Sweet Analog Mechanical Time
At Christmas time this year I was looking for some old junk in one of the old catch-all drawers at my parents home. I came across a watch which I obtained while on a People-to-People visit to what was then the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. There were a few items that I brought back -- one was a fur hat which I purchased at a tourist shop. The other was this military watch, and another, nearly identical in construction, but having a blue-grey concentric fade for a face. This watch has a black face with a red star in the place of the number 12, and a tank just below the star. The manufacturer's name is precisely machined (maybe stamped) into the back plate -- Boctok with nice line above it. Lets see if I can replicate it in text:
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Boctok
is close. Having found this watch which brought me some great memories, I automatically attempted to wind it. I don't think that I was surprised when I saw that its movement still worked even after 10 to 18 years without use. Its only defect was that some of the phosphorescent highlights on the face had lost their adhesive. One entire line for the hour hand and one half of the line for the minute hand. A circular piece which had been on the second hand was visibly floating around in the face-space. It wasn't long before these bits settled their way into the day-of-month display -- from the time that I found the watch I began to wear it.
The watch needs to be wound daily, a ritual that I found myself enjoying quite a lot. On the days when I forgot to wind it I'd laugh at myself when I'd finally realize that the hour had been lasting a little bit too long. Oh -- I forgot to mention that I went for about 4 years without wearing a watch before this Christmas. Since my find I was really enjoying the timepiece in it's convenient place on my wrist, rather than on a phone in my pocket if I were lucky.
So it stopped working. The first time this happened was while I was driving somewhere. I wound it, but it wouldn't move -- so I took it off and put it on the dashboard. This had the effect of shaking something out of a tight spot in its movement somewhere and making it work again. Must have been the vibration of the road.
Then it stopped working again. And the dashboard trick didn't fix it. That was a little more than a week ago, so I'm finally getting brave enough to take it apart and see what's inside.
I guess I'm cheating now, because I'm writing this post-surgery. I just cracked it open, took some of the visible debris out --surprisingly little I might add-- which included the round phosphorescent peice and some small chunks of the hour hand bar, monkeyed with it gently with a very small screw driver, and a little bit of spinning on my desk, till it worked! It was such a thrill to see movement start up! :)
I took photos so I'm going to share them here. I think that an animated gif would be ideal, but I'll play with that later when I have some time.
Devin
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