Adjusting the time on an Automatic

[jimmy156]

Hi all,

I know very little about watch movements so apologies if this is a stupid question.

I have just corrected the time on my seiko 5 by moving it back by a few minutes. When i did this i noticed that as i was winding/holding the hands backwards the second hand stopped moving. Then when i clicked the crown back in, the minute hand swung forward by a minute or two.

Is this normal? Is moving the hands against the movement of an automatic watch putting any strain on the movement?

[Mr_C]

It'll be ok

I tend to go backwards past where I want to be then forwards to the right place

I think adjusting the date near the time it changes can damage the movement though

[Variomatic]

Yes it is (fairly) normal. It's safe to set the time in either direction and ideally it shouldn't stop the watch like that, but it wont cause any problems if it does.

There's a friction drive between the hands on a watch and the rest of the movement which is there so that you can turn the hands during setting without trying to spin all of the wheels at very high speed (which you couldn't anyway becaue the escapement would prevent it turning)

In a perfect world, the friction is set so that the hands "carry" reliably but turn freely when setting. In the real world the friction is sometimes a little too light (the hands may stop during date changes but the watch keeps running) or a little too heavy (the watch will stop when set backwards). As long as it doesn't start getting noticeably tighter to turn there's no problem - in fact, it can be useful for setting the seconds hand!

If it does start "feeling" tighter then it needs looking at because if it seizes then you'll do damage trying to set the hands.

[sad61t]

Hi Jimmy,
I have a Seiko5 and it behaves in just the same way. Going a little too far and then forward can help as it takes out the slack when changing direction (http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gear#Backlash). The movement doesn't have hacking seconds so, as Variomatic says, using gentle back pressure to freeze the second hand can be useful for syncing with the beeps.

[jimmy156]

Thanks everyone, good to know its working as it should and i won't be damaging it by winding it backwards!

With regards to using it to set it so that the seconds are right, the watch runs a bit quick so i tend to set it a minute or so behind anyway, so that it catches itself up over the couple of weeks or so

[sad61t]

Gaining a few seconds is the normal way to set the timing (gain is seen as a better failure mode). It allows you to pause the second hand for a few seconds at the beginning of each day to get back to the odds trims... huh? the correct time... Darned autocorrect!