RGM Service Experience

I love the whole story of RGM, and I am perpetually fascinated by guilloché techniques and patterns. Having said that, the RGM style isn't one that I find incredibly appealing, but I can totally appreciate and admire the skill and craftsmanship and philosophy that goes into it.

ooh I see they're an authorized service center for Titoni. Maybe when it's time to send my grandfather's watch in I'll give them a holler.

I've never been to RGM but I've had several of their watches and I've used their service center. All good for me.

Somehow, I have missed the existence of this thread.

So far, RGM has serviced a JLC Memovox, two Enicar Sherpa Graphs, a Gallet Electa trench watch, and four Gallet multichron 12 watches for me . . . and in each case the watches came back running well, and more importantly, running as if new when checked on the timegrapher. In one case, RGM had to manufacture a spring, complete with Geneve striping, machine marks, for one of my EP40-68 watches, documented elsewhere here.



One of my MC12H watches needed to have the central hands cleaned up and relumed:



And on the occasion of servicing the first Sherpa Graph by them, we decided that a case opening tool was necessary. They made one for themselves and one for me:



I added a handle to it so that it could be used "by hand"



In one case I had to send a watch back because, in one combination position only, the chrono central seconds hand caught the central minutes hand, a minor QC miss.

When I first started working with them some years ago, their turnaround time was under six months and in a couple of cases about 3 months. The last two watches I sent to them were returned in over a year and subsequently, Roland suggested that I check with them to see how the queue was running before sending in another watch.

The above is not meant to be criticism as, from what I have seen, most well-established quality watchmakers have relatively large service queues and the wait to get the watch back is longer than some years ago.

RGM must be among the best of the very few independent full-service watchmakers remaining.

Was not happy with RGM service. I had them service this Sinn.

When I sent it in for a service, I said the bund hand slips a little can you fix this when you service the movement. The pendent in the sweep bund hand needed to be tightened think RGM glued it. So, when I got it back from service it did not last long. When I contacted them about it, they wanted to put a regular 103 hand on it to fix the problem. This is special 103 with hand wind movement and the bund hand you take that away you ruin it. Had to send it to Zaf at classicwatch when they use to service watches to have the pendent tightened that the part at the end of the hand that connects to the watch. Now works perfect and better than ruining the watch with the wrong hand for this model. I had to pay twice to get it right. A simple job they could not perform.

They serviced a Sinn 156 I had. I need to send my Fortis 24hr watches to them. Maybe they'll be repaired correctly.

Was before the pandemic so some years ago they might have improved. Maybe they are trained on just servicing the movements, but the simple stuff old time watchmakers know how to do the odd jobs like a simple hand repair they might be a little lost and might know how to do it now. Or it's for speed to get the watch in and out like not fixing the hand and just putting a new hand on.

I've tried two different outfits (neither RGM) to get them repaired and now they're practically trashed; they came back worse than when I sent them in. I just need the stem/crown/tubes replaced and a simple movement service. I want the hands aligned properly and the date to turn over on time. I have a Glycine Airman 2000 that needs the similar work but the Glycine US center is pretty bad so it just sits in the drawer.

It was an unfortunate experience for you.

I guess, like in most things in life, a reputation can sometimes become as good as the least talented person on one's staff or be set back with one unsatisfactory experience.

RGM builds watches from scratch. It seems unlikely that 'simple stuff' would be beyond their collective capabilities.

They have the tools to make a new hand tube or pipe if that is what the hand needed. I am in no position to say why they did not want to rework the hand for you, but perhaps they didn't want to assume the risk of dissatisfaction with the repair and the likelihood the hand would have had to be repainted. See note below.

I believe RGM will shy away from a job with which they are uncomfortable.

I'd be reluctant to heavily criticize any watchmaker if I were not satisfied with a single service. I'm not suggesting it is wrong to do so as one may save others some grief. I'm simply stating I would not do it.

I had a monumentally bad experience with Gallet service - no evidence that the watch was ever disassembled even after sending the watch to them three times. Gallet service gave me a 'cock & bull' story each time they returned the watch to me. I personally could not say the watch was not at least partially disassembled, but I benchmark every watch I acquire on the timegrapher and I recheck the watch prior to sending out for service, entering the data into an Excel spreadsheet.

When a watch is returned, it should have excellent amplitude, reasonable S/D timekeeping, with stability on the plot and a low beat error, generally 0.5 msecs or better. The Gallet serviced watch ran like crap and got progressively worse upon each return.

In the end, I bit the bullet and sent it out to RGM and it came back running like I would expect, ticking all the right parameters on the timegrapher. When I asked what they found, they were hesitant to say at first, but upon my persistence, I was told that the movement was very dirty and looked like it had never been serviced.

I did not condemn Gallet service right away, but waited until I became aware of similar reports from others. I've since urged people to stay away from what is left (one person) of the US Gallet organization, Multichron Service located somewhere in Florida.

Now here is the "Note below:"

I would also recommend Precision Horology, Ashton Tracy though I have only had one experience with him that was very satisfactory..

Ashton serviced an Enicar a 1961 Sherpa Graph Ib "Jim Clark" gray & white for me and it too had a loose central chrono hand. At one point it looked as though it would need a replacement hand pipe or tube which Ashton has remade for others from time to time. In the end, he was able to complete the repair of the hand and there has been no slippage.

I reached out to Ashton in this instance because RGM would not have been able to take in the watch for several months or more and their backlog at the time for return was a year or more. I'm too damn old to wait that long. ;-)

Communication is of primary importance once you know you've got a good watchmaker who is talented . . . and also will set proper expectations for turnaround time.