A query about automatic watches

Discuss Christopher Ward watches
declan29
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A query about automatic watches

Post by declan29 »

Hey everyone,

I'm still in my early days on the fora here, and as yet I don't own a CW watch (though I'm hoping that situation will change shortly). I wouldn't describe myself as a watch collector or anything (I only own 4), but I've always loved watches. The watches I own are all quartz movement (2 Skagen, 1 Maurice Lacroix and 1 Longines), so I've never actually owned an automatic watch.

So here's the thing. At the minute, I'm not sure if I'd be wearing a watch every single day (and even if I was, often it would only be for an hour or so at most). And given how fantastic the CW watches look, it's questionable if I'd even want to wear one of them every day for fear of scuffing / scratching / marking etc.

Now, I know the automatics that I'm looking at mostly have a 36 hour power reserve or thereabouts. And I know I can just manually shake them every day to give them some "exercise. And I know I could buy a watch winder (though they're a bit pricey for me at present). So what I'm wondering is (finally!): does irregular use of an automatic cause any problems to the movement? That is, does regularly letting the power reserve run down and leaving the watch "dead" prematurely degrade the watch movement, or cause stress to the mechanics or anything like that? I know this might be a very stupid question, but I've always wondered and thought this was a great opportunity to ask some experts.

Thanks for any help,

Declan.
robinbarke
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Re: A query about automatic watches

Post by robinbarke »

I think you need have no worries at all. If you wear an automatic every day, unless you have a particularly sedentary lifestyle the watch will fully wind and give you a power reserve of 40-48 hours. If you wish the watch to remain running, without wearing then you can manually wind, bit this isn't desirable over long periods as in some autos it will create wear on the winding mechanism, particularly those with screw in crowns. It will do no harm at all to let your watch run down and remain idle for long periods, just as they do in a jeweller's safe! In other words do whatever you want to give you the most satisfaction and greatest pride and joy of ownership.

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ianblyth
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Re: A query about automatic watches

Post by ianblyth »

From what I have read as long as the movement gets used (on the wrist, winder or manually winding) once a month to keep the oils distributed then that is all that is needed. A number of us on teh forum have a number of automatic watches and so can not wear them all. :shock: :lol:
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bydandie
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Re: A query about automatic watches

Post by bydandie »

robinbarke wrote:I think you need have no worries at all. If you wear an automatic every day, unless you have a particularly sedentary lifestyle the watch will fully wind and give you a power reserve of 40-48 hours.
Only if it has that power reserve though, and most of the watch movements CW use don't have that IIRC (except the 7750). ;)

The important thing to remember is something called isochronism, whereby the accuracy of the movement can vary over the state of the mainspring; the accuracy can vary between when it's started running to when it holds a full charge. Interestingly, the testing Bremont did in creating the MB2 showed that the movements are more susceptible to shock when not fully wound as well. It's always preferable to manually wind the watch approx 30 times and then wear to allow the watch to get up to speed.

HTH! :)
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declan29
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Re: A query about automatic watches

Post by declan29 »

Thanks for the replies all. That's been very helpful.
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