Next Watch Repair/Restoration - 1970's Nino Day/Date - This one had issues! - Pic Heavy

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thor447

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Hey OSA.

I'm really glad to see that so many people gave a thumbs up to my last watch rebuild post. I'm relieved that writing that whole thing up wasn't a wasted effort. I'll put a bit more detail into this one, so bear with me as it will take a few posts to write everything up and post the pics/vids.

The next watch on my bench was a really unique (I think) retro looking Nino from the 70's. I cannot pinpoint the exact date, but the particular movement that is in it was manufactured from 1969 to 1978. The best info I could find was that Nino was a brand established in Switzerland in the 1920's. It quickly vanished until 1968 when the name was resurrected and a new watch company using that name began operations in Neuchâtel, Switzerland. There were several small Swiss watch companies in operation in the early 70's. This one, like most others, contracted out there work and made very few items in house. The movement in this watch is an A. Schild 2066 model, dating from 1969 to 1978. Nino appears to be one of the several victims of the quartz crisis in the 70's. When the Japanese perfected the quartz movement, and made it where it could be built economically, the mechanical watch industry was hit hard. Between 1970 and 1983, Swiss watch companies decreased from 1,600 to 600 and employment fell from 90,000 to only 28,000 jobs. Smaller workshops and family-run businesses primarily had to file for bankruptcy. Nino appears to have been one of those companies who went under during that time. Ok, enough history, on to the watch!

I bought this one as a non-runner off of eBay for a pretty good price. As you'll see in the first photos, the case, crystal, and dial appear to be in great shape. There was no data given on why this wasn't running, but I could see from the pictures on eBay that it was missing the seconds hand. That was my first indicator that someone else had been inside this watch. There were more tell-tale signs as I dug deeper.

1 - Missing Seconds Hand.jpg

2.jpg


This watch even came with the original strap, which appears to be have been unused! It still has the 'Nino' tag. Unfortunately I have large wrists and it is just barely too small to fit me on it's longest setting. The case back has what I thought to be the factory protective sticker on it. It is somewhat common for people to keep those on the watch when they buy it new, as it potentially adds value if you ever decide to resell the watch. A watch of this age with one still on it is a very rare thing. Upon further inspection, it appears that it is just some sort of color applied by the factory. What few examples I could find of other Nino watches online nearly all had a color of some sort applied on the case back. Mine isn't unique, but I did not want to take a chance to removing any of that coloring, so when I cleaned up the case later on, I left the case back alone.

I started digging into the watch. It wasn't terribly dirty by any means, but I could definitely tell that someone else had been inside the watch and didn't know what they were doing. There were a few parts missing, and things just generally didn't seem to be fitting right.

Here's a few photos of the watch in various stages of disassembly.

Front Side Of Watch:
3.JPG

4.JPG

5.JPG

6.JPG


Rear Side Of Watch
8 - Rear.jpg


9 - Rear.JPG


More continued in follow up post (2).
 
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thor447

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Post 2

Additional photos of rear side of watch during disassembly.
10 - Automaic Works Assembly.JPG

11 - Wheel Train.JPG


As I went through the watch I found a few missing parts. Specifics are detailed within the photos below:
12 - Broken Setting Lever Spring.jpg

13 - Missing Retaining Clip.jpg

14 - Missing Date Wheel Arm & Spring.jpg

15 - Worn 4th Wheel Pivot.jpg


Shown below is the watch fully disassembled. This picture was taken after cleaning, and I had already assembled the mainspring barrel, spring, and arbor assembly, so unfortunately I do not have the cool photo showing the mainspring curling around all of the other parts! While I was sourcing the missing parts, I began working on the case and crystal. I had already cleaned and polished the case, restored the crystal, and reassembled them before this photo was taken. I'm kicking myself now for not getting the full picture of everything taken apart before any repair/restoration work had begun.
16.jpg


The case was in pretty decent shape and it didn't take much to bring it back to life. The crystal, while it looked good on eBay, and appears to be good in the first photo of this thread, actually had tons of smaller scratches and scuff marks on it. It took a good 45 minutes of hand polishing with 0.5 micron diamond lapping paste to get it back to looking good. In the final photos you'll see that this crystal is faceted. Oddly, and thankfully, the facets on this one are on the underside of the crystal, and needed only a tiny bit of work. All of the elbow grease was applied to the top side of the crystal, which is flat and made for much easier work.

I was luckily able to find a good condition donor movement that I could pull all of the needed parts from (aside from the missing seconds hand which I had in stock). Here are the missing parts I scavenged from the donor:
17 - Missing Parts.jpg


More continued on follow up post (3).
 
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thor447

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Post 3

Once I had all of the missing parts pulled from the donor, I cleaned them and began assembly. I am finding it difficult to remember to stop during assembly to take photos, so I don't have much to show here during the process, but there are some decent little videos.

18 - Rear Assembled.JPG


This first video was during assembly of the rear side of the watch. It is the critical point of installing the balance assembly. The rest of the rear side of the movement (aside from the automatic works) had been assembled and lubricated. I apologize for the lack of video quality, as I have zero clue about camera settings, so this video was taken using the default options on the microscope camera I use.

Installing the balance:


Here's a video of it running a few minutes after installing the balance. I am looking at it from an angle, checking the flatness of the hairspring, checking to see that the wheel doesn't appear out of balance and swings true, and getting a feel for the amplitude by looking at how far the balance is swinging in either direction after engaging the pallet fork. It's an interesting angle in the video where you can see the underside of the balance, where the impulse jewel on the underside of the balance/roller assembly engages with the pallet fork, thus running the watch:



The last video is the timegrapher reading after regulating it. This was taken after about 10 minutes of adjusting the watch. I got really good results. The next step after this video is to let it run in for about 24 hours. This is so that the lubricants have a chance to cycle though the watch (only where they are supposed to be), and any issues that might creep up due to end shake, side shake, mainspring issues, etc. will come to light. Thankfully I didn't have much to do 24 hours later. I hadn't wound the mainspring since I first assembled it, and I was still getting a pretty good amplitude a day later.



Here's a couple of photos taken today. It was the first day wearing the rebuilt watch.
21.jpg

22.jpg


I will take it apart in the next few days to adjust the landing position of the day wheel. It is a little off-center, but not enough to make me not want to wear it today! It didn't appear that way in the original photos, but since the day wheel retaining clip was not installed, it wasn't fully indexing into position. Once the clip was installed, this issue showed itself. It's a quick fix, but I'll address it later. I'm just enjoying wearing this weird retro-looking watch for the time being.

This is the final post - 3 of 3. Congrats if you made it this far!
 

thor447

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Very impressive. You must have very steady hands, patience, and e tremendous talent.
Thank you. Patience is something that this is teaching me. It can be an expensive lesson to learn, which I've done so already! I am even going to put up a 'Patience' sign above my workbench as a reminder.

Impressive for sure.
Thank you.
 

thor447

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This one is next on the bench.

A vintage Zodiac from 1970. I still can't believe that I won the auction for this one, as I expected it to go much higher than my final bid. I've always wanted an old Zodiac watch, and these are extremely well made. This one is going to be killer once it's finished.

1668480967468.png


I also have the original steel bracelet for it, but it is too small for me. I'll end up cleaning it up, but will just keep it stored as I won't be able to use it. It'll go with this watch if for some reason, I cannot fathom, I end up selling it later.
 
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thor447

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I’m loving these. Keep it up.
I'll do my best. I just pray that I don't dive head first into cameras and start ordering a bunch of stuff create better videos. Before I know it, it would spiral out of control and I'll be one of those YouTube people doing watch videos. If I sell a gun or two on OSA in the future, make sure to confirm that I'm not doing it to buy camera equipment, haha!
 

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I'll do my best. I just pray that I don't dive head first into cameras and start ordering a bunch of stuff create better videos. Before I know it, it would spiral out of control and I'll be one of those YouTube people doing watch videos. If I sell a gun or two on OSA in the future, make sure to confirm that I'm not doing it to buy camera equipment, haha!
Hey if you love it, dive in! You can make some money while spreading information and passion for such a useful trade/hobby. A camera, tripods, light box, light, and a quality mic can be more affordable than you think.
 

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