I just got the an IWC Yacht Club Chronograph w/ screw in crown. You can wind it as you normally would most watches but one of the things I thought was pretty cool is as you screw the crown down, it also winds it. The first couple of times it felt like I was not holding the crown down far enough as I screwed it in but I think it is actually by design. Anyways, I love the watch, might sell it at some point. Here's a pic.

 

This does not compute

 

I couldn't follow any of it TBH. Wind the watch while screwing in the crown. Sure, why not?

 

Efficiency?

 

Seems like it, makes taking a picture with slow shutter speed a pain.

 

There are two types of screw down crown designs. One has a clutch inside the crown that disengages the part of the crown you are turning from the portion that is connected to the winding stem, when the spring inside the crown is compressed. Rolex uses this design, as do others.

Others do not have this clutch, so when the crown turns, the stem turns. The crown still has the telescopic function, but there’s no clutch inside. Omega uses this design on many of their more modern watches.

The design that has the clutch inside can fail, and I’ve had many in my shop that have done so. Personally, I much prefer the style without the clutch, as they are more reliable over time.

The only time the clutch is actually needed is if the watch is a manual winding watch, where the mainspring winds to a hard stop. Examples of those are manually wound vintage Rolex, modern Panerai Radiomir models, etc.

Cheers, Al

 

Thanks for the detailed explanation, Al. I'm still learning every day. It makes absolutely sense that the clutch would be necessary for a hand-winding watch. And from a repair perspective I can see why the non-clutch design could be better.

I was just having a hard time understanding why a user would see this as an important feature (i.e. the ability to wind the watch while screwing in the crown). So you get three extra turns of winding while screwing in the crown?

 

Really great explanation, very detailed. I appreciate it! Thank you!