Patek Philippe

I was using the chrono on my new 5270/1R today and noticed the hand on the right chrono subdial for minutes passed is slightly misaligned on each indeces. The hand is consistently slightly left of each indece from all angles I look at it. Is this normal? ...  

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that I would have that addressed, especially on a watch of that magnitude

Once you noticed it it will continue to bother you, pretty sure about that. Otherwise you probably wouldn’t ask. If I would notice, I would have it fixed. Br, Dirk

Even though this is technically a grand complication, maybe they can at least take a look? I'm no watchmaker, but this would seem to me a really simple matter ;-)

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So how does it work? At the first minute it jumps by roughly 1.1 units, or does it start later at some specific minute? And after this first "wrong jump", does it *always* jump again by 1 unit? As I said I'm no watchmaker, but this looks more strange than... 

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I'm not a watchmaker, but something to do with (certain) spokes of the gears driving the chrono minute indication? Or just the amount of play in the gears. Certainly it cannot be that the printing of the markers is uneven - or can it? I'd assume they use ... 

Looks like the perspectice is slightly distorted. Maybe there i no misalignment when you take the shots from exactly above the sub-dial...

I would leave the watch as it is. In my opinion, the mistake is too small to initiate a service. For me the danger is far too great that other problems arise after the service. But if it bothers you very much (and you wrote a post about it, which suggests... 

I think the issue is too minor, and the hands will need to be removed later when you send in the watch for servcing anyway. But if you do send it in...those markers at 12 look slightly misaligned (right looks higher than left), so ask them to take care of... 

Good choice!

in a world of "cold" perfection, these little "mistakes" are a wonderful sign of romantic imperfection. Wearing a mechanical watch in the digital age is a conscious anachronism. That's exactly the reason why I stopped measuring the time deviations of my g... 

Overall, I agree with Thomas and jleno. Personally that's something I wouldn't notice, and wouldn't care too much about. But indeed, if you made a post about it, then you will obsess over it. So it is best to at least send a note to Patek and see what the... 

Agree that contacting Patek would be a good idea. But I don't think these things are necessarily going to be cause for obsession. Btw, on my Grossmann, there are a couple of minor imperfections on the dial that are barely noticeable in photos. They bother... 

The watch is a fake !!! .... ... ... ..... ....... I m far far far far away .... seriously, i would get in touch with PP and explain that to them may be with a bit of humour saying that you are obsessed .... so at least if there is anything else more seri... 

But that had me ROFL.... and, I agree with most here, send it in for service. You won't be happy unless you take care of the problem, nip it off.

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The "best" explanation would really be an issue with the subdial, at least it wouldn't affect the movement. Of course, that would mean replacing the dial. I'd probably try to explain this issue to an authorized watchmaker, just to get a quick feeling if y... 

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it is an imperfection of the dial and not of the hands or the movement?

If I were in your shoes I would definitely give it to the AD and have it fixed. Let’s face it: you’ve paid a lot of dollars for that watch and the hand simply isn’t aligned properly. On top of that I agree with Christian, once you know it you will see it ... 

...with those two for me personally I would actually be walking this back to the AD immediately. Any reasonable AD should be falling over to make this right for you immediately. This isn’t exactly a small purchase. I hope you find a satisfactory resolutio... 

I believe the problem is the gear that registers the minute, most likely the arm that holds the register gear doesn’t fall in properly... If it’s under warranty, I would send it in, if not, live with it until service is due. That’s what I would do... ... 

Maybe it’s just a parallax effect, which is due because of the depth difference between the hands and the dial, this can resulting in misreading the position of the hands. This is why some hands are curved towards the dial at the tip.

The problem may be your second hand is slightly past 60. When I stopped it perfectly everything lined up, if I missed by a single tick it did not line up perfectly. Your second hand is past 60 in your pictures. ...  

Don't accept any excuses about your watch being a hand-made artisanal product. If there is such issue as you show, this must be fixed. It's time we hold our beloved brands accountable to deliver quality and excellence in everything they do!

I emailed Patek in NY (Henri Stern) and this was the response: “Thank you for your email and the detailed pictures. Our Head watchmaker has reviewed the photos and has confirmed that we will need to ask you to return the timepiece to us for evaluation.” I... 

send it for evaluation and as long as it’s not mechanical I’ll just have them send it back and take care of it at the 5 yr service. If it’s Mechanical then they can keep it there and repair under warranty.

Since the evaluation time is really fast I’d definitely send them the watch at this point (via an AD would always be safest)👍

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It also seems very odd that anytime your AD sends a watch to HSWA it's going to cost them $4,000...;-) I probably wouldn't be happy to spend that amount (or even the $550) for an issue that doesn't seem to be your fault, but keep in mind that driving up t... 

So this seems to explain all the trouble, since obviously his AD cannot be held responsible for a watch they didn't sell. It's still desirable to help a good customer, but it'd really be out of courtesy or friendship now. Not sure what's in the contract w... 

I did buy gray (and saved over $60k in the process). no regrets at all. What this situation has shown is that regardless of where you buy the watch, just Ensure it is under Warranty and Patek\HSWA will take good care of you. The AD is merely a conduit to ... 

I'd probably make sure that $4k is fine with them and then keep all receipts, but now it's a no brainer to ship it. Nothing in principle against buying second-hand, as I said (and if you saved $60k it might make sense), but keep in mind that the perks of ... 

He told me he spoke with HSWA and this rest assured he will personally take care of the issue, regardless of whether I bought it from his AD or not. He has certainly won be over and I look forward to beginning a relationship with this AD once the issue is... 

As an engineer my 2 cents. I believe the gear that moves the minutes for the chrono has a couple sequential teeth that are damaged. It resets to the same location, but when it hits the damaged teeth it jumps past them causing a misalignment. Only a guess.... 

I am bringing it on Monday to the AD so I’ve got a few days left with it. I have a macro camera lens at home so I’ll snap some closeups tonight and post them

I need to read up on some of my books to fully understand. But here goes. I may be off a bit. Most chronographs reset via a reset cam that rides with the minute timer gear. The resetting disengages the gear, the whole thing swings back and the cam stops a... 

Hope you can now get this issue resolved soon, and that you can begin a long and successful relationship with this AD! ;-) Cheers.

What am I missing please? On my identical watch the sub dial aligns perfectly when the sweep second hand is exactly at 60. The sub dial hand moves past center if I am one tick past 60, like it should, you can see that in my pictures. In you pictures you s... 

I am also confused! If you stop the chrono so the large sweep second hand is EXACTLY at the 60 second mark, (straight up 12:00 position) the sub dial hand aligns perfectly. If the large sweep second hand is even one small tick past the 12:00 o’clock (60 s...