Hunting for Vintage Movements
Sometimes we catch a bug or fever in our collecting. GMT’s are this year’s Tiffany blue dials. Or maybe you are looking for a Type B Flieger or a world timer. The latest infatuation becomes the driver for acquiring new watches. I have recently been on the hunt for Felsa Bidynators.
Felsa was a movement maker in Grenchen, founded in 1918 and joining Ebauches, S.A. in 1928, known for their early self-winding mechanisms. These bumper automatics wound in only one direction. Felsa further developed automatic movements and introduced the first bi-directional winding system using a free spinning rotor with the Felsa 410 Bidynator (with sub-seconds) in 1942. I have a Felsa 415 (central seconds) in an early Enicar and in a later Bulova Watertite (NWA). In 1947 Felsa refined the movement further and introduced the 690 Bidynator. This movement was popular in many automatics, including Breitling. I have one in a post-War Ellis. These movements were still in use in the early 1960’s. The Felsa 690 may be among the most popular automatic movements in history.
Scrolling through endless old and broken watches I came across this:
I have a theory that crystal failure consigns many a working watch to banishment to a drawer. This crystal was too high and failed all at once. I only vaguely knew that the brand was associated with Glycine. However, I knew that Glycine joined ASUAG specifically to gain access to Felsa movements. Without pictures of the movement, I gambled that it was a Felsa 690. Jackpot.
Hans Troesch founded Altus in 1920. They originally made movements for German brands, reportedly including Lange. Charles Hertig bought Altus in the 1940’s. In 1951 Hertig bought Glycine. He merged the companies in the early 1960’s. To celebrate the merger there are many watches from that era that have both brands on the dial. Altus is still lurking somewhere in the intellectual property of Glycine.
This one still needs some work, but it has cleaned up well. I like the dial texture and gold accents. More than that though, is the satisfaction that I could spot a Bidynator just by looking at grainy pictures of the dial of a broken nearly forgotten Swiss watch.
Restitutor Orbis. Aristocrat of beauty. Autocrat of time. (Trying to perfect trolling over at theescapementroom.com)
Oh wow! That Altus is awesome. Absolutely love everything about the dial. Nice find! 😍
Very nice find, digging the linen-y, sector-ish dial. Either from wear or on purpose, looks 👌🏻.
Your first paragraph brought this to my mind for some reason 😂.
Amazing!!! Great save. 👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼
Very cool indeed, interesting read. Thank you 👍👍
This is how you do vintage - take notes everyone, take notes.
Thanks, as always for the insight 🙏
God job Greg👌 Fantastic write up and great looking gem👍Interesting squared dial. Breitling have the same, but in blue, in one of their chronograph reissues.
God job Greg👌 Fantastic write up and great looking gem👍Interesting squared dial. Breitling have the same, but in blue, in one of their chronograph reissues.
Did you notice that it was from the 1950's?
Did you notice that it was from the 1950's?
Glad you found one. There are so few of them👍
THE HUNT is the best part of this hobby!
Hi Greg,
I recently (past few months) have been on a Felsa binge myself. I bought a Mercury automatic with power reserve indicator out of curiosity and discovered a Felsa F 760 inside and fell in love with it, but sadly it did not have the power reserve wheels inside it! So I bought a Stewag with a power indicator in the same position and yes! It had a F 760 inside with the missing wheels! Which I then accidentally destroyed because the key wheel is an odd brass differential with very fragile teeth.... So then I had two F 760s in need of that same differential gear! I couldn't find that gear with any parts dealer, then quite by accident I bought a 1950's Consul with no date or power reserve indicator and popped it open and saw that it had a Felsa F 699 inside, which has a power reserve function even though the dial on the watch did not! So rather than immediately open the movement to see if the gear I needed was in it and unused, I started researching if the 699 even used the same differential gear, which it does, and then I found a parts dealer with two of them, which he sold me for the price of one! Now having three Bidynators, I discovered that I also have a Felsa 4007N that was in a Mondaine that I've had for several years that didn't work, and having fallen in love with Felsa movements I decided to get that up an running as well (it needs a setting lever spring).
I read your blog post asking if Swatch kept and let go of the right brands. I agree with you, especially about Eterna.
Nice work on the Altus, and great job spotting it in the wild!
Dayton
Hi Greg,
I recently (past few months) have been on a Felsa binge myself. I bought a Mercury automatic with power reserve indicator out of curiosity and discovered a Felsa F 760 inside and fell in love with it, but sadly it did not have the power reserve wheels inside it! So I bought a Stewag with a power indicator in the same position and yes! It had a F 760 inside with the missing wheels! Which I then accidentally destroyed because the key wheel is an odd brass differential with very fragile teeth.... So then I had two F 760s in need of that same differential gear! I couldn't find that gear with any parts dealer, then quite by accident I bought a 1950's Consul with no date or power reserve indicator and popped it open and saw that it had a Felsa F 699 inside, which has a power reserve function even though the dial on the watch did not! So rather than immediately open the movement to see if the gear I needed was in it and unused, I started researching if the 699 even used the same differential gear, which it does, and then I found a parts dealer with two of them, which he sold me for the price of one! Now having three Bidynators, I discovered that I also have a Felsa 4007N that was in a Mondaine that I've had for several years that didn't work, and having fallen in love with Felsa movements I decided to get that up an running as well (it needs a setting lever spring).
I read your blog post asking if Swatch kept and let go of the right brands. I agree with you, especially about Eterna.
Nice work on the Altus, and great job spotting it in the wild!
Dayton
Nice catch on the power reserve parts. This the geeky part of collecting watches that I really like. Thanks for reading over there. I enjoy the videos (I subscribe).
I appreciate the long and thoughtful comment (with pictures no less).
Thanks! I remember your username from a year or more ago.
I spent some time in Charleston when I was producing theater (Spoleto festival). I also lived in Sumter as a child (on Shaw Air Force base).
I was looking at your Le Marc pictured in theescapemetnroom. Do you know what the 9033 sand 822 signify? I have no idea. I guess it's a model number. Reminds me of Seikos. I love its monohull case!
Thanks! I remember your username from a year or more ago.
I spent some time in Charleston when I was producing theater (Spoleto festival). I also lived in Sumter as a child (on Shaw Air Force base).
I was looking at your Le Marc pictured in theescapemetnroom. Do you know what the 9033 sand 822 signify? I have no idea. I guess it's a model number. Reminds me of Seikos. I love its monohull case!
I never could see those numbers until it was cleaned up. I don't know what they are. Marc Nicolet was never a big company. Edit: browsing eBay I saw a Benrus with the exact same case (with the weird flat bezel).