Just to follow-up on this, I took some photos yesterday to illustrate how I remove hands from chronographs.
The specific concern is that when very tight hands are removed, the sudden forces when they are removed from the posts will cause an acceleration that may cause luminous material to dislodge from the hand. This is primarily a concern on the central chronograph hand on watches like Speedmaster Pros.
These techniques are what Omega uses when removing hands, and what was taught in training when I was at Omega.
This isn’t a Speedmaster Pro, but a Speedmaster Date with a Cal. 1152 (ETA 7750 base). And here I’m about to remove the hands:
So the movement is in a holder that is made specifically for the 7750 series of movements, and I have gathered the items required to remove the hands. There are different tools used to remove hands, and I’ve tried most of them, but prefer hand levers as they give the greatest control. These are hand lever made by VOH, and they are the best I’ve found on the market. I use two sizes, so one for small hands one for larger hands. In addition I have hand tweezers that are highly polished for handling the hands, and some bits of plastic.
There is a small plastic baggie (I get tons of these containing parts, so they are always plentiful) and some other plastic parts there that Omega refers to as “pants” as they are shaped a bit like a pair of pants. These are made of a heavy plastic that is used for wrapping up watches for shipping, and when stacked they stick to each other, but not to anything else. I’ve stacked these and cut them into the shape you see, and the height can be customized by adding or removing layers.
I start by removing the sub-dial hands, as I don’t want them in the way when removing the other hands. I lay the plastic bag over the hands, and use the small hand levers to remove those. Next the most difficult hand is the central chronograph hand, and this is the one the OP was concerned about. I line up the hour, and minute hands under the chronograph hand to start:
I then place the plastic pants of the appropriate height onto the dial. What I want is to have the surface that the levers will work against be nearly the same height as the underside of the chronograph hand:
I then place the plastic bag over all of this, and use the small hand levers to tuck the bag under the hand, and then lever it off, like so:
Since this hand is on tightly, it will sometimes come off with some force, and you will hear a snap sound. The top plastic bag makes sure that the hand doesn’t move much at all during this process, in particular the end of the hand where there is often a section that is lumed.
Next is the removal of the hour and minute hands, and those are removed together. If you try to get between them to remove them one at a time, it is sometimes possible, but there is risk of possibly scratching the top part of the hour hand:
So back to just using the plastic baggie, and using the large hand levers to get under both hands, and gently pry them off:
This process protects both the hands and the dial, and if done properly shouldn’t result in any damage from forces require to remove the hands. There is always some risk involved in doing this, so in my experience this is the best method to mitigate that risk.
The hands are then stored away properly to prevent damage. There are several ways of doing this, but I use the same packaging that Omega uses for storing and shipping complete hand sets:
Using these methods has never resulted in lume damage like the concern that was expressed.
Hope this helps.
Cheers, Al
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