Welcome

Glad to have you aboard the most unique luxury watch Internet presence available. I will be focusing on in depth service reviews into some of the worlds most expensive and complicated mechanical wristwatches. It is with great pleasure I bring you a look into what is usually held secret in a lot of the complicated Master Watchmaker rooms in Switzerland.

These service reviews will be conducted by Swiss Certified Master Watchmaker of Complications Specialist and three time Grammy nominated multiple platinum recording artist, Dan Spitz . All timepiece service and pictures are done by Dan Spitz.

Music

Please follow DanSpitz.com for all my music and Autism awareness areas of discussion.  My new site that will continue to evolve shortly with a new face lift.

Tourbillon + Complications Repair

Here is another Tourbillon with multiple complications that came in. It had a few unique problems so I’ll post this one.

It’s another Christophe Claret caliber (amazing execution of precision) that puts smiles on my face as I rip it down and diagnose the mysteries under all those tiny little parts. This one has some setting mechanism problems and a really weird Wolfs tooth problem on one of the gears. For those who don’t know what Wolfs teeth are I’ve included a picture of one of the gears in question during diagnostics under my fiber optic scope. You’ll only see this kind of gearing in extremely high quality movements because of the cost to cut the teeth in this fashion. If it’s cut right the wheel will be very thick. This added thickness and correct annealing of the metallurgy involved will yield such a precise mesh to the next gear that it’s simply incredible !

Notice the blue saphire jewels in the Tourbillon !

I’ve seen some chinese copies now but rest assured these are simply cosmetic junk. The addendum / deddendum  of these REAL Wolfs teeth gears have to be cut so precise. I love when I see a movement hit my bench that has this type of gearing in an area that really calls for it.

Can’t remember what else was making this piece malfunction. I do remember it wouldn’t make it the full 10 days on the autowinder and I had to go back in a few times. There were adjustments to the Tourbillon cage needed as well as a pallet fork on the Tourbillon cage needing the usual run through the cleaning machine and jewel adjust.

I am so blessed to be able to take these things apart and stare inside such miniature works of human art. Blows my mind. How about yours ?

A Pair of Double Barrel’s

Had a pair of double barrels come in for service. One had an out of round escape wheel. I was fishing for a while as newer pieces tend to not have this problem to often. In the vintage world of repairing Pateks and VC’s it’s a daily routine. I was fighting for a while with some other problems in the auto unit on the same watch and it still wasn’t hitting the diagnostic outcome I needed. This one would stop randomly and/or slow down on day 3 on an autowinder after closing her up. Someone was inside hacking away before me for sure. The balance hairspring needed hours of work. Out of round, out of flat and through the pins was really lean city !

She purrs like you wouldn’t believe now. Double barrels are just incredible. These have a bunch of other complications so strip downs are extremely time consuming but I’ve done so many of these (I don’t post most repairs) that I’m really comfortable with these now. The dial on the other hand….. careful … careful ….. the crown on these watches are simply a work of an artisan. The diamond is a really pointy cut only Leviev can do. Crazy good work under the scope.

Double Barrel and Multiple Retrogrades

Here is a double barrel timepiece with a wonderful engine turned dial that came in with problems that would certainly get past most trained Watchmakers. In fact I think the customer who owns this $60,000 – $80,000 piece had it serviced outside of the company, as there are some hack marks inside the movement (and the screw heads) due to bad screwdriver sharpening and misuse.

Are you  a Watchmaker and have wondered why I have so many screwdrivers. I actually have more ! I sharpen sets of screwdrivers per brand that I service to fit the slots of the heads of the particular brand, per set. In this fashion I get a perfect fit and can execute removal and insertion without damage to the screws. At this level of Watchmaking most timepieces have a see through back for the customer to view the mechanics and we as Watchmakers must make sure the watch leaves the bench as it came in.

This watch was running erratic in many areas of digital diagnostics. One of the problems was an out of round escape wheel. I wanted to post this to show that even newer watches can have this problem that is most notable in vintage era pieces. After the problem was fixed I did some pallet stone adjusting. I have a special pallet micrometer warmer tool that helps facilitate with this. I’ll show a picture of one at a later date perhaps. Adjusting the lock and slide is a tedious job indeed and this movement requires a very high amplitude at half winds of the twin barrels to run properly.

What I find with multiple complication movements (such as this one) is the functions of perpetual calendar gearing complications (and having other functions such as retrogrades along with these) facilitates a need for a constant high amplitude and a medium to light lock to make sure at low levels of wind down on the main spring all functions can still operate correctly. If the lock and slide is not adjusted correctly the watch will surely run fine but it will not obtain the proper running length of residual power it was designed to obtain. I think this movement was about 110 hours of rundown or so. My technicals are not in front of me at the moment so please forgive the rounding off of end life.

Great movement !

Dr.Ruth Westheimer Vacheron Constantine

I do get a few celebrity watches in and can’t always gather the time to post them. This one is the famous television celebrity Sex Dr.s watch that we all know and adore. Kind of special to me as I was on her show with my mother once.

Dr. Ruth wears a Vacheron Constantine solid 18K gold model. This model has a wonderful caliber 1056 29 jewel movement. In addition you

Click to Open and Read More / Click to Close