Do you use a watch winder?

I voted yes…which is a lie. I asked Santa for a WW, but all I got was some coal, so I ordered one on Amazon, and it will be arriving next week. 
 

Yes I have one, but I use it sparingly. If I’ve set an auto with day and date (and screwdown crown quite often) and then I’m wearing something else after a day or two I keep the auto going for a few days on the winder. If I don’t wear it again within a week or so I let it run down to avoid unnecessary wear & tear. Budget model for me (these are reduced on Amazon at the moment). I’ve had zero issues 👍

The way I plan to use mine is with my 38 hour power reserve COSC ETA watch with a date and screw down crown. I wear it ~ 3 days a week. My other three watches in regular rotation have 72 hour+ power reserve, so they stay running between wears with occasional winding. 

Putting unnecessary wear and tear on watches for no good reason.

Just pick up a watch when you want to use it, set the time, and off it goes.

Much better for the watch in the long run.

I personally think the unnecessary wear on screw down crowns is more likely to cause issues. Winders don't unnecessarily wear automatic watches. I looked into it extensively before getting a Wolf. 

If I wear an automatic watch every day for 5 years, and you wear yours once a month for 5 years, which watch has more wear and tear? Mine, yes? And why? Because the parts in mine were moving more often than in yours. Extrapolate that to a scenario where one watch sits in a drawer, unused, for long periods of time, versus a watch that gets spun around on a winder more regularly. It's the same thing. One watch is moving more than the other; accordingly that watch will have greater wear and tear than the other.

I have the Luxwinder Affinity. It is quite expensive in my opinion, but it’s super quiet, goodlooking and easy to place your watches in it. I’ve had different ones before but they were either super loud or much bigger

JQUEEN Watch Winder on Amazon.  Works, but not a fan of how bulky it is.  

I see no value in a winder.  Maybe if I had a perpetual calendar, I’d keep it on a winder because some of them are incredibly difficult to set.  Otherwise, it’s just excess wear and tear.

I had a boss who kept his 1992 Coke GMT on a winder until 2018.  He only wore it two or three times per year but he had 26 years worth of wear on it without a single service. That’s practically watch abuse. 

I just did some quick math but somebody correct me if I’m wrong.

28,800 vibrations per hour x 24 hours x 365 days = 252,288,000 vibrations per year.  
 

Since each vibration is a start, stop, return and stop, that means there are 504,576,000 separate contacts on the escapement each year.  

Your seconds hand will have to make 31,536,000 full revolutions each year.

I’m not certain people realize just how much contact and motion is going on inside a mechanical watch, especially in terms of contacts per hour or pinion turns per year.  This is the primary reason to service a watch that you want to maintain long term.

Putting an unused watch on a winder is simply forcing these millions of operations on the watch for no good reason, imho. 

I was gifted a Wolf watch winder with an Omega purchase. RRP for it was £279 apparently. 
I planned to use it but they didn’t include batteries 🤷🏻‍♂️ so it’s been sitting there ever since. 

None of your poll options applied to me :)
I want one, but haven't picked (or saved up for a nice one) yet.

My setup.  Two WOLF 1834s, a single and a triple (AVOID, never again!) on the left and a random quad Chinese ZoeJoe from Amazon picked up on Prime Day, which has been phenomenal so far.

What’s your point? There are watches running since the 1970‘s that never saw a service center. Modern watch parts are so friction resistant. If you do NOT let them run though, the oils will dry up much faster. So having your watches run all the time is the better option in my (and my experienced watchmaker‘s) opinion.

Firstly, I think you need to calm down. It's not that kind of forum. I apologise for the laughing emoji but I was disappointed to read the post and how vehemently you presented your argument as fact. 

Secondly, I have no interest in changing anyone's else's opinion. Here's mine but I'm happy for you or anyone to disagree (but I won't be defending it further). - It's already been stated that there is lots of 'facts' supporting benefits of both approaches (some say letting a movement go static causes damage, some say the opposite) but you only have to watch restoration videos to see plenty of evidence that a watch worn every day for decades often shows little "wear and tear" and equally a watch found in a drawer after decades. What IS evident is that screw down crowns are easily damaged and often expensive to repair. So I choose to have a winder so it limits the times I have to do it. 

Whatever floats people's boats but IMHO, is completely useless...like leaving your car running all the time so it is "ready."

Plus, I like winding my watches. Is part of my routine and calms me.

I have a winder that can wind 4 watches at a time. I'm not home so I will share a picture later if I can. I don't understand people saying that they cause unnecessary wear and tear on a watch. Most winders are factory set at the bare minimum of time to wind a watch so the springs aren't super tight. Some winders have settings for the user to set it to the way they like. My winder runs for 4 minutes at a low speed. It stops then restarts again after 20 minutes. Mine is factory set. I can't adjust the speed or time. I think wearing the watch is more wear and tear than a winder. I think that the watch actually is wound more by body movement. I only suggest to not put vintage automatics on a winder. They don't have the mechanism to keep them from being overwound like newer ones. But hey to each their own and what ever floats your boat. Just keep wearing what you like and love. Watch on! 

When I get a watch with too many hats to set complications I'll get one.   Until that time I'm not too bothered.

Here's mine. Only use it to give an automatic a head start if I'm going to wear it and when testing a new watch.

I have a few Wolf winders. These ones are from my themed section with the winders coloured in country of origin for each watch.

My take on the great watch winder debate is that it’s a bit like an old car. The old cars that you keep running are still running years on, whilst the ones found in the back of sheds that don’t get started are always seized up.

I might be proved wrong some day, but I’m sticking with this theory until proven otherwise.

I have an Orbita Siena 1 Rotorwind and love it. 

Own two of them. JQUEEN model W004. purchased from Amazon.

I am the watch winder 

Yes I do use a watch winder, several of them in fact. No, I don't think they are essential and I'm also undecided whether they do really cause long term damage or don't.

The first that I have is an 8 slots Jins&Vico. It's been working for two years and so far it didn't cause any watch to malfunction. 

The second winder that I own is a stack of modular BOXY winders. I keep arranging, adding or moving these modules and while bulkier than the J&V they are also way more flexible to configure.

They are convenient, they do their job and they also provide a convenient place to store watches but I would not qualify them as essential. Surprisingly, they are also something anyone can decide to buy or skip. Nobody is forcing anyone to buy them and there is no conspiracy targeted at depriving us from buying a watch winder if it catch our fancy. 

Wow, very nice collection, can you make a resume on it?

I already did: SOTC part 1, 2, 3, 4 & 5

An Orbita Spartan came with my Snowflake as a promo from the dealer. I use it occasionally and will likely keep my upcoming Horage on it, but for the most part it’s dormant.  Would consider a wolf at some point if I got a perpetual or something that annoying to set 

Yes, but only for my watches that tell more than time since those are kind of a pain to set

I use two watch winders, a single watch winder with my timegrapher for keeping the watch I'm adjusting wound, and a quad watch winder for my two automatic only Seikos and my two GMTs because I keep messing up the GMT setting when I adjust the date. (The photos are from Amazon.)