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Getting Wound Up with Self-Winding Watches

There was a time when people would witness the birth of a new technology, and deem it as the marker that would be the end-all of all technological advances before it.

Perceptions couldn’t have been more wrong.

When video tapes came out, theaters were said to die. When laser printers came out, word was; the need for dot matrix printers would be phased out. When newer, more advanced wrist watches came out, self-winding watches would be a thing of the past.

Perceptions couldn’t have been more wrong.

Movie theaters are still up and about, Dot Matrix printers are still in the market, costing even more than newer, faster printers and Self-winding watches are still preferred over other watch types.

Self-winding watches are works of art. But this “superstar status” isn’t the enduring quality that makes it what it is. The basic principle behind its power is.

An oscillating weight, positioned within the watch, stands as its “primary” source of power. As one moves about, one’s arms swing to and fro. As the laws of gravity would have it, the oscillating weight would turn about, swinging back and forth as well. The weight is connected to a gear train, which is connected to the watch’s spring (or winder).

Every move the wearer makes induces movement from the gear train, which then winds up the spring (also known as the mainspring). Self-winding watches indeed.

A more recent revolution in automatic watch technology, the principle behind self-winding watches still run the watch-works of most modern automatic watches. The oscillating weight is still employed by automatic watches, but the revolutions are converted to electric power, which is stored in a rechargeable power source.

What Abraham-Louis Perrelet, a Swiss watchmaker responsible for inventing a self-winding system for fob watches, did in 1770, was later improved by Abraham-Louis Breguet. Breguet’s watches were called “perpetuelles”, which quite possibly inspired Rolex’s “Perpetual” watch brand.

Though invented then, the closest ideal (meaning the closest to how current self-winding watches operate) didn’t appear until the 20th century. John Harwood, used a pivoting weight which swung as the user would swing his/her arms. The pivoting weight would then wind the mainspring. Very close to how the standard of self-winding watches nowadays.

The thing about self-winding watches is their simplicity. There are other “perpetually” powered watches out in the market, but these devices just don’t fair exactly well with self-winding watches, in terms of cost.

Self-winding watches are relatively cheaper compared to solar powered watches, or thermal powered watches.

Perceptions couldn’t have been more wrong when people thought that new meant the end of the old.