ektaylor
160
Gear tolerances for mechanical watches are on the order of several microns. The difference between a “tight” movement and a looser one may only be a micron. That’s a thickness of just a few hundred atoms. So you wouldn’t see shavings
Just atoms. Which, needless to say, you can’t see.
IWC dilemma solved
So I am going to stick with my personal experiences and they are that IWC in house movements are just not accurate. I have owned in some form or another a watch from almost all their lines and the only reliable/accurate ones are the modified ETA versions....
I don't have any watches with the latest modern in-house IWC movements so can't comment on those
But I do have these modern pilot's watches from IWC with Sellita-based no-date movements and they keep chronometer time. +1s to +2s per day. I also have a vintage Ingenieur ref. 666 from the late 1950s with the in-house cal. 853 which needs a service so I...
Love those pics. Great watches
I have had a few big pilots including the new ones. A few yacht clubs. Both new spitfires. I think Richmond group ruined their brands by making them share generic “in house” Calibers. I’m happy with Valjoux 7750 in this one!
Thanks ripper
Yep, I think IWC is really good at using the Valjoux 7750 and ETA movements since their what I call "technical era" (1980s to early 2000s). That's when they came out with the great watches from their Porsche Design collaboration, classic Mark-series of pi...
That's too bad, but IWC's 7750-based pilot watches are terrific.
I have two IWCs with in-house movements, 8-day manual wind and chronograph classic, both Portuguisers. Not sure how relevant these are to your experience, but both keep good time although they’re both tuned to run fast, ~+5 seconds per day. The chronograp...
IWC does not use COSC but its own parameter of 0 to +7 sec p/day for their inhouse movements, so fast is good. The slower UTC may be affected by rotating the UTC hour ring ? but as long as its stable rate p/day i am okay with it.
For their inhouse Portugieser i am much less flexible but it has run at 1 or 2 sec fast every day now for 8 years or so. remarkable !
I also had the Portuguese chrono classic laureus 3904 with in house cal 89361 and that was not my favorite movement. It didnt reset 100% all the time and needed some force on the pushers.
My 70 year old Valj 22 is Much smoother. But i sure loved that blue dial ! ...
I had that too. It’s because the gear tolerances are ridiculously small when new. Now that it’s a few years old, friction has done its job and it has stopped doing that. I sort of miss it
You could push the crown in to set the time and the hands would t budge. Great for people like me who need their minute hands to align perfectly with markers when the seconds hand reaches 12 o’clock. The jump is still very small, but there’s a bit more gi...
D0 you really mean that?
" Now that it’s a few years old, friction has done its job" - so your interpretation is that friction shaves off metal and creates more room for the teeth to "play"? If that is the case, can you pleaser explain to me where the metal shavings go - I have n...
Yes. Gear tolerances for mechanics watches are on the order of a few microns. So, the difference between a “tight” movement (such as my Portugeiser when I first got it) and a palpably looser one may be just 1 micron less metal on the gears
That’s only a few hundred atomic layers thick. So no shavings, just atoms, which you wouldn’t see of course.
Interesting theory
I have discussed it with a few watchmaker colleagues - out of respect I will not quote they reactions.
I should also point out that this was a very unusual situation, this watch. The tolerances were unlike anything I’ve experienced.
Most movements have a bit of give so that they don’t jam due to thermal expansion, etc. This one jams up every now and then (you can find reports of similar experiences on the old IWC website forum).
I would assume it was the minute tube being too tight.
It loosens over time. (But what do I know - im just a simple watchmaker).
No experience with the latest "in-house" movements but...
I have had many 7750 based chronos from IWC and none of them kept accurate time. The best would be + 10 seconds per day while most of them have been double that. And what's worse they don't get any better after a service by IWC. Having said that, just rec...
Strange
IWC makes no sense to me! My omegas and Rolex watched and even JLC has never given me issues.
Surprising!
I've owned many IWCs, though none of them with the 'in-house' movements, and they've all kept fine time.
I guess it's just the two of us then...
"ripper444" and me. I've had much better luck with accuracy with other brands.
Le Petit Prince
I can’t comment on the difference in movements because I only have one IWC, the petit prince It runs perfect, time deviations are well within acceptable l8mits But if I compare the two dials on your pictures the blue one sticks out as my favorite ...