This watch is not my own. It was sent to me by someone who had watched some of my YouTube videos and got in touch to see if I could help him with this watch. It was his late grandfathers and he wanted to get it working again so he could gift it to his uncle as a surprise. Watch is a Gruen from around 1960 552 RSS. The watch would run but poorly and not for long periods of time. Clearly further investigation would be needed but my hunch was its more likely just needs a good clean and service.
here are the photos the client sent me.
Quite a nice classic 60s dress watch that has a signed bridge by Gruen but using an ST1686 movement (Standard Time) So a bought in movement rather than one of their own.
Once in my possession I quickly stripped the movement back for cleaning.
here as some of the photos of that procedure.
Really nice movement that is in layers on the train side. This would be fun for the rebuild and hence why I took so many photos (you are only seeing a fraction).
Alas I did not see any significant dirt or issues to suggest the cause for the poor running. Sometimes you don’t though. Then I opened the barrel…….
Okay looks dirty but nothing more. I remove the spring from the barrel.
There is the problem. The bridal on the mainspring has broken. This would be causing issues in the tension of the spring and thus some poor running. A new mainspring will have to be ordered and fitted.
I have no photos for this, or the rebuild but I can say it all went back together well and was running well on the timegrapher.
A little more regulation would result in that line being a lot more horizontal but alas this is the only photo I have.
Once I was happy the owner had asked if I could relume the hands. I was hesitant as the dial lume is radium (or at least I think it is) the hands however looked a completely different colour so I figured that perhaps they had already been relumed or exchanged at some point in the watches history. I still took no chances and wore a face mask as I removed the old lume.
Happy with the finished result I checked them under an ultraviolet torch.
This is a great photo but I think the camera made them look like Star Wars light sabers…
So there it is all done. A new crystal was fitted and I gave the case a good clean and polish with some Autosol metal cleaner.
fitted onto a nice leather lizard print strap the finish is fantastic. Much better than how it had arrived.
The owner I hope will be very happy with the finished watch restoration.
