It is seemingly little known that watches require servicing. While this is an accepted fact with almost every other type of complex machine containing moving parts, watches are often left much longer than they should be with no maintenance, despite the fact that they are generally being used 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year. On average a watch should be serviced every 5 to 6 years, occasionally sooner. Sometimes quartz watches will have longer service intervals, but not always. As the cost of a service can sometimes run to several hundred pounds, I thought I would do a breakdown of exactly what happens when a watch is sent to the service centre, to show you what happens to your watch ‘behind the scenes’. This information is taken from the Rado service booklet, but many of these steps are the same with other brands.
On arrival at the service centre, the watch will firstly undergo a full diagnostic check, recording things such as external wear and tear, timekeeping, amplitude (for mechanical watches), power reserve, consumption (for quartz watches), and what intervention is required to restore the watch to good working order. After this the movement is removed from the case, which is then sent for ultrasonic cleaning (along with the bracelet if applicable). In some cases the cleaning is done by hand. Also at this point any replacement gaskets and other spare parts will be prepared so they are ready for the technician to use later.
Once the dial and hands are removed and set to one side, the rest of the movement is completely dismantled, and each component is placed in a fitted mesh basket, which is in turn placed into a special movement cleaning machine. Once this is finished he movement is reassembled and all of its functions are tested. The battery in a quartz watch will be replaced at this point. If the watch is mechanical, the amplitude will be checked and the rate regulated.
With the movement reassembled and functioning correctly, the dial and hands will be put back into place. If the watch has a date, the jump function will be checked (so the wheel clicks over properly). The whole assembly is then put back into the now cleaned case, along with new gaskets and a new crown, and the water resistance is checked using a pressure testing machine.
For mechanical watches, the rate and amplitude is then checked again now the movement is inside the case, and the watch will be fully wound and the power reserve tested to make sure it runs as long as it should. The cleaned bracelet is then reattached and a final quality check is carried out before the watch is returned.
As you can see, servicing a watch is a very detailed process requiring highly skilled personnel and very specialised equipment to carry out. Several of these steps – while they are quick to describe – can take a considerable amount of time. Testing the timekeeping of a watch can take several days or even longer in some cases, as often the best way to check accuracy is to see how the watch behaves over a set time period. This is why a service can take several weeks to carry out, but most come back within 3 to 4 weeks.
Hopefully this has made a few things clearer, but feel free to call us if you have any queries about servicing. We are authorised service agents for all the watch brands we sell, and some which we don’t. If you have a watch which needs a tune-up, bring it in and we will do our best to get it working as well as possible.
Ian Palmer – July 2018
