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Automatic watch accuracy

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Noob question: my Orient Mako II gains about five seconds every day. I've tried leaving it in different positions for the night, but the best result I get is +4 seconds instead of +5. Is this normal?
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bwoo
11
Jul 23, 2018
noob, everybody starts somewhere, anything near 4, is a great number for any watch,and if it holds that number, even better. don't drop it. there is a "shock absorber" in mechanical watches, most modern ones, anyway, that keep the guts from breaking. if you drop it, it may knock it out of wack. the numbers may change and being new may not know why you're watch is "broken" with numbers like ,15+ so be glad and put it on over your bed which helps not to drop it to a hard surface. remember, smile you have a real winner.
robar1
8
Jul 20, 2018
I recently acquired an Orient Ray fromMD and find it to be a couple min fast a week. But since I am long retired and getting on it doesn't make that much difference to me. It may even help since I have slowed down a bit, so a fast watch helps me get places on time; which doesn't actually matter most of the time. I think I will plan to reset it Monthly. R
BF_Hammer
717
Apr 1, 2018
+5 seconds per day for a watch not certified to chronometer specifications is abnormally good.
Cloaca
1906
Apr 1, 2018
That sounds fine to me. Usually watches are regulated from minus 15 to plus 25 seconds, with the goal being plus 5 seconds, right in the middle. I think this is because for most watch movements nearly perfect timekeeping is unrealistic. So the second best thing is to assume that a watch will be checked and set by the user daily or weekly, and allow it to be a little off.
It turns out to be easier to set a watch that is a few seconds fast than to set one that is a few seconds slow, or just 1 second fast. To set you pull up an authoritative time source and pull out the crown when your second hand hits 12:00, for instance five seconds before it should. Then five seconds later you push it in. Finished!
If it's slow five seconds you have to wait 55 seconds for it to go arounds again. But wait, you also have to reset the minute hand one minute forward, which can be fiddly.
If it's fast one second, it's the same as being slow five seconds, since you really can't pull out the crown and push it back that fast without possibly harming the movement.
So five seconds fast is the ideal to me.
YanDoroshenko
175
Apr 1, 2018
CloacaThat's more or less what I thought, thanks. I usually set it to something like -20 every week to have a consistent +-20 seconds accuracy.
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