Horological Meandering

clemens m
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Universal Geneve White Shadow Quartz Cal 74 - Follow-up

So this is a follow-up post about my UG White Shadow with Cal 74 with more pictures and some background information. When I received the watch it shortly worked with a new Battery (had to figure out a replacement for the obsolete mercury cell with similar dimensions first) but then it stopped. I sent it off to a microelectronics specialist and fellow watch lover who examined it. The original Cal. 74 looked like this:



A bit dirty but not too bad, right?




Unfortunately there was some disintegrated plastic seal inside the movement (photo courtesy of the watchmaker)




And the capacitor didn’t look too good... (photo courtesy of the watchmaker)


I was very lucky that this guy had some NOS condition Cal. 74 in his stock of donor movements and he agreed to service one and put in in my watch as a "factory-fresh", although old replacement. The Cal. 74 was Universal Geneves first Inhouse quartz movement and at the time of its inception it was the thinnest quartz movement in the world. Here is some more information:

www.crazywatches.pl

I really like wearing this gem, the Patina on the dial is awesome and is changing from a deep royal blue to a reddish purple depending on how the light hits it.













Unfortunately I can not provide definite production numbers but from what I have heard this is a very, very rare watch so chances to see another one in the wild are near zero. I bet there can not be more than a hand full of these with blue dial that are still in working condition, probably most have been killed by moisture and/or leaking batteries, the movement itself is quite delicate too and a very fragile construction. But now that mine has been equipped with a serviced NOS movement and new gaskets I hope for a worry-free wearing experience of this rare bird for many years to come. I just have to be veeeery cautious when changing the battery.