Amateur Hour Watch Restoration

Where it’s from

This pocket watch was purchased at the Alameda Flea Market on Mar 2, 2025 for $7.

What it looked like

The gold-colored case had an unusual asteroid shape. The crystal was a bit scratched. The dial had a fabric-like texture with numerals at 3, 6, 9, and 12. “Unbreakable mainspring” indicates that it’s an older watch, as newer watches no longer (falsely) advertise something that can’t break. The only hands are hours and minutes. (The image above was taken after opening the case already, since I forgot to take one before opening it, ha).

The crown clicked when winding, and it felt like it had some resistance, but I didn’t hear any ticking. The crown was able to set the time.

How I restored it

Mar 9, 2025

Opening the case was quite difficult: I had to pry at the case back near the crown wheel, and then really jam in a casing knife to pop it off. I think I damaged the case a little, since it said it’s made of aluminum (so is very very soft).

The movement has one (1) jewel, and says “BRAC 192”. It also has the stamp “BREV 343 306 SWISS” which I had mistakenly taken for the movement identification, but I learned that “BREV” is short for “brevet”, which is French for “patent”. The “BRAC 192” stamp is the actual movement serial number. Interestingly, the 17 jewels site lists it as a 17 jewel movement, but this one is clearly only one jewel. I think the movement may have had a variable number of jewels , as another source (emmywatch) shows a single jewel movement. It also shows the movement was in production around 1970.

May 4, 2025

It’s been awhile, and I forgot where I was. It was mostly disassembled, but I think I recall difficulties getting the barrel out. But, I took a screwdriver to it and it came out just fine, so maybe I was mistaken. The barrel cover doesn’t really snap in at all, so note to future self: be careful handling the barrel. Overall the movement seems to be in decent shape, and fairly clean. I noticed that the balance wheel has an excessive amount of end-shake, but after putting the weird shock-plate thing back on (see below), it seems to have lessened.

Some notes about the movement construction:

• The top pivot of the balance has the single jewel, and the bottom pivot looks like it has some kind of shock absorber via a thin pill-shaped plate with a single screw.
• The jewel looks like a cap jewel, and is secured with a circular plate that screwed in from beneath the balance wheel bridge… cleaning and oiling it probably requires removing the balance wheel from the bridge, ugh.
• The hairspring is attached to the balance bridge with what looks like a brass pin, similar to the Timex movements. However, unlike the Timex movements, I don’t see a bend in the hairspring to indicate where it should sit when it’s pinned to the bridge.

May 10, 2025

After finishing cleaning, I assembled everything except for the balance, because I am just not ready to deal with the flippin’ hairspring.

May 11, 2025

I decided to take a deep breath and tackle the hairspring. I spent probably 30 minutes figuring out the best angle to put the hairspring in the arm hole. Then I took about another 15 minutes to figure out the best way to get the hairspring pin in… but I totally did it! I couldn’t believe it! And THEN, it totally kicked up! Running not too badly either, about 220 amplitude, and 5ms beat error! I am a god among watchmakers! </sarcasm>

May 12, 2025

After fully assembling and oiling, it’s back together, and running! Not too badly either, about 280 amplitude, and depending on the orientation it’s close to 0s per day. The beat error is around 4ms, but I ain’t gonna touch that, lol.

I feel like this is my first real success; all the other ones I’ve worked on so far, I haven’t been able to get decent performance out of.

Feb 2026

I decided to give this away as a gift for a friend for her birthday. Bon voyage! May you keep ticking for another 50 years!