This can't be right....arggg!

[Anakin14]

I noticed today that my SMP keeps running out. When I wind it more than a few times, the rotor spins and spins until the mainspring is all wound out. I guess my movement is no good. And the watch was supposed to have ETA 2824-2 movement in it. This can't be right, can it???

Here's my watch which is only several weeks old:

click

Maybe I'll have to swap the movement out with one of these:

click

[fitmic]

Why do you wind an automtic watch?

Just wearing it should be enough.

[P4GTR]

post a pic of the mvmt inside your watch.

[Anakin14]

I've had to wind it because even while I'm wearing it, the watch keeps running down.

Here's the movement...

[tick123]

i have the exact same movement in my UPO...i did my research and I believe its swiss...and I do experience the lack of power reserve sometimes. I was told to wind the watch fully, and it did the trick. The fact that the watch is an automatic, however, is odd because the natural movement of my hand does not seem sufficient enough to keep the watch going. maybe it needs service? hopefully an expert can answer this question because I would like to know the answer as well

[Anakin14]

It's weird because if I wind the watch I can then watch the rotor just spin around until the mainspring is unwound (with the back off, of course). Wearing the watch, it won't make it through the day w/o winding it.

I'm no watchsmith, but it seems to me that the mainspring tension shouldn't make the rotor spin. There must be some mechanism that stops this from happening and isn't working in my watch.

Tick123, does your watch do this? When you hold your watch so it is level, can you hear or feel the rotor just spin & spin??

[tanya]

Similar problem with my swiss eta UPO. No power reserve. Sent it off to Rex at RG and he found dirt in the movement!!! Gotta love the repfactory QC!!! Not sure if you have the same problem but it definately needs to be serviced. If you are in with Master The Zigmeister I'd sent it off to him for sure if not Rex at RG is a true master with movement servicing.

Prob better to have it serviced and regulated because it would likely be cheaper than a movement swap and even a new out of the box eta movement would prob need regulating by someone with the know how for optimum reliability

[FxrAndy]

If the rotor turns when you wind it (which is not recomented in the first place) it is because the reversing wheels in the auto wind bridge are gummed up and anot alowing the rotor to free wheel as you wind the watch.

Solution is a good service

Ziggy may know a short cut but generaly there are no better options than a full and proper service

[Anakin14]

Two questions:

Who is The Zigmeister and how do I do business with him?

Do you think I have gen ETA movement that's old and gummy or some craptacular rep movement? I paid extra for ETA (which I assumed was new) from TrustyTime that gets good reviews.

[P4GTR]

You can either have it serviced by a local watchsmith or send it back for a replacement. Your choice.

[Anakin14]

I got an email back from Andrew @ Trusty and he says that this is normal. Doesn't seem normal to me. I have several other watches that are automatics and none of them do this.

[FxrAndy]

No it is not normal, BS as usual from dealers

[Anakin14]

Update: Andrew at Trusty offered to have the watch repaired if I send it airmail to him (China). How much will that cost? What do you think, am I better off shipping it back for repair or should I send the watch off to someone like The Zigmeister for service, enhancements, and some TLC?

[tanya]

The Zigmeister is prob out for you bud. Go over to Repgeek and contact Rex. Many of us frequent both sites. Rex is as good as there is with respect to servicing and repairing movements. He is pretty fast and his prices are fair. He is an actual watchmaster at his family jewlery store in PA. After that come back here and discuss.

[tick123]

tanya, how much do you think rex will charge for a cleaning & lubing of a movement?

[Shundi]

Rex quoted me around $150 for my SSD...I'm waiting on the watch to come back so that I can send it off...

[tanya]

Don't wanna speak for Rex he will send you a worksheet with price quotes. In my experience it was about $125.00 but he completely ripped apart the whole movement, sonically cleaned each part, rebuilt, oiled and regulated it. Lot of work for not too much money from about the best there is with movements

[RWG Technical]

Ziggy is prob out for you bud. Go over to Repgeek and contact Rex. Many of us frequent both sites. Rex is as good as there is with respect to servicing and repairing movements. He is pretty fast and his prices are fair. He is an actual watchmaster at his family jewlery store in PA. After that come back here and discuss.

Are you sure about this?

My understanding is that rex was/is in the jewellery (?) sales end of the business and switched over to the watch repair section recently (within the past couple of years). I don't believe he has any formal or distance training (such as Time Zone) but relies on the expertise of watchmakers in house? Some of his technical responses have been off the mark, for example when someone asked why their automatic watch stopped running when worn, but worked fine if handwound, his reply was that the mainspring needed to be replaced. Based on this and other comments, and his own posts, I think he's still learning... but he certainly has access to a first rate shop and tooling.

Please correct me if I am wrong.

RG

[tanya]

As much as it pains me to Zig you are off on Rex. For those unable to aquire your tremendous talents Rex is a terrific professional watchmaker with respect to movements. He has repaired alot of movements for alot of RGers (and alot of RWGers as well) with nothing but praise for his work. Not comparing his talents to yours for sure but for any movement issue and simple mods Rex is brilliant and a true professional. I would love to see you two team up!!

[kbh]

The Zigmeister is right about Rex. He is preparing to take the test, or course, or what ever it is that certifies you. On the other hand he is very professional to deal with and quite reasonably priced. At the moment he's a few weeks out on servicing. He also has an old time master watchmaker who is mentoring him and always available.

And on the original question I would avoid sending it back to China if at all possible. I've been waiting 4 months for Josh to replace my wife's Chopard. I've had a tracking number for going on a month that is no good and can't get a straight answer out of Josh.

I've been buying almost all my watches from him but I'm done unless we get this straightened out soon. I don't know what's going on with Josh but he doesn't seem to be on top of things like he used to be.

[Anakin14]

Guys, please validate this course of action for me....

I think I'm going to buy the ETA 2824-2 MONDAINE on Rotor from Otto click here to view and swap out my watch's original movement. At this point, I doubt I have true ETA movement and therefore it wouldn't be worth the money to tear apart and clean.

Discuss....

I must say I'm disappointed. I spent over $300 (including shipping) for a watch that doesn't work. I guess that if I look at it like for $300 I got a kick-ars case, band, face, etc and an extra $150 gets me real ETA movement, then that's worth $450, isn't it???

[FxrAndy]

Yep that would do the job

[tick123]

well another question that arises is do you know how to install the movement? if not, its prolly going to cost you extra $$ for installation

[tick123]

then again...the more I think about it the more of a brilliant idea that movement swap becomes...say youll end up paying 160 for the movement (shipped) from otto...you will sell the eta movement that will be swapped for around 60...all in all, youll end up with a finished brand new movement (that is reliable) for the cost of cleaning your old eta............let me know how it works out for you

[Anakin14]

Actually, I do. I recently tried removing movement, dial, and hands and then replacing them on some old junk watches. Then, I took a pretty nice, but cheap, watch that stopped working and swapped out the movement for a cheap Chinese movement I bought from Otto for $35. I'm certainly not an expert but the hardest part of the whole operation is removing and reinstalling the hands. Everything else is pretty straightforward.