How to slow a watch down?

My vintage has been gaining some seconds. It’s still under +/- 10 per day, but I’m wondering if there’s a way to slow it down other than bringing it to a watchmaker?

I heard I can slow it down by putting the watch crown down, but I’m not sure for how long or if there’s any other ways (not willing to touch the movement and my watchmaker is on summer break lmao)

thanks!

Reply
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Einstein would tell you to run really, really, fast.

If you are measuring the inaccuracy of a vintage watch in seconds you are still winning the game. Once it becomes chunks of minutes it will be time to make sure the mainspring isn't sticking due to old oil and dirt.

If it is a watch that you only occasionally wear trying leaving it wound for a few days.  Often, they self lubricate and settle down.  If it gets frequent wear just monitor it for a service.

And, always post a picture for the visual learners out there.

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Aurelian

Einstein would tell you to run really, really, fast.

If you are measuring the inaccuracy of a vintage watch in seconds you are still winning the game. Once it becomes chunks of minutes it will be time to make sure the mainspring isn't sticking due to old oil and dirt.

If it is a watch that you only occasionally wear trying leaving it wound for a few days.  Often, they self lubricate and settle down.  If it gets frequent wear just monitor it for a service.

And, always post a picture for the visual learners out there.

Yeah, well, I just got it serviced last february and I'm not very familiar to vintages so it's just kinda new for me haha.

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@Flandericious, to unpack the advice you heard about storing the watch crown down to slow it down is as follows:

Mechanical watches have ”positional variance,” i.e. run faster or slower depending on the position of the watch.  I believe this is due to slight differences of gravity and/or friction on the hairspring and balance wheel.  This is why the accuracy rate of mechanical watches is described as an average over X number of positions. 

You can take advantage of positional variance when you take your watch off overnight and letting it rest in a position that you know has a slower rate than when you wear it.

For example, my watch when worn is about +10 seconds fast.  I know from experience that when I rest my watch overnight with the crown up, the watch is about -10 seconds slow.  By resting my watch crown up whenever it is off the wrist, my average accuracy over time is roughly +/- 0.

Generally speaking, watches that are dial-up or dial-down tend to run faster than watches kept crown-up or crown-down.  However, every mechanical watch (even those of the same make and model) runs differently so you have to experiment to figure out how your watch actually runs in various positions.

This method of “self regulating” obviously only works for “daily drive” watches that you keep continuously wound up.  This does not permanently change the accuracy of your watch.

If you only wear the Constellation occasionally (lovely watch, by the way), +/- 10 seconds is pretty damned impressive for a vintage and better than the accuracy of a lot of entry/mid level mechanical watches.  It’s recently serviced so don’t fret and enjoy!

Hope that helped.