Mechanical Watch Build

I have always been fascinated with mechanical watches. In the days before cell phones I used to carry a vintage pocket watch. I recently got a promotion at work and thanks in part to cheesy jewelry store commercials decided to reward myself with a watch. Since my pockets are now occupied I decided to go for a wristwatch. After searching around I couldn't find exactly what I wanted in my price range, however I came across a few people that had assembled their own watch. Hmmm...how hard could it be? After descending down the research rabbit hole for a few weeks I had figured out what I wanted to build and where to get the parts.

First a picture of the finished product:

I decided to base the project around the ETA 6498 movement. This movement, along with it's sibling the 6487 (which has the seconds opposite the crown, rather than 90* from the crown for the 6498) is good for ham-fisted beginners due to it's large size. It was originally designed as a pocket watch movement and is 37-mm in diameter. It is also fairly easy to find dials, cases and hands for. All needed parts can be found on ebay, or specialty sites like Otto Frei or helenarou

Inspired in part by one of my old pocket watches I decided to build a marine-style watch. I got my dial from ebay, hands from helenarou, and everything else from Otto Frei. I decided to splurge and use a decorated swiss-made movement and sapphire crystal case.

Here is a picture of the movement I used:

Including tools I have around $500 into this project. To stay on a tighter budget a un-decorated movement or even a Chinese movement and mineral crystal case could be used and would bring the cost down to $200-$300.

To figure out what the heck I was doing I primarily used this website and these youtube videos.

Tools needed were a set of watch screw-drivers, movement holder, tweezers, rodico cleaning putty, and a hand-press (you could probably skip the hand press per the links above). Tools were purchased fairly in-expensively from Amazon.

The links above give good step-by-step directions so I won't repeat them, but I will show a few extra steps that I had to do.

First, the dial that I selected was about 2mm too big for my chosen case. I used a bolt and some rubber washers to chuck it onto my drill and turned it down using a file.

Then I test-fit the movement and dial into the case:

After installing the hands I replaced the plastic crown with the real one and measured the cut for the stem (rather than eye-balling it):

After dressing the cut with a file I installed the crown:

When I fit the trimmed down stem and crown it still seemed a bit too long, so I stupidly trimmed it a bit more. I think that it seemed a but long because it wasn't properly seated in the movement when I test-fit it, so it ended up a bit too short. A bit of blue lock-tite made the most of the few threads of engagement I had left.

After securing the stem with its screw the case-back was installed:

And that was it!

Here are a few glamour shots showing the blued hands and the watch with its inspiration, a 1919 Hamilton I inherited from my Grandpa. The Hamilton still keeps good time!

Totally cool. I've long thought mechanical watches are awesome and I would love to make my own sometime.

How much assembly are we talking here?

Edit: you just answered my assembly question, but I have one more. How is it powered? Wind up?

It only took me about an hour to assemble it. Yes, it is hand wound.

Wow. Maybe thats the solution to my problem. Make my own watch!

I did not know this was a thing. Wonder what the cutting edge of the hobby looks like?

timely thread for me, I just started looking into a new watch for my wedding and building the right one sounds awesome.

nice work!

did you consider an automatic at all?

In reply to NOHOME:

There are people 3D printing cases, modifying and decorating movements by hand, and working on and modifying much smaller and more complex movements. I don't think I have a steady enough hand to get too deep into this hobby.

In reply to bluej:

I considered an automatic, but like my car decided to stick with a manual.

The same principals apply, just pick a movement and find a case, dial, and hands to fit.

Awesome!Wise choice on the Swiss ETA 649x over the Seagull built clone. I have had a few problems with Chinese versions so I am not doing anymore builds with those.

I have built a couple.

I have a few others I am working on.

It is a really fun hobby but it can also be insanely frustrating. Tiny parts are fun...

It can also get really expensive. I am slowly getting together parts for my grail build. It is probably going to end up being about half a challenge car...

can you guys point me in the direction of where I can look for more watch dials? I've already spent some time looking around www.helenarou.com and ofrei.com, and was hoping you might know some others off the top of your head.

Thanks!!

anyone know anything about servicing an automatic watch (lubrication/etc)? I have one that I would love to wear, but the service costs are keeping it stored instead of worn.

bluej wrote: can you guys point me in the direction of where I can look for more watch dials? I've already spent some time looking around www.helenarou.com and ofrei.com, and was hoping you might know some others off the top of your head. Thanks!!

What size are you looking for and what movement?

I never knew this was a thing as a hobby. That's very cool.

Apexcarver wrote: anyone know anything about servicing an automatic watch (lubrication/etc)? I have one that I would love to wear, but the service costs are keeping it stored instead of worn.

That is on my to learn list but I haven't got there yet. It is much more complicated and requires a lot more tools. There is an online school for assembling and servicing watches. http://www.timezonewatchschool.com/WatchSchool/

What kind of watch is it? How much have you got quoted to service it?

ultraclyde wrote: I never knew this was a thing as a hobby. That's very cool.

Watch collecting is a big time hobby. I have talked to a few guys with $250k collections.

But of coarse there is a small group of people who like to build their own. TBH a large portion of that is building replicas/homages.

93EXCivic wrote:

Apexcarver wrote: anyone know anything about servicing an automatic watch (lubrication/etc)? I have one that I would love to wear, but the service costs are keeping it stored instead of worn.

That is on my to learn list but I haven't got there yet. What kind of watch is it? How much have you got quoted to service it?

A 1970's Seiko "Pepsi" divers watch that was my dads. Last quote was $150 for service.

similar to this (similar meaning looks the same, not sure if same serial number series)

It functions, but hasnt been serviced for at least 25 years. Dont want to wear it out, but I wore it for my wedding and it kept time for that day.

93EXCivic wrote:

bluej wrote: can you guys point me in the direction of where I can look for more watch dials? I've already spent some time looking around www.helenarou.com and ofrei.com, and was hoping you might know some others off the top of your head. Thanks!!

What size are you looking for and what movement?

Maybe it's super backwards, but at this point I'm fairly flexible. My brother whom is marrying us, my best friend whom is my best man (only g-men), and my soon to be father in law all like and wear watches. I was thinking it could be cool to build a set of matching ones for us all as my thank-you gifts to them.

That means price point needs to be pretty good of course and I'd prefer lower featured over lesser quality. I lean towards something that's more of a "gauge" inspired look, but fairly clean. Some of the ones I saw on those sites weren't bad, but I like options. Oh, size is somewhat flexible too, but on the medium to smaller end for mens watches.

Apexcarver wrote:

93EXCivic wrote:

Apexcarver wrote: anyone know anything about servicing an automatic watch (lubrication/etc)? I have one that I would love to wear, but the service costs are keeping it stored instead of worn.

That is on my to learn list but I haven't got there yet. What kind of watch is it? How much have you got quoted to service it?

A 1970's Seiko "Pepsi" divers watch that was my dads. Last quote was $150 for service. similar to this (similar meaning looks the same, not sure if same serial number series) It functions, but hasnt been serviced for at least 25 years. Dont want to wear it out, but I wore it for my wedding and it kept time for that day.

$150 for servicing an automatic chronograph is actually very reasonable. I'd have it serviced even if it is keeping good time as the oils are going to be mostly dried up and can damage the movement. Seiko Pogues have only been going one way in price and it isn't down. That model was the first automatic chrono worn in space by Colonel William Pogue on one of the Skylab missions. Also it is one of the world's first automatic chronographs.

bluej wrote:

93EXCivic wrote:

bluej wrote: can you guys point me in the direction of where I can look for more watch dials? I've already spent some time looking around www.helenarou.com and ofrei.com, and was hoping you might know some others off the top of your head. Thanks!!

What size are you looking for and what movement?

Maybe it's super backwards, but at this point I'm fairly flexible. My brother whom is marrying us, my best friend whom is my best man (only g-men), and my soon to be father in law all like and wear watches. I was thinking it could be cool to build a set of matching ones for us all as my thank-you gifts to them. That means price point needs to be pretty good of course and I'd prefer lower featured over lesser quality. I lean towards something that's more of a "gauge" inspired look, but fairly clean. Some of the ones I saw on those sites weren't bad, but I like options. Oh, size is somewhat flexible too, but on the medium to smaller end for mens watches.

Sent you PM cause I feel like I am taking over this thread.

In reply to 93EXCivic:

Got it and that's super helpful. Thank you!!!

This is what the guts look like in my 1884 Waltham, pretty sure I haven't got the patience or tools for the hobby.

Please follow up with pics if you get it running.

Dan

Watches are fun. A thread here years ago actually got me into this money sink of a hobby. Now I've infected a few friends as well.

Thanks to this thread, I realized that I can replace the movement in an old watch that means a lot to me, but has only worked for a short while.

I'm thinking that I'd like to change it from the quartz movement to a mechanical one. Since the watch is fairly useless as it is, I can at least take it apart (as little as I can get away with) and make some measurements. Not sure what will fit in the case- but I'd be ok with a basic winding watch.

Need to get some basic tools, it appears. It's the face that's the important part.

I'm excited to see that others are interested in watches Keep us posted on your projects.