanguard up/down models, myself. Not a great picture.

Edited:
 
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Heh, I remember asking about the Wind indicator on a watch when I was a newbie. I thought it was odd trains needed to know, or that a watch could tell, or was needed to tell, which way the wind blew. Up/Down made even less sense ....... until I heard someone say it out loud and had that flash of learning mixed with more than a touch of embarrassment. Wind, wind, whatever.... 🙄
 
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Heh, I remember asking about the Wind indicator on a watch when I was a newbie. I thought it was odd trains needed to know, or that a watch could tell, or was needed to tell, which way the wind blew. Up/Down made even less sense ....... until I heard someone say it out loud and had that flash of learning mixed with more than a touch of embarrassment. Wind, wind, whatever.... 🙄
LOL
 
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Many railroad time standard forbade the railroad employee from re-setting his own watch. That was supposed to be done only by the railroad watch inspector if re-setting was necessary, each time the employee visited the inspector.
(Often, every two weeks!) That way, it was supposed to be the role of the inspector, to allow him to monitor the accuracy of the watch. So the up/down indicator was handy in terms of not letting the watch run down. Talk to an old time railroader, and he’ll likely tell you that these people re-set their own watches, all the time! Sometimes, the inhuman shifts these people had to work, made it a regular occurrence that his watch was allowed to run down.

Because railroads operated on strict time schedules, it was vital that a crew operating a train, didn’t find their watch (or watches) had run down, part way through a trip!

I have one of those Vanguard up/down models, myself. Not a great picture.


my dad was on the engines for 14 years and told a lot of watch stories. Not only did he set his watch he would occasionally adjust the regulator a tiny bit to improve the timekeeping. Even worse, he would have an acrylic crystal put in which was strictly taboo as they would discolour. But they didn’t break quite as readily as glass. He said you knew you’d done the crystal in when you heard the watch go *dink* against the side of the toilet bowl as you sat yourself down on the john.

i think i still have a copy of the timekeeping rules around here.
 
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Time service rules for the Canadian Pacific Railway dated 1962 specify only that the employee with a railroad standard watch “must not regulate the watch”. It discusses at length, protocols for the employee who carries the watch. When the employee arrives for a trip, his watch must be compared with a designated standard clock. The time when the watch is compared with a standard clock, the result of such comparison must be recorded on the prescribed form, (the card the employee must carry at all times). If the watch is set (re-set), the word set must be recorded, along with the variation. (So CPR employees were permitted to re-set their own watches, it appears).

After this handbook was published, the mandatory visit to the railroad watch inspector every 90 days was amended to 180 days. If the watch no longer could maintain the requisite 30-second per week standard of accuracy, the watch must be surrendered to the watch inspector for service, at which time the inspector provided the employee with a loaner watch. The costs for such service as might be required, were borne by the employee.
 
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...After this handbook was published, the mandatory visit to the railroad watch inspector every 90 days was amended to 180 days. If the watch no longer could maintain the requisite 30-second per week standard of accuracy, the watch must be surrendered to the watch inspector for service, at which time the inspector provided the employee with a loaner watch. The costs for such service as might be required, were borne by the employee.

@Canuck , did they have timegraphers back then, or did they need to bounce their eyeballs back and forth from the standard clock to the pocket watch?
 
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@Canuck , did they have timegraphers back then, or did they need to bounce their eyeballs back and forth from the standard clock to the pocket watch?

By ‘“timegraphers”, did you mean timing machines? The first watch manufacturing company to use electronic timing machines was Hamilton, and that was in 1931. When a railroader compared his standard watch to the standard clock, it was a visual comparison. A second difference here or there was not critical.