I tend to rotate wearing automatic watches to try to keep them all going.

Is there a clear answer as to what an hour of wearing an auto translates to how many hours of charge?

Let's say average wear around the house. It may vary by movement so perhaps there's an average?

TIA, Rich.

An interesting question. Depends on the movement and on your level of movement.

I’ve never had a watch with a PR indicator, so I can never be certain. Wearing a watch all day nearly always powers it through the night, though I’ve occasionally had one stop at 4 am after a particularly lazy day.

How long is a piece of string?

My start point is that it will vary depending on the movement used in the watch. It is quite clear from my experience that the watches I own with decent in-house movements require less effort to charge up the PR than any ETA or Sellita based watches that I own.

As to an hours wear in the house? It will clearly depend on what you are doing.

An hour of housework will be far more effective than a typical hour for the “working from home” brigade - sit at laptop, look out of window, type a bit on keyboard, get up and make a cup of coffee, return to seat, check forum, get up and go and look in the fridge, decide a snack is not the best idea, return to laptop. Rinse and repeat!

I can’t find the post, but in the distant past I remember mentioning that it was easy enough to put a full 72 hours PR in a watch from no more than a couple of hours wear.

I typically keep three watches running at any one time (without using winders). No trouble keeping all three running, however the shortest PR of any of a typical three will not be less than 48 hours.

Neil

^^^ Yes, I generally rotate 3 and can keep them all going.

If I wear just the one watch, it's generally for 16 hours and then off for 8 hours whilst I sleep and then it's back on my wrist and I find that's good for 48 hours. I can't do the maths but that might answer my question.

There's a task here to define this by movement! I'm NOT volunteering to do this UNLESS it means I get loaned a watch for a month to do the necessary. CW bosses are you listening? DMs open!

Something like:

* An ETA2824 worn for one hour will give (let's say) 4 hours of power
* An SH21 worn for one hour.....
* A Valjoux 7750....

You get the drift!

The SW200 datasheet lists 1250 rotor turns to fully wind a watch. The SW300 lists 1000 turns to fully wind. I have seen ETA 2824 listed at 1250 and the 2893A2 as 1000. Datasheets for ETA are hard to come by so I am unable to verify these numbers.

As an aside I have seen that 1 turn of the crown on an ETA or Sellita will turn the barrel a half turn. One turn of the rotor turns the barrel about a half a gear tooth.

So there are a lot of variables at work here. How much reserve was already in the main spring when you put it on? How active are you for that hour?

If you have a watch with a display case back spin it around and see how the rotor moves. They move in fits and starts. It isn't a constant motion. This will give you an idea of how much activity you would need.

^^^ that is alot of variables!

It's kind of like a car's published MPG where it all depends on driving style, weather, weight, tyre pressures etc. My car NEVER matches the published MPG.

It was some years ago that I seem to remember someone wanting to trade an automatic (C5, I think) for a quartz version. He, or someone, had bought it for his elderly father. The old guy wasn’t very mobile or active so the watch kept stopping.

nbg wrote: ↑Thu Sep 26, 2024 12:44 pm
An hour of housework will be far more effective than a typical hour for the “working from home” brigade - sit at laptop, look out of window, type a bit on keyboard, get up and make a cup of coffee, return to seat, check forum, get up and go and look in the fridge, decide a snack is not the best idea, return to laptop. Rinse and repeat!

Damn, I’ve been rumbled!

My only watch with a PR indicator is the Tudor North Flag. I can wear for a day WFH and it maybe gets to 2 bars out of five (28 hours out of a 70 hour PR). If I was out and about then it would probably get all the way to five.

Honestly I can wear auto watches in variety and put minimal charge in there - sedentary activity you know - or remember to give the old wrist flick some exercise and put in 56 hours of charge which we might equate to 1 hour giving 8 hours of juice?

Experiment number 1:
C12Ti-40-AG
SW300-1 COSC PR 56 hours

Yesterday evening I picked up the watch. Walked from lounge to kitchen, a quick single shake, set the time and put the watch on at 7:30pm.

My recollection of subsequent activity for the next two hours…

Visit smallest room in the house, clean teeth, wash hands. Back to kitchen to dry and put away a couple of saucepans and kitchen knives. Up and down the stairs once. Remove glass from cupboard, make a gin and tonic. Take teacup, teapot and green tea from cupboard and leave on kitchen worktop.

Sit at kitchen table and join a Zoom meeting on iPad. Talk nonsense, drink G&T and occasionally wave a watch at the screen. Occasionally look at phone. Visit smallest room in house, wash hands. Make another G&T, rather than a pot of tea and return to meeting.

Remove watch at 9:30pm and place dial up on kitchen table.

Two hours of rather inactive wear…

Checked this morning. The watch stopped at…

Well at 10:00am it hasn’t yet stopped. I will update when it does.

Neil

^^^ I shall follow this with interest! And it sounds like my general level of activity at home too!

Experiment number 2:
C65 SC
SW200-1 PR 38 hours

Set at 9:00am.

Shower whilst wearing, dress and have breakfast. Check IPad and waste some time. Put away a few groceries. Mess around picking up and putting down a few watches. Up and down stairs a couple of times. Yoga in lounge for about 25 minutes. Make a cup of coffee with espresso machine. Sit and listen to a podcast, check forum(s), read Fratello review of the new C65 desk diver. Check fridge and decide what to have for lunch. Read a few newspaper articles and decide that as it is raining I won’t go out for a walk until after lunch.

Midday. Remove watch, put it back in box and wait for the PR to run down.

(Drafted, with the intention to post at midday, but pressed post, rather than save draft!)

To be continued…

Neil

RichM wrote: ↑Fri Sep 27, 2024 10:36 am ^^^ I shall follow this with interest! And it sounds like my general level of activity at home too!

It finally stopped after 15 hours.

An average of 7.5 hours of power reserve generated for each leisurely hour of wear… Neil

That's great to know! It's good it's as high a rate as that. I wonder how it will compare to the other watch which has the shorter power reserve #waitspatiently

nbg wrote: ↑Fri Sep 27, 2024 11:50 am Experiment number 2:
C65 SC
SW200-1 PR 38 hours

Set at 9:00am.

Shower whilst wearing, dress and have breakfast. Check IPad and waste some time. Put away a few groceries. Mess around picking up and putting down a few watches. Up and down stairs a couple of times. Yoga in lounge for about 25 minutes. Make a cup of coffee with espresso machine. Sit and listen to a podcast, check forum(s), read Fratello review of the new C65 desk diver. Check fridge and decide what to have for lunch. Read a few newspaper articles and decide that as it is raining I won’t go out for a walk until after lunch.

Midday. Remove watch, put it back in box and wait for the PR to run down.

(Drafted, with the intention to post at midday, but pressed post, rather than save draft!)

To be continued…

Neil

@RichM the Super Compressor stopped at 10:30am this morning… 22.5 hours of power reserve generated by 3 hours of leisurely wear…

7.5 hours per hour - the same as the C12.

Experiment number 3 involves a non CW, non Sellita, non ETA, in-house movement, worn this morning for 3 hours from 8:15-11:15.

Neil