Hmmmmm... Good news and bad news and not great news.....

Good news: the new band arrived. Early in fact. Seriously, this can go from HK through KIX and arrive 4 days? And I can't get a pkg from OH in less than that?

Bad news: tools are still stuck in OH; not sure when they will arrive. Hoping by Sat. I may be order another strap and tools for my Promaster and that may arrive before I get the tools from OH.

Not so great news: I've got some sort of rash my wrist. I've never been allergic to straps before. But perhaps I'm allergic to this one? Or perhaps some odd interaction between the strap, the pool and me? Could be coincidence but it's just in the area under the strap....

Pics of the new strap once I get it installed. Mainly waiting for the small screwdrivers; I don't have one small enough (smallest I have is 2.2mm I think. I'm guessing I need 1.8mm or 1.6mm).

I'm still characterizing the watch behavior. But it generally seems to be about +12s per day when worn for the day for a 'seat warmer' - sitting for 8+ hours at the desk working / typing, daily activities like cooking, cleaning.


BUT - I noticed that when I take a jog (I'm old and trying to get into shape so just a slow 1/2 mile for now), it'll be about 20s faster than before the jog.

Is this expected? I'm not breaking anything, am I? If I shouldn't be jogging with it, I can use a different watch.

Konata88, I hope someone more knowledgeable than me will chime in. In my experience most every automatic will run faster if you subject it to a substantial amount of physical activity. Some movements are better than others and handling it but for me it’s been an across the board sort of thing. My best automatic will withstand a bit of physical activity and typically run -1 seconds a day unless I go jogging and then it will run about +5 seconds for about 24 hours.

I cannot speak for the newer luxury brand movements but I’ve heard they tend to be incredibly accurate. How much physical activity their owners subject them to is another matter that I would be curious to learn more about. I have heard some good things about Tudor’s new movements and of course a properly dialed in Rolex can of course be fine tuned by position when you take it off for the night.

Thanks. So sounds like running faster is expected after physical activity. Important thing is that this is okay and I’m not breaking the watch.

Hi guys.

I've been closely monitoring the gain in seconds per day of the Kanno generously gifted to me by stickman. Ignoring gains from physical activity, I think the watch is settling in between 9-11 seconds per day.

I can live with this; love the watch. But I’d feel compelled to sync weekly.

If I bring this in to get it regulated, could I reasonably expect to see less than 5 sec per day? Or even 3 sec day? This would be worth $50 to me; I'd probably only sync every 2-3 weeks then.

I took the Kanno for regulation. Watch expert said he regulated and should be down to about 1s per day!!!

One thing - I hadn't worn the watch for about 1 day. I was going to wind it up a little using the crown (20 rotations) before handing it over but I forgot.

Does it make a difference if he regulates the watch when fully charged vs under charged? If so, is it common procedure for the watch expert to wind up the watch before regulating? What if the watch is regulated when it's low on reserve?

It shouldn’t be an issue. I believe they can test for the power reserve/ health of the movement by measuring its amplitude while it’s on a timegrapher.

Have you noticed a drastic improvement in accuracy?

I was big into watches..........but not so much now. They ALL need servicing @ $1000 each. I sometimes still wear them, but only as jewelry. I don't set them or even wind them. My phone has it all.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: skywag,

That's a pretty serious watch to not run it the way it's supposed to be run. It should be as accurate as your cell phone and with a longer power reserve.

Regulation depends on many factors.

Lubrication, pinion tolerances,if the balance is evenly balanced, the banking pins are exact, the pinions centered in the wheels, the wheels being free of debris, a burr on a wheel, the tension of the pinions in the jewels along with the position of the movement when doing the adjustment.

A burr on a tooth will have an affect the regulation once an hour, once a day or once a minute. A mis-centered wheel will make all sorts of trouble that can't be detected without a microscope.

If the movement is not a COSC certified, hand adjusted, polished, assembled, regulated movement, it's an exercise in futility to worry about getting it to a second or two a day.

I had to just learn this and get them as good as it would go and let it be.

Sigh. Well, either the watch man didn't do well or the watch isn't capable.

I reset the watch this morning - it's now about 10 seconds fast (less than half a day).

I could try once more (probably free?) and wind up the watch fully before regulating. But sounds like it wouldn't matter?

Maybe w/ or w/o regulation, best is about 10 seconds per day? If so, it is what is. It's still a very nice gift and a great beginning into the world of automatics.

quote:

Originally posted by konata88:
Sigh. Well, either the watch man didn't do well or the watch isn't capable.

I reset the watch this morning - it's now about 10 seconds fast (less than half a day).

I could try once more (probably free?) and wind up the watch fully before regulating. But sounds like it wouldn't matter?

Maybe w/ or w/o regulation, best is about 10 seconds per day? If so, it is what is. It's still a very nice gift and a great beginning into the world of automatics.

Depending on the movement 10 seconds a day might not be that bad. A watch that is COSC certified is -4to +6 seconds a day. In the watch world that is considered 98% accurate I think.
Run it for a few days and average it out. The only other thing you can do to check accuracy is to buy a timegrapher. The one I own is made in China and I bought on Amazon for around 175 dollars. If you buy one ther are different parameters depending on the movement you have to know to set the time Grapher settings. You can find most of that info on line.

I can live with as-is. Although I’m thinking its worse now than before - I’m gonna take it back and regulate while fully charged. It’s gaining about 20 sec in 12 hours now.

I took it back. He said last time, he demagnetized except for the case back. He made some measurements and it was varying all over the place. He demagnetized the case back and he said the measurements are steady now. He didn’t regulate again. We’ll monitor for a couple of days and see how it goes. If it was magnetized, i wonder how it got to be so. And maybe i should invest in some demagnetizer device?

I’m thinking it got magnetized on its trip to you. I demagnetized it when I owned it to see if that would make it run a little slower. I’ve had a good number of watches come my way with a little magnetism that my $8 demagnetizer tool was able to remove. As a delightful bonus the demag tool often yielded me a much more accurate time piece.

+\- 4-5 seconds a day or at least around 10 seconds or less is a good bar to strive for. I believe even a basic Seiko or Orient automatic should be capable of accuracy in that ball park.

Thanks. I’ll look into a tool. Not sure what to look for yet though.

I’ll see what happens over the next few days. He said bring it back if it’s still off. I’ll settle for anything less than 10s per day.

Most autos can be regulated to almost COSC standards, about 5 seconds a day +/-.

I have a Seiko Orange Monster that won't do it unless regulated, straight from the factory it ran about 2 minutes a week fast. And after 18 months the weekly correction was causing the stem to get wobbly. I then got an Invicta Ti diver with the upgraded Seiko movement, it was 1 minute a week fast. Any auto with that kind of +/- is "factory normal" for most of the mass production they sell. It's not impossible to open the case and adjust, but it is a delicate mechanism exposed.

Anyone who does want an auto to run the best it can will be better off with regulating it, as the non Swiss factories won't. Swiss COSC certification is their main method, it's a 45 day exercise of adjustments in various planes to get it as best that movement will run. Rolex makes a million watches a year, a substantial number are COSC and with the rest of Swiss production doing that the pipeline is pretty full there. The DIY or shop regulation is a great initial first step in tuning it to it's best performance.

After about 20 years of fiddling I went to cold heartless quartz - a Rolex invention - and now enjoy 24 seconds + a year. That is .5 seconds + a week, which includes a perpetual calendar and three Dive models. Dive watches are more than capable of handling abuse and they are the go to watch when a rubber G Shock doesn't meet the dress requirement. Dives and G Shocks are what the military, marine shipwrights, auto mechanics, and tradesmen wear while doing their routine work. And some even play golf - same watch.

Guys - help me understand a little expected behavior here. I understand that as part of regulating, some sort of pulse rate (beats per sec) and amplitude are measured.

The pulse rate is part of keeping accurate time. What does amplitude do?

If I fully wind up the watch, I'm assuming that amplitude will be high. What about the pulse rate - will it be relatively high (leading to keeping time a little faster?)?

As the watch winds down (say, sitting on a table), I'm guessing the amplitude goes down over time (linear or exponential)? What about the pulse rate? I think I've noticed that, if I'm not using the watch much, it drops down to being fast about 2-3 second / day (whereas fully wound, it seems about 12-15 seconds per day fast).

If I don't wind the watch and just wear it 8-12 hours per day (nothing strenuous, just around the office), does the state of charge basically remain in a certain band (ie - it'll go up and down between 40-80% charge).

Would this be a steady state sweetspot? For example, if fully charged, expect about 12-15 sec/day. If just wearing daily, expect about 5-10 sec/day. If not wearing, expect it to go down to about 1-2 sec/day until stopped.

Or should I expect the watch to be 10-15 sec/day fast from fully wound all the way to depleted - state of charge doesn't matter?

Just out of curiosity - not trying to fix anything.

Konata88, very good questions. To be completely upfront there is still quite a bit about watch regulation that I have yet to learn.

One of my favorite watches a Seiko PADI Turtle will run 4-6 seconds slow a day if I set it down. Now if I wear the watch continually it will run a little faster and keep just about +/- 1 second a day.

If yours is acting similarly it might be a good idea to have it regulated on the timegrapher to a few seconds slow a day.

I have a basic timegrapher but I have so many mod projects in cue I haven’t fiddled with my timegrapher yet.

I hope someone else will chime in and offer more advice and input.

This is a good video to gain a basic understanding of watch regulation. Link to watch regulation video

There is a truly unique feeling of satisfaction one gets from owning an automatic mechanical watch that keeps great time. Sure, the quartz watches can do far better for less money but they don’t excite me.

The feeling of the rotor spinning and knowing my movement powers the watch is something a quartz watch just cannot match. There might even be an argument to be made that the automatic mechanical watch is the most environmentally conscious watch since they do not rely on batteries or produce battery waste.

Please forgive brevity, on my phone.

State of wind affects precision; it’s called isochronism.

Regulation is making the watch run faster or slower, but it doesn’t do anything for precision, only accuracy.

Positional variance (how your watch’s rate changes depending on which side is down) and isochronism are big factors in precision.

There are common misunderstandings about watch accuracy. You can’t really regulate a watch to “COSC standards.”

COSC, aka ISO 3159, has to do with a lot of things, like performance based on temperature, state of wind, shock, rate resumption, etc.

The one most people think of is net daily rate…the -4/+6 thing. But that doesn’t mean accuracy should be within that range each day. It means the average of six positions should fall within that range.

Think of it like a target at the range. Precision vs accuracy. A precise watch might do something like the following in six positions:

Dial up: +4
Dial down: -2
3 up: +2
6 up: +6
9 up: -1
12 up: -2

Then you wear it, and let’s say you spend a lot of time at the desk, so a lot of 6 up…you might ask your watchmaker to regulate it for how YOU wear it and how it performs FOR YOU, and dial in (pun intended) to be more accurate for how you wear it.

But if your watch does like:

Dial up: +18
Dial down: -14
3 up: +9
6 up: +21
9 up: -15
12 up: +5

Then you can regulate, sure, but it’s still a shotgun pattern. Regulation just moves the whole thing faster or slower. Averages and how you wear it means it’ll depend on you. And if your wear pattern changes daily, it’ll be hard to lock down any accuracy.

If I may, you are overthinking it. Don’t try to keep it wound to a certain degree. Watches are meant to perform best at a full wind or nearly so.

Beats per second has to do with movement frequency (balance and escapement). Most Seiko movements like that are 3 Hz (6 beats per second). Amplitude has to do with how far the balance swings back and forth each time. Higher is healthier. Low amplitude means it doesn’t swing as far each time (multiple times a second)…means things generally speed up.

Keep it wound when you wear it. Keep moving. Get an app like WatchTracker and test its offset from atomic time before bed. Then put it in a specific resting position overnight and check its offset in the morning. Keep testing different positions and you may find one that counters the gain or loss your watch did during the day.

I have mechanical watches and even my cheap Seiko (7S26) are within a few seconds a day from the box.

Hope that helps. Good luck!