Horological Meandering

mkvc
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That's a large topic.

I have a few thoughts on "robustness."

First, some watches are designed to tighter tolerances than others. Those that can work with fairly loose tolerances will be able to take more abuse than those that depend on everything's being "just right." Certain features such as Breguet balance springs can allow watches to perform relatively well with looser tolerances.

Second, there are different hardnesses of and ways of hardening metal. Each manufacturer has to make some trade-offs involving hardness versus brittleness, etc. In many cases, those decisions are affected not only by ultimate durability of the watch but also by considerations of ease of manufacturing or finishing the parts. That is not necessarily a problem, as it's a perfectly sensible design solution to make a part relatively cheaply and simply plan to replace upon servicing. However, especially when servicing by the manufacturer may no longer be available, it results in a less-than-optimally durable watch.

Obviously shock absorption plays a role. Some movements have shock protection only for the balance spring; some have shock protection at other points. Different automatic winding systems have different types of shock protection, ranging from "none" to quite sophisticated forms of three-dimensional flexibility. Free-sprung balances are harder to knock out of true than regulator balances; screwed regulator balances are harder to knock out of true than friction-set ones. All those factors, and others, affect how a movement responds to shocks. Of course, some watches have special suspensions designed to reduce shocks to the movement so the movement doesn't have to deal with them.