Is watchmaking really a dying skill?

If I lived close to you (and I don’t know that I don’t), I’d practically beg you to let me look over your shoulder and watch you practice your art (and I’m a 57 year old young man). That I’d ask a 100 questions would probably get me kicked out though. 😀

I have no intention of leaving my day job. I have much lab space and a great low magnification dissecting scope that I can project on a screen if I desire. I actually put a watch under it this afternoon to admire the inner workings of a watch just to see if it would work. I’m in the process of assembling a set of tools and looking for the right ultrasonic cleaner. I have the time many afternoons to piddle with such and still be accessible to my faculty. i just want to be able to one day be able to service what pleases me as a (expensive) hobby.

I don't have much to add to this thread, but here are a couple of comments which may get me into trouble . . . 😉

Even living in the New York City area it is not easy to find a qualified watchmaker nearby to work on one's vintage watches. I had two such watchmaker candidate firms in mind, one of which is in Manhattan, but someone whose opinion I value tried these two ahead of me and had two unpleasant experiences involving multiple watches, an experience which he shared with me in some detail. These two watchmakers are now off my list.

I have had good experiences with two watchmakers and a bad experience with a third where I sent off one watch three times to the same entity and they never did get the watch running properly. I suspected the watch had never been disassembled. I did eventually send it out to Mt. Joy Pennsylvania where it was returned running as new. I was told that the watch was dirty and in need of a full service. My earlier suspicions were confirmed.

A fellow 'in the business' shared with me his opinion that watchmakers are at risk for living a shorter than average life expectancy as a lot of time is spent in a sedentary manner at the bench. He'd recently lost a watchmaker to a heart attack. Of course, one should not generalize as it is quite possible to live a very active life and still do a job that requires that one works at a desk or a bench during most days, but it will take discipline to overcome a potential for not getting enough cardio, I would suppose.

Perhaps dealing with impatient clients will get the heart rate up!

In my experience, sending a vintage watch our for repair is a bit like giving it a very long vacation and the time to return seems to be getting longer. This confirms what we all know: there is a shortage of qualified watchmakers.

Cheers,

~ Joe