The Breitling Watch Source Forums

Over the years I have seen all kinds of timepieces come in with the comment that they are "overwound" or "wound too tight" and not running. I rarely see a broken mainspring, although one occasionally comes in. They are always the old steel springs. I have never seen a newer white alloy spring break. I have, as Craig attested to earlier, seen stripped winding pinions, ratchet wheels, etc. from too much force.

When a fully wound timepiece will not run it is not the fault of the mainspring. It is almost always caused by postponed maintenance. With proper periodic cleaning and lubrication a timepiece will last for centuries. I have several watches over 100 years old and they work just fine. As discussed in other threads, delaying maintenance only makes things worse.

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1809 Cosmonaute
1903 Navi
Navi Olympus
Super Avenger

That is interesting to know. This makes me wonder what went wrong with my watch..

I gave the watch to BUK to service after sitting in a drawer for at least 20 years. (the watch not me!) It came back seemingly fully serviced and polished etc. I wore it every day for about two months until I wound it a few (literally) winds one morning and it jammed. As described in my first post.

Now I have it back from the repair, I have been recording how many turns I wind it up and how long it runs for, I have been told it should run for around 36hrs on a full wind.

I found I had been only winding it about half way (in my ignorance) before thinking there was enough resistance and stopping. So why did the watch jam if I was only winding it half way? (I will call BUK and ask on Monday as they still haven't sent the report of what was wrong with it as I requested).

Now I know thanks to all your help, I was a chicken shit! I thought 14/16 winds from dead was giving enough resistance. I have progressively increased the amount of winds until I found the distinct stop at 28 winds and I will not push past that. The watch hasn't run down yet but I have worked out it should run for around 38 hrs from full wind until dead.

My watch has finally run down - from 28 turns from dead my Premier ran for a little over 42 hours.

When winding a manually wound watch, the resistance increases as the mainspring is wound. The mainspring is inside a barrel and fastened to the barrel wall at one end and to a small arbor in the center at the other end. From a completely unwound condition, the first few turns wind very little length of the spring onto the arbor. As the winding continues, the diameter of the wound part of the spring increases so the length of the wound part of the spring also increases with each turn of the crown, causing increased resistance. It is difficult to detect in small ladies watches, but more pronounced in larger watches especially those with additional complications that require a larger spring.

Automatic watches have a spring with a bridle. It is a small spring attached to the end of the mainspring and curved in the opposite direction so it causes friction against the barrel wall. When the spring is fully wound, the spring will overcome the bridle friction and slip against the barrel wall. That's why you can endlessly wind an automatic.

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1809 Cosmonaute
1903 Navi
Navi Olympus
Super Avenger