Hey all,

Sorry if this topic has been discussed to death but the search function doesn't bring up a lot when you search for this. I picked up a FOIS from an AD around 2 months ago and have noticed pretty inconsistent time loss. Some days, the watch will have gained 2 seconds, and other days lose almost 15. Just wondering what everybody elses experience is with their speedies and 1861 movts. I'm aware Omega's tolerances for the watch is +/- 1-10sec/day and that it's not chronometer rated, but a little insight would ease my mind.

Additionally, I'm not able to psedo-hack my watch by slightly turning the crown backwards. I've read that this quirk manifests eventually after the lubricants settle in, but it's been almost 2 months and I'm still not able to do so. Thanks

 

It depends on how/how much you wear it, how much and how often you wind it and how you place it when not wearing.

Winding it to full at the same time each day and placing it in the same position at night should even out the time keeping.

You may find that the rest positions will slightly affect gain or loss overnight, so some experimenting may be needed.

Consistent and regular wearing and winding should solve the problem.

As to "hacking", it all depends on the canon pinion tightness of your watch, nothing to do with oils "settling in".

 

Mines within 3 seconds a day when I wind it every morning. 145.022-76. Unknown service history.

My Sinn with the same movement is about the same and needs a service. Movement is Circa @1988

 

Welcome to mechanical watches

Grab a coffee and enjoy. Others have been there already

https://omegaforums.net/threads/a-few-questions-about-a-speedmaster-from-a-paranoid-new-owner.26075/

 

I'd guess a lot is to do with the fact it's hand wound. On an automatic, it's being wound to full all day long everyday so it's keeping consistent time daily. If you wind a manual watch at 8am then the next day at 1pm it's going to have different time loss day to day as everything inside winds down over time and gets less accurate.

I'd imagine if you let a Speedmaster run for like 45 hours without winding it that it would be keeping really poor time those last few hours before it stops.

 

Omega specs for this movement are that the average daily rate should be between -1 and +11 seconds per day - note that hits is measured with the chronograph off.

Since we don't know how you are determining the rate you are seeing, and what you are measuring it against, it's difficult to say if there might be a problem or not. Certainly if the watch is losing 15 seconds in a day, that is well outside Omega specs.

As others have noted, winding it daily, around the same time of day, will produce the most consistent timing results.

For the hacking, it depends on 2 things - tightness of the cannon pinion, and the torque from the movement. If the watch will not hack by turning the crown backwards slightly when it is fully wound,. if you let it run down the amount of torque that the friction of the cannon pinion had to overcome will drop. So it's possible that a watch that will not hack when fully wound, will do so when it has run for a time - just when that point is you will have to determine by trying it as the watch winds down.

Cheers, Al

 

A bit of a revival, but I got my Speedy back from service about the time this thread was being posted. I initially tested its accuracy, and then noticed a few weeks later that it had seemed to "settle in" a bit, so I did a follow-up timing test this week, and was quite impressed by the results. All timing runs are done using the WatchTracker app for iOS.

Here is the first run, begun immediately after Fedex dropped off my Speedmaster on 8 August:


Despite some obvious irregularities, the overall rate was excellent at about +1s per day. Considering this watch was +8s/day prior to being dropped and needing repairs, I was very happy to see this result.

After running my Speedmaster for a few weeks, I noticed it had some irregularities, especially right after being wound. It would gain 5-7 seconds over a period of a few hours following a full wind, and then return to an accurate rate. I thought this was strange, so I checked the watch for magnetism using an app called Lepsi, and sure enough, the Speedmaster appeared to have been somehow magnetized! I have no idea how that happened, but I ran it over a demagnetizer, and hoped for the best. After several more weeks of running and not noticing this problem anymore, this is the accuracy I am seeing (17-27 October):



Note that while the rate has increased slightly, the precision is much better. I have no idea of all the factors that might contribute to this, but I found it interesting. It's worth noting for this test that I consistently give the watch a full wind every morning between 0600 and 0700, which is what I normally do with the Speedmaster. I wore it occasionally during this test, but not every day. When not being worn, it was stored dial up in a watch box on my dresser.

Suffice it to say that I am quite happy with the accuracy and precision of my Speedmaster following service! The mystery magnetism has not been solved, but as long as the watch continues to run in this fashion, I am very happy.

 

Wow! how do you measure the timing and come up with a graph like this ? I am sorry I just got my first Speedmaster and wanted to know how to keep a watch on it .

 

You can use a iOS app called WatchTracker. I like using the app to track my speedy and my subCdate

 

Thank you. Do you happen to know any free app by any chance ?

 

Sorry, I don’t. I read about WatchTracker on one of the threads, checked it out and liked it, so I stopped looking at others.

 

Yep, that’s WatchTracker. I think it cost $4 for my iPhone. The app walks you through taking data points and automatically generates the charts you see in my post above. It’s very easy to use.

 

Hey all,

Just a quick update for those who will eventually discover this thread in searches etc.

It’s been 5 months now since owning the watch, and I’ve more or less religiously adhered to a routine of keeping the watch dial up at night and giving it a complete wind at 11am everyday. The watch has stabilized to -6/7 seconds per day. Not terrible, not the best. It is at least it’s a good sign of a healthy movement and can most likely be fixed by regulating.

I brought it in to an AD a few weeks ago and their chronoscope read off -13sec/day at the time. I was advised to let the watch power down completely and give it a full wind, and if it continued to lose that much time they would warranty out to regulate it. Luckily it hadn’t come to that and has been keeping decent time since then.

 

I've had my speedie for just over a year. For the first month or so I was at +5a day. About two months in I noted that I was getting +12-15 seconds a day and I started to wonder if I had an issue. Being a patient sort I decided to let it be and started experimenting with how I store the watch at night (face down). I set my watch two weeks ago and noted I'm now running +1 a day which is pretty incredible. As I assume this too shall change at some point, while I keep an eye on it I don't sweat it.

 

I’m disappointed with your AD. You TOLD them you were having a problem with the watch for five months. They check it out with an instrument that confirms your problem. They send you away with instructions to wind it and see what happens? Sounds like they just hope you go away. Not very good customer service, IMHO.

 

I suppose they came off that way in the abridged version of my story, but everybody at the AD helped out and were more than accomodating with my concern. I think their tech was just trying to save me from the hassle of holding on to my watch for a few days. For them, -13 sec/day is just slightly out of tolerance aka not so bad that they had to take it off my hands right on the spot. I’m also local to the area and it’s no big deal for me to dip in and out of the AD in a moments notice. Their tech left me her business card and told me to give her a call if the issue got worse, which it hasn’t.

 

New watch running -13? Get a warranty service.

I get plus minus 2 on a 76...

 

The watch has already stabilized to ~4sec/day without servicing so I probably won’t go through that hassle until it’s losing crazy time again.

 

Another resurrection, after I found this thread through the search.

I've had my Tintin for just over two weeks now after I bought it as NOS from forum member Kringkily - my first manual watch in forty years. I set it against https://time.gov/ the day it arrived, I lay it face-up on my bedside table each night, and I wind it every morning before putting it on. And as of today - a little over two weeks later - it's gained exactly ten seconds. I'm pretty happy with that!

Good to know about the Watch Tracker app - I'm interested (did someone say "anal retentive"?) enough that I'm going to purchase that and see how my small collection compare.

 

Good luck with that app. I have no idea what I was doing wrong, but for several weeks I tried to track four watches. All four were running well and gaining between two and six seconds per day. The app kept telling me that each and every one was WAAAAY off. To the tune of several minutes per day. I followed their instructions to the letter and never could figure out why it kept telling me all of my watches were so wildly inaccurate when I knew they were not.