Hello neptar,
And thanks for asking a question that I have wondered about as well.
As I often browse watches online and have a liking of automatic
watches myself as opposed to quartz or hand wound, I wondered what I
would do if I owned more than one. I have seen watch winders at every
extreme of an imagined price range, and some have earned their price
from fine woods or decoration, but the majority have always seemed to
be "overpriced" in my opinion, as well.
I searched to see what I could find to answer this question, and as
you might expect, the first site I found was for a German company and
talked about precision. But I did learn a bit here and excerpt the
following:
"The most valuable lesson I learned about watches is they should be
worn, not placed in a drawer or a safe. And, if you are going to wear
a watch, it must be kept wound with the time, date, and other
functions set.
If you also own more than one self-winding watch, this may be the
obvious reason you are interested in watchwinders. A watchwinder keeps
a watch wound and ready to wear. The watch is set to the correct time,
and the date and other functions are intact. Equally important, the
watchwinder keeps the fine oil moving throughout the watch, by moving
it in either a clockwise or a counterclockwise direction. This
encourages the weight inside the watch to continue moving and keeps
the spring wound.
From a basic single-head electric winder to an ultrasophisticated
four-watch winder that rotates in both directions, JFA's commitment is
to deliver German quality at American prices--within reason and
without compromise."
From: http://www.watchwinders.com/about.html
So, the ability to change rotation direction is one feature that will
drive a watch winder's price up, but may spread lubrication a bit
better.
I often see the name Orbita associated with watch winders and their
site at http://www.orbita.net/pages_us/home_us.htm talks about their
quality:
"All Orbita Watchwinders are battery powered to provide for
portability, allowing their use anywhere. They are always supplied
with a convenient AC/DC adapter which also allows plug-in convenience
. Every Orbita winder is programmable for watch winding time ( turns
per day ) in order to avoid watch over-winding. They are also
programmable for watch winding direction ( either clockwise or
counter-clockwise ) or for automatic rotation reversing when desired.
Orbita Watchwinder cases are truly "works of art". Many cases are made
from fine hardwoods and hardwood veneers with superb hand-rubbed
lacquer finishes. Others are covered with soft and supple luxurious
cowhide or calfskin leather, with hand-stitched finishing and/or gold
accent stripes. Cases may be selected with either solid or see-thru
glass tops or fronts. All cases are suede lined and storage space is
generally provided for one or more additional watches. The hardware we
use all made of stainless steel and all exposed locks and hinges are
gold-plated."
Even their discontinued and blemished models range from $250 to $2700
on their specials page, and again, a good portion of the cost seems to
be related to aesthetics.
Investigating further, http://www.genesisny.net/OrbitaFAQ.html
mentions new information on the winding requirements of different
watches:
"Question: O.K. How much winding time is right for my watch?
Answer:
Rather than talking about winding time in terms of minutes or hours,
let's substitute Turns Per Day (TPD). That is the number of turns of
the internal rotor that is required each day to keep the particular
watch wound. Most automatic watches require 500 to 650 TPD. For
example, a Rolex President needs about 500 TPD. Rolex watches are
designed to wind in both directions as do many other brands. However,
some other watches wind in one direction only and that direction can
be clockwise or counterclockwise. For example, many Patek Phillipe
watches only wind counterclockwise. All IWC Chronographs using a
Valjoux 7750 movement wind only clockwise and need at least 700 TPD.
Accordingly, the best-engineered Watchwinders are programmable both
for TPD and rotation direction to meet these diverse requirements."
And...
"Question: What about watch winding "cycles" ?
Answer:
Let's presume your particular watch needs 600 TPD to keep it wound.
Some Watchwinders ( not ours) run continuously for several hours and
then turn off for the rest of the day (i.e. 100 turns per hour x 6
hours = 600 TPD). Ours, and some others, run for only a few minutes
per hour, but do so all day long (i.e. 25 turns per hour for 24 hours
= 600 TPD). Both methods keep your watch fully wound but when it comes
to watch accuracy, the second method is infinitely better. Why?
Because the mainspring attains its greatest torque when it is fully
wound. As it slowly unwinds over the day, torque decreases and this
torque reduction impacts the running accuracy of the watch. So,
periodic rewinding all day long translates into more constant
torque, a constant running rate and a more accurate watch."
So we now have more features that will drive up the cost of a watch
winder.
Further on, they mention:
"High speed continuous rotation of an automatic watch in a 360 degree
motion increases wear of the winding mechanism components. Typically,
motion of the wearer's wrist when walking or working is only 60
degrees or less and is intermittent. Obviously, many existing
watchwinders do not replicate human motion."
The WatchWinderStore.com at, not surprisingly,
http://www.watchwinderstore.com , says in their self description:
"In the course of selling high quality watches to our customers, we
were constantly asked by our customers about quality yet affordable
automatic watch winders for their automatic watches. With the
feedback from our customers, we've found out that in general, they are
looking for a watch winder that is of high quality, in-expensive, with
full-feature functionality, yet esthetic pleasing. "
It seem a lot of us have this question!
"We have been searching for the right watch winders around the globe
for many months. However, it is not easy to source a quality, well
designed yet affordable automatic watch winders in the market."
And we have noted this as well.
"For most inexpensive watch winders, they are either made of cheap
looking plastic or of unsatisfied quality. Many of them are of funny
windmill shape that are not well received by our customers.
Until we found the ERS watchwinders.. It is by far one of the very
few watch winder brands that meets all the requirements of being:
in-expensive, high quality, full feature that fits all watch design
specification, and with an esthetic pleasing design . They are all
made of real wood and hand polished to a piano like smooth finish.
It's elegant design is a showpiece by itself."
Their products look attractive and range in price from $320, but
incredibly:
"Our Summer Specials receive tremendous response. All our watch
winder products have been completely SOLD OUT !
Our new shipment will arrive in mid October "
You can sign up for information and specials on their page, and be
alerted when the replensih stock.
Equation of Time at https://www.wsccommerce.com/eotstore/index.cfm?ProductID=3742&do=detail
shows an Orbita at $189! It is for a single watch and I will let you
judge the aesthetics for yourself. A partial description says:
"Orbita's new Sparta Watchwinder is a unique winder for mechanical
watches that is both affordable and amazing. Unlike all other
watchwinders on the market which rotate the watch, the new sparta
winder gently swings the watch to wind it. Every 10 minutes throughout
the day, the built-in control microprocessor activates a servomotor,
which causes the watch to swing back and forth for several
oscillations just as it would being worn on the wrist. The oscillating
winding action is totally self-regulating and therefore there is no
chance of damaging an expensive watch by overwinding it. Moreover, as
the servomotor powers only the first oscillation in the 10 minute
cycle with a ll succeeding oscillations totally powered by gravity,
battery draw is minimal. hence the Sparta winder is guaranteed to
operate for at least one year without any need for a battery change;
an ideal arrangement for unworn watches, which are kept in safes for
long periods oftime. "
This is a great site for watch enthusiast discussions and sale and
trades. I visit it often.
And last, I found the following page which actually attempts to answer
the question, "Why are Watch Winders So Expensive?"
http://www.chronocentric.com/watches/winders.shtml
"Why are watch winders so expensive when they seem pretty simple in
concept?
Watch winder manufacturers and sellers emphasize the quality, the
precision, and their knowledgable design to correctly pamper your
watch as the reasons. These do factor in, but only explain part of the
cost of these $200-$8,000 devices.
But the remaining factor in the cost is that these are specialty items
manufactured in relatively low quantities. Although winder
manufacturers keep their sales numbers confidential, it is safe to
guess that sales are a few thousands of units per year. At this level
of production, they cannot achieve the economies of mass production
that make items that sell in the multi-million units (such as blenders
and toasters) so affordable.
So while the prices of the devices may be higher than you might
expect, it is not viable for these manufacturers to produce them at
prices comparable to mass consumer items."
I trust this explains the surprisingly high cost of watch winders.
Thanks for a very interesting search!
Search strategy: why are watch winders expensive
Regards,
-=clouseau=- |
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