Reply To: Winding up an automatic watch.

[c.kelly]

Hi,
Been reading this topic and kind of stayed out of since Bob was helping but now I want to jump in because I like puzzles like this. I want to make a guess and explain my reasoning because if Bob comes back with something different it may help us both. Part of my theory is based on idea that an automatic typically stays wound and hardly ever runs down all the way. Means the end of the mainspring is touching the barrel walls but not pressing as tightly as it could. Now when you took out mainspring barrel it had to be fully unwound. This seems like it would cause the end of the spring itself to be pressed up against the inside of the barrel tighter than it may have been in years, especially if it slipped a bit in the power let down operation. What I’m guessing has happened is that the end of the spring has become caught or stuck on the inside of the barrel and is now acting like a normal mainspring. Also barrel itself may have seperated slightly from cap and be putting spring in bind. Seems like a wierd sort of thing to happen but I don’t know what else to think since it was working earlier. If you have another of similar caliber might want to swap out mainspring barrel and all and see what happens.

Charles