I was pleased to see that the author used the PT5000, one of my favorite calibers. As pointed out in the article it's a Chinese clone of the ubiquitous ETA 2824-2; this movement is used in a lot of affordable watches that are sold on AliExpress. You can get a Submariner homage with a sapphire crystal, ceramic bezel, lume, and full water resistance powered by this movement for $100 that keeps time just as well as a Swiss watch (i.e. within COSC standards). Before I sold it mine was running at +5spd... the Chinese watchmaking industry is truly something to behold.
It is remarkable indeed! When not ruining watches with resin I enjoy servicing them, and I'm planning to learn how chronographs work next. The ST19 movement is on its way now, another very reasonably priced, reliable and fully mechanical chronograph with a column wheel. Hats off to the Chinese.
Do you have any recommended resources for buying mechanical watch clones on aliexpress? Im interested in grabbing something but would love to get an idea of where to find the best value before pulling the trigger on one.
There's a long and winding thread called "Best of Ali-Xpress" [sic] on WatchUSeek that has a bunch of ideas. Outside of that I'd recommend searching either by movement name ("NH35", "PT5000") or popular watch model diameter ("40mm" for a Sub, "41mm" for an SMP) and sorting by best selling. From there you can go to the storefronts and see all of their models.
There are a few brands that have been punching above their price points. For Rolex Submariner homages, you can't really beat Sugess. Other Chinese brands worth considering are San Martin, Cronos, WM, and Seagull. Among the upcoming brands, Watchdives and Tactical Frog are also doing quite well. Though cheaper, Pagani Design is a step below the rest. It's not bad, but their watches are definitely not as polished as the ones from the brands mentioned above. In terms of movements, stick to NH35, NH34, PT5000, SW200, Miyota 90S5, etc. Try to buy from the official stores on Aliexpress, and check your private messages after you add the watches to your cart. They'll often issue coupon codes for said items.
If you can swing it, I'd go for the Bulova Lunar Pilot or the Seiko Prospex Chronograph SSC819. If you are looking for cheap Chinese, Phylida makes a well-reviewed one.
For something slightly more expensive check out NTH (now defunct micro brand but easy to find on eBay) or Squale.
For vintage (ignore their new stuff), Enicar, Eterna, Roamer, Rodania, Cortebert, Wakmann, Mido, Certina, early Girard Perregaux, etc. all can be had cheap. Bunch of excellent brands wiped out in quartz crisis that can be had for next to nothing.
How serviceable are watches with defunct manufacturers? My understanding is typical mechanical watches require service to replace worn parts every 5 years or so.
Most services just include cleaning and relubrication. Parts don’t wear out that quickly.
Most watches from before the quartz crisis (pre ‘70s) used standard off-the-shelf Swiss movements for which spare parts are still readily available. It can get tricky with expensive or rare in-house stuff like Omega and Rolex though.
I’m sure you have though about it already, but if you had a way to modify the refractive index of the resin, you could make the fishing lines disappear completely.
You can use index matching fluid to determine what the nylon line is currently at and then use the fluid to experiment with epoxy droplets containing various amounts of low index additives like MgF2 nanoparticles or something :)
This is awesome! Reminds me of an artist that would encapsulate items like cameras into resin and then slice them with a water jet cutter creating a different version of an 'exploded view'. Can't find the link.
The author does corss sections of a lot of electronic components and the more delicate ones were cast is resin first. Th "making of" is as cool as the end result!
> I don't have the tools or knowledge required to sand this down to a perfect mirror finish
I did a resin cast that had a similar "lip" at the edge (I turned a LGA CPU socket into a coaster), and I was able to sand it down fairly easily using regular sandpaper of progressively higher grit, producing a more or less perfect cuboid. The flatness was achieved by taping the sandpaper to a flat surface, and moving the part.
It's been a while, I can't remember if I used some kind of polishing compound at the end or whether the sandpaper alone was enough for a good finish.
I suspect you're right, but knowing myself I'd quickly get sick of sanding (6 faces with 5-6 different kinds of sandpaper), and I'd want an orbital sander. Then I'm pretty sure you want to polish the surfaces: lots of elbow grease or a polishing/buffing tool. If I had a workshop with space for tools and dust I'd probably go for it, but I'm doing this in the living room of a small apartment.
This would be a similar process to finishing any painted surface. Progressive through the grits, each time removing the scratches from the previous grit, wet sanding with the higher grits. You can then hand polish with polishing compounds you can get at any hardware/car accessory store. You can start with an orbital sander or a belt sander of some sorts. I've done this on guitars I've built.
If you're fairly close it shouldn't be a ton of work.
Could probably cut this into a cylinder on a wood-lathe; you can do some pretty good polishing on one too ala polished wood pens. With skill you might even be able to round the end.
Part of me wants to believe this is sacrilege: these are incredible machines, and the magic is in not just seeing _how_ they work, but that they continue to work reliably for decades, and when they don't it's magic seeing them fixed somewhere like https://www.youtube.com/@WristwatchRevival. But also... this is incredibly cool! As kids, my brother used to do these little resin sculptures, putting in sand shells and little plans to it'd look like the bottom of the sea. I tried repeatedly to get into the same hobby but I was always too impatient so my designs would end up with fingerprints all over them before they'd properly set.
Pocket watches are sold in antique shops by the price of their weight in brass. Finding one that is complete but needs a cleaning and new oil to spring to life is relatively easy.
There are 10x more pocket watches than owners interested. Theyre incredible machines... but their greatest use is practice materials for aspiring watch repair technicians.
They're expensive to repair because few people have the skills and tools. The demand is so low. (I have two)
I literally started by buying a bunch of cheap Waltham movements on eBay and tearing them apart. From there my progression was read a few books, watch some videos, buy some tools, join the NAWCC and go to some local meets, and meet local folks to teach me directly. Once you make some helpful friends who are a lot more knowledgeable and experienced than you are and are eager to teach, you're off and running.
I actually discovered pretty early on that my interest was more in clocks than watches, but the early explorations in the watch realm were almost entirely applicable to clock repair as well. I have since repaired at least a hundred clocks and pocket watches. Next month I'm going down to the NAWCC school of horology in Columbia, PA to take my third workshop there, this one on the repair of wooden works clocks. The school was closed for a number of years, but has fired back up in the past few and I know they're actively working on getting more watch repair workshops going. Last time I was there they were just putting together a killer watch lab with some very expensive benches and equipment.
You can get started for <£100 or even <£30 if you are careful
You will need a set of flat headed screwdrivers. These are 80% of the tools you'll be using.
If you are approaching middle age, you'll need some magnification. I dont like loupes (those lenses you hold to the eye), and the visor mounted magnifiers are also not that good for me. I got a second hand long armed stereo 10x microscope for £30 which is perfect for me. You might just want a big old magnifying glass.
You might want a movement holder, again you can get super cheap ones, but second hand ones are better (because the shit ones are thrown away). they are basically specialized vices, or tiny little buckets(those are custom to each movement though.)
Next, start off with pocket watches, they are much bigger and more forgiving, and also cheaper.
In the uk: H samual, Thos russel are good brands to look for anything £20 or less.
For america: waltham/elgin (they often have broken balance though so watch out ) Eglins and Walthams look a lot more pretty, and have a better standard of finishing than the english counterparts.
Watch a few hours of watch repair on YouTube. If you're still intrigued, I highly recommend Mark Lovick's course over at https://www.watchfix.com/. You'll learn all you need to know about tools, lubricants and techniques to service most watch movements.
it's magic to see the repair process, but not magic to see how the mechanisms work? i'm unsure how you could draw enjoyment from the former without also appreciating the latter.
Kinda hoped that's what I wrote, but clearly not. For what it's worth, I'm already working out how I can give the same treatment to my Atari Lynx when it conks out.
ah, i believe i misunderstood. on re-reading, i see your statement about sacrilege was more about removing a functional watch from circulation before its time.
Is there no transparent substance that is gel-like for a period of time before it cures solid so that the pieces can simply be suspended in it and nudged to their final positions manually? Like a gel suspension 3D printer but where the gel hardens instead of being washed away at the end. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=swB5-GzX3nQ
I don't know how viscous SLA 3D printer resin is, but if it could be made viscous enough then it seems like maybe you could just suspend the parts in it, tweaking their positions as much as you want until they're just right, then blast the whole thing with enough UV to cure all of it.
There are gel-like resins, but you'd have massive issues with air entrapment. There's really no shortcut for making these. Casting in layers is the most common approach, but as noted in the article, it's hard to avoid slight refractive index discontinuities.
If it's fluid, I guess you always would have an issue with buoyancy/density. The things you want to suspend will either want to float up or sink down before it cures.
But maybe it could work with something like beads of same refraction index, and then pour resin in when everything is in place? At least it works for water, I've seen it used for decorations and then pouring water over when everything is in place.
Yep, nylon and epoxy resin have similar indices of refraction, but it's not perfect. I tried casting thin rods out of epoxy to replace the nylon but failed to achieve a good result.
Have you tried Fluorocarbon? this has replaced Nylon for many fishing use (fly fishing in any case), it has a different refraction index -- not sure if it would be closer, or further from the resin, but at least it is different! :-)
Never tried, because fluorocarbon's index of refraction (1.42-ish) is further from epoxy resin (1.50-1.57) than nylon (1.53). It does make sense that fluorocarbon has replaced nylon because it's going to be less visible in water (1.33).
I guess the epoxy's index of refraction depends on all kinds of factors such as the mixing ratio and the conditions under which it cures.
I tried, but they're very difficult to cast. Epoxy resin is also very brittle and difficult to cut neat and square. A jagged edge does not bond very well to a smooth surface.
Also these would be awesome display pieces for a jewellers selling watches. Not sure there'd be a correlation with sales, but it'd give people being dragged around those shops something to pay attention to.
What’s a decent vintage watch that is simple to buy these days on eBay? I don’t care for the brand but I would love to have a vintage watch with a Swiss movement.
Beware, buying vintage watches on eBay is 'hard mode' even for longtime collectors. The number of 'Frankenstein' Omegas and other older pieces likely outnumbers the legit ones, and the degree to which -- and skill level with which -- things have been refinished or repaired is often very difficult to ascertain.
The other thing to beware is that the fake market ("replicas") is now unbelievably good - and also include vintage pieces. So scammers could buy very good fakes, artificially age them, and charge a fortune.
The only thing that works is to 'buy the seller' meaning: only buy from reputable sellers/dealers.
Chrono24 and (carefully) using r/WatchExchange are your best bets, but even there - diligence the sellers very well.
Adam Savage took on a similar style of project trying to make an exploded cellphone cast in resin - with the added challenge of making the screen work. It was evidently a sponsored project and some of the work was rushed a bit - the outcome feels more like a prototype rather than the display quality piece he was going for - but the same kind of problem solving and techniques were involved.
Still, if you’re interested in more of the same sort of thing, worth a look:
Well, if Bartosz doesn't reach out (I offered to send it to him), I'll consider sending it to Adam. My favorite builds of his are boxes that reflect their contents, and I'd love to see what he'd consider for something like this.
This is a labor of love, there’s no way the 15+ hours would be worth it commercially.I think it’s cool and if you start looking at things like this as a business idea they get unfun really fast.
Except that above a certain price, demand falls to zero.
The question is whether there is any overlap at all where the price would be high enough to motivate supply (worth it to him) but low enough that there's still demand (worth buying). Also factoring in the cost of marketing, since potential buyers don't just automatically find you.
There are a huge number of business ideas where there is no overlap at all. Finding an overlap even without competition is hard enough. (Then add competition and it gets even harder, of course.)
I'd wager OP will get some DMs from people willing to pay $1k+ for this sort of thing. Watch people can be very spendy, especially for something unique like this.
Rich watch people can be spendy because it's fashion and, for mechanical watches, the idea of timeless functionality at the highest levels of craftsmanship.
This is exceptionally cool to me. But it's not something you get to subtly show off in public, it's going to (hopefully) involve a cheap watch, and therefore the "timeless functionality" appeal is gone.
Make a couple of them using Rolexes in a cube shape, and somebody would pay lots to have them as "fuzzy dice" to hang from the rear view mirror of their high end car.
But seriously, it doesn't have to be displayed with subtlety. Somebody offer OP $10K for this so you can use it as a paperweight on your desk.
The problem is if this takes 20 or so hours for someone who is highly skilled and could likely make a much safer easier income doing something else, so even $2000 would be $100 an hour which if OP’s hanging out on HN there’s a good chance they could just straight up make that amount in a day job.
Let’s go really pie in the sky, maybe some billionaire sees this (surely there’s some hanging out on hacker news) imagine them giving OP a $30,000 pocket watch owned by Ulysses S Grant or something and asking them to take that one of a kind art piece and encase it in resin. What would the pay rate be for such a project? The sky’s the limit, really.
Hand made pieces that only an expert could assemble are extremely expensive.
While it might not have the same cachet, an easier way to get this done would be to use a laser printing inside an glass or acrylic block --- just model all the parts:
but there should be companies doing 3D --- I distinctly remember a company doing a 3D map of the nearby star systems (which the _Universe_ role-player in me desperately wanted) --- perhaps:
l'm curious if Bartosz will actually contact him for that final casting, i know i would definitely love to own one. And mainly because I love mechanical watches, especially what's inside, but I don't like to wear or really use them, this is a great solution for this "problem".
I'd just like to highlight that this is one of quite a few things of a similar incredible amount of detail that they have done: https://ciechanow.ski/archives/
The minute hand is set to 43-ish minutes past the hour while the hour hand is showing 15-ish minutes past noon/midnight. If you’re used to reading analog watches it’s jarring.
Index matching UV cure optical adhesives could in principle be used in an SLA printer to make scaffolding structures for the exploded system that should completely disappear. Provided you can get an adhesive that matches the index of your resin of course.
It seems like it should be possible to make exploded models that way with more investment in upfront cad and less assembly labor. Perhaps very useful if you want to make many of them.
I like this, and respect the craft which went into making it. I still think an immersive 3D model you can interact with may be more functional to illustrate mechanisms.
The room of clockwork/ratchet mechanisms in "Musee des arts et metiers" in Paris is fantastic.
I proposed an archival function at my uni, for historical artifacts held in static collections e.g. the physics lab old computing gear. Turntable, slow rotate, static camera film, done.
This was actually pre-web: I wanted this put in the campus gopher!
I've done some projects like that, although not with as many parts! I think the main disappointment that awaits the author is that within two years or so, the epoxy will turn yellow. These resins are unfortunately not UV-stable, even if kept in a reasonably well-lit area indoors (bookshelf, etc).
There are resins you can use for projects like that if you want them to last, but they're less fun to work with.
Modern epoxies often claim to be UV stabilized, and as far as I can tell, this is a relatively recent advancement. For reference, I used Entropy CCR (slow cure) for the final model: https://entropyresins.com/product/ccr-clear-casting-epoxy/
We had UV-stabilized resins for the past two decades or so, but it just slows down the process. I used several UV-stabilized products and it just doesn't last.
For the UV-stable options, you have polyesters (which are very smelly) and premium aliphatic polyurethanes (which are finicky to work with).
Would putting some UV filter glass, the kind often used in museums, work to protect it the resin? I'm wondering if you fixed a glass casing around it that way... granted you'd have corner seems for the glass though
I was thinking about a larger with less curvature glass. It might also be interesting to see if it's possible to match the refractive indexes of the epoxy and the glass.
next step do one that can somehow still work as a clock, maybe by projecting the hands down into the watch face from above with lasers, or just have a super thin working watch hidden in the face, or hardcore mode somehow connect all those parts with real functional shafts ^^
I think it may still work if you don't wait until the last layer has completely cured. The viscosity just has to be high enough to be able to suspend the artifacts.
"To achieve the effect I want, I need around 20 layers for a regular pocket watch movement. If I were to cast each layer in a transparent container, adding components and epoxy as the previous layer was half-cured, I would be doing nothing else for a solid week."
I was pleased to see that the author used the PT5000, one of my favorite calibers. As pointed out in the article it's a Chinese clone of the ubiquitous ETA 2824-2; this movement is used in a lot of affordable watches that are sold on AliExpress. You can get a Submariner homage with a sapphire crystal, ceramic bezel, lume, and full water resistance powered by this movement for $100 that keeps time just as well as a Swiss watch (i.e. within COSC standards). Before I sold it mine was running at +5spd... the Chinese watchmaking industry is truly something to behold.
It is remarkable indeed! When not ruining watches with resin I enjoy servicing them, and I'm planning to learn how chronographs work next. The ST19 movement is on its way now, another very reasonably priced, reliable and fully mechanical chronograph with a column wheel. Hats off to the Chinese.
Do you have any recommended resources for buying mechanical watch clones on aliexpress? Im interested in grabbing something but would love to get an idea of where to find the best value before pulling the trigger on one.
There's a long and winding thread called "Best of Ali-Xpress" [sic] on WatchUSeek that has a bunch of ideas. Outside of that I'd recommend searching either by movement name ("NH35", "PT5000") or popular watch model diameter ("40mm" for a Sub, "41mm" for an SMP) and sorting by best selling. From there you can go to the storefronts and see all of their models.
This is EXACTLY what I was looking for. Very, very helpful. Thank you!
There is a huge community on Reddit for Chinese watches https://www.reddit.com/r/ChineseWatches/
I bought a Bauhaus style watch from a brand called Seestern for $65. https://www.reddit.com/r/ChineseWatches/comments/1jjkf52/see...
That watch is so nice. Can’t believe you got it for <$70. I always assumed automatic watches were much more expensive.
I was surprised to see it loses several seconds per day, do you have to reset the time on a monthly basis?
There are a few brands that have been punching above their price points. For Rolex Submariner homages, you can't really beat Sugess. Other Chinese brands worth considering are San Martin, Cronos, WM, and Seagull. Among the upcoming brands, Watchdives and Tactical Frog are also doing quite well. Though cheaper, Pagani Design is a step below the rest. It's not bad, but their watches are definitely not as polished as the ones from the brands mentioned above. In terms of movements, stick to NH35, NH34, PT5000, SW200, Miyota 90S5, etc. Try to buy from the official stores on Aliexpress, and check your private messages after you add the watches to your cart. They'll often issue coupon codes for said items.
Any good Speedmaster homage recommendations?
If you can swing it, I'd go for the Bulova Lunar Pilot or the Seiko Prospex Chronograph SSC819. If you are looking for cheap Chinese, Phylida makes a well-reviewed one.
Seiko SSC819 is a good Speedmaster homage. And it's solar powered so you never need to open the case.
For something slightly more expensive check out NTH (now defunct micro brand but easy to find on eBay) or Squale.
For vintage (ignore their new stuff), Enicar, Eterna, Roamer, Rodania, Cortebert, Wakmann, Mido, Certina, early Girard Perregaux, etc. all can be had cheap. Bunch of excellent brands wiped out in quartz crisis that can be had for next to nothing.
How serviceable are watches with defunct manufacturers? My understanding is typical mechanical watches require service to replace worn parts every 5 years or so.
Most services just include cleaning and relubrication. Parts don’t wear out that quickly.
Most watches from before the quartz crisis (pre ‘70s) used standard off-the-shelf Swiss movements for which spare parts are still readily available. It can get tricky with expensive or rare in-house stuff like Omega and Rolex though.
I think familiarity with the machining and assembly processes used in consumer electronics has helped them a lot too.
I’m sure you have though about it already, but if you had a way to modify the refractive index of the resin, you could make the fishing lines disappear completely.
I never gave that any serious thought. What additives would do that, do you think?
Edit: A quick search reveals that there is quite a lot of prior art from the optical community. Darn, maybe I'm not done here.
You can use index matching fluid to determine what the nylon line is currently at and then use the fluid to experiment with epoxy droplets containing various amounts of low index additives like MgF2 nanoparticles or something :)
My drawer is already full of radium dials. I'm not sure adding nanoparticles to the mix is a very good idea.
I've never heard of index matching fluids! Will have to read up on this.
The rabbit hole never ends. Godspeed, friend.
Add a polarization filter coating to the epoxy? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Optical_filter#Polarizer
Also, if the plastic can be "invisible", you can also house it in invisible plastic- thus creating, a exploded working model, inside the resin
On a similar line, I wonder if making it cylindrical would help reduce refraction when viewing at an angle?
The author mentions this, a cylinder shape causes a lot of optical deformation so it doesn't look as good.
> Bartosz, if you are reading this, contact me and I'll send you the final casting. This project would never have happened without your blog post.
I am impressed by the quality of your work on this side project and I love that final attention.
This is awesome! Reminds me of an artist that would encapsulate items like cameras into resin and then slice them with a water jet cutter creating a different version of an 'exploded view'. Can't find the link.
https://fabianoefner.com/cutup/
Hmm. I think he sliced it after he encapsulated it. Or that's my memory! So he had a "book" of cut acrylic sheets/layers of the object.
You are right! Was thinking of the same artist just a different project he did. https://fabianoefner.com/the-bialetti-book/
Video on the project https://vimeo.com/354927033
Different take, but you might like Open Circuits too: https://www.opencircuitsbook.com/
The author does corss sections of a lot of electronic components and the more delicate ones were cast is resin first. Th "making of" is as cool as the end result!
> I don't have the tools or knowledge required to sand this down to a perfect mirror finish
I did a resin cast that had a similar "lip" at the edge (I turned a LGA CPU socket into a coaster), and I was able to sand it down fairly easily using regular sandpaper of progressively higher grit, producing a more or less perfect cuboid. The flatness was achieved by taping the sandpaper to a flat surface, and moving the part.
It's been a while, I can't remember if I used some kind of polishing compound at the end or whether the sandpaper alone was enough for a good finish.
I suspect you're right, but knowing myself I'd quickly get sick of sanding (6 faces with 5-6 different kinds of sandpaper), and I'd want an orbital sander. Then I'm pretty sure you want to polish the surfaces: lots of elbow grease or a polishing/buffing tool. If I had a workshop with space for tools and dust I'd probably go for it, but I'm doing this in the living room of a small apartment.
Here's the process as explained by a reputable epoxy vendor: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9-WYOK90KNo
Incredible work. I love it.
This would be a similar process to finishing any painted surface. Progressive through the grits, each time removing the scratches from the previous grit, wet sanding with the higher grits. You can then hand polish with polishing compounds you can get at any hardware/car accessory store. You can start with an orbital sander or a belt sander of some sorts. I've done this on guitars I've built.
If you're fairly close it shouldn't be a ton of work.
Could probably cut this into a cylinder on a wood-lathe; you can do some pretty good polishing on one too ala polished wood pens. With skill you might even be able to round the end.
Ooh a cylinder is a great idea! Makes a lot of sense for a watch.
Tape or glue sandpaper to a piece of glass for a really flat surface. It works nicely for making consistent angles.
Source: holy shit can you get a knife sharp using this method.
Wow, never heard of this method, thank you! What kind of sandpaper do you use?
Any brand. It's the grit progression that's important. Watch Paul Sellers for tips: https://youtube.com/watch?v=bailuQUh2mY&pp=0gcJCfwAo7VqN5tD
Thank you!
Part of me wants to believe this is sacrilege: these are incredible machines, and the magic is in not just seeing _how_ they work, but that they continue to work reliably for decades, and when they don't it's magic seeing them fixed somewhere like https://www.youtube.com/@WristwatchRevival. But also... this is incredibly cool! As kids, my brother used to do these little resin sculptures, putting in sand shells and little plans to it'd look like the bottom of the sea. I tried repeatedly to get into the same hobby but I was always too impatient so my designs would end up with fingerprints all over them before they'd properly set.
Pocket watches are sold in antique shops by the price of their weight in brass. Finding one that is complete but needs a cleaning and new oil to spring to life is relatively easy.
There are 10x more pocket watches than owners interested. Theyre incredible machines... but their greatest use is practice materials for aspiring watch repair technicians.
They're expensive to repair because few people have the skills and tools. The demand is so low. (I have two)
How does one get started in this? I'd love to have this as a hobby!
I literally started by buying a bunch of cheap Waltham movements on eBay and tearing them apart. From there my progression was read a few books, watch some videos, buy some tools, join the NAWCC and go to some local meets, and meet local folks to teach me directly. Once you make some helpful friends who are a lot more knowledgeable and experienced than you are and are eager to teach, you're off and running.
I actually discovered pretty early on that my interest was more in clocks than watches, but the early explorations in the watch realm were almost entirely applicable to clock repair as well. I have since repaired at least a hundred clocks and pocket watches. Next month I'm going down to the NAWCC school of horology in Columbia, PA to take my third workshop there, this one on the repair of wooden works clocks. The school was closed for a number of years, but has fired back up in the past few and I know they're actively working on getting more watch repair workshops going. Last time I was there they were just putting together a killer watch lab with some very expensive benches and equipment.
You can get started for <£100 or even <£30 if you are careful
You will need a set of flat headed screwdrivers. These are 80% of the tools you'll be using.
If you are approaching middle age, you'll need some magnification. I dont like loupes (those lenses you hold to the eye), and the visor mounted magnifiers are also not that good for me. I got a second hand long armed stereo 10x microscope for £30 which is perfect for me. You might just want a big old magnifying glass.
You might want a movement holder, again you can get super cheap ones, but second hand ones are better (because the shit ones are thrown away). they are basically specialized vices, or tiny little buckets(those are custom to each movement though.)
Next, start off with pocket watches, they are much bigger and more forgiving, and also cheaper.
In the uk: H samual, Thos russel are good brands to look for anything £20 or less.
For america: waltham/elgin (they often have broken balance though so watch out ) Eglins and Walthams look a lot more pretty, and have a better standard of finishing than the english counterparts.
Watch a few hours of watch repair on YouTube. If you're still intrigued, I highly recommend Mark Lovick's course over at https://www.watchfix.com/. You'll learn all you need to know about tools, lubricants and techniques to service most watch movements.
You can buy a kit that comes with a practice movement:
https://sutcliffehansen.com/pages/tool-kits
Does it help you to think of this as an instructional aid? That was literally the purpose of the digital version that inspired the project.
it's magic to see the repair process, but not magic to see how the mechanisms work? i'm unsure how you could draw enjoyment from the former without also appreciating the latter.
Kinda hoped that's what I wrote, but clearly not. For what it's worth, I'm already working out how I can give the same treatment to my Atari Lynx when it conks out.
ah, i believe i misunderstood. on re-reading, i see your statement about sacrilege was more about removing a functional watch from circulation before its time.
Is there no transparent substance that is gel-like for a period of time before it cures solid so that the pieces can simply be suspended in it and nudged to their final positions manually? Like a gel suspension 3D printer but where the gel hardens instead of being washed away at the end. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=swB5-GzX3nQ
I don't know how viscous SLA 3D printer resin is, but if it could be made viscous enough then it seems like maybe you could just suspend the parts in it, tweaking their positions as much as you want until they're just right, then blast the whole thing with enough UV to cure all of it.
There are gel-like resins, but you'd have massive issues with air entrapment. There's really no shortcut for making these. Casting in layers is the most common approach, but as noted in the article, it's hard to avoid slight refractive index discontinuities.
Strange thought, but, if you shine a uv laser through uv-setting epoxy, does it create a fishing-line-like column of set resin?
If it's fluid, I guess you always would have an issue with buoyancy/density. The things you want to suspend will either want to float up or sink down before it cures.
But maybe it could work with something like beads of same refraction index, and then pour resin in when everything is in place? At least it works for water, I've seen it used for decorations and then pouring water over when everything is in place.
Random video showing what I mean: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/LuTlY6DkHQw
These look incredible. I'm guessing there are museums that would love display these.
Also https://ciechanow.ski/ is an absolute inspiration.
The suspension (supports) should not be visible if it has the same index of refraction.
Yep, nylon and epoxy resin have similar indices of refraction, but it's not perfect. I tried casting thin rods out of epoxy to replace the nylon but failed to achieve a good result.
Have you tried Fluorocarbon? this has replaced Nylon for many fishing use (fly fishing in any case), it has a different refraction index -- not sure if it would be closer, or further from the resin, but at least it is different! :-)
Never tried, because fluorocarbon's index of refraction (1.42-ish) is further from epoxy resin (1.50-1.57) than nylon (1.53). It does make sense that fluorocarbon has replaced nylon because it's going to be less visible in water (1.33).
I guess the epoxy's index of refraction depends on all kinds of factors such as the mixing ratio and the conditions under which it cures.
Couldn't you make little sticks with the same epoxy resin to hold up all the parts?
I tried, but they're very difficult to cast. Epoxy resin is also very brittle and difficult to cut neat and square. A jagged edge does not bond very well to a smooth surface.
I love this. Would absolutely buy one if it were for sale. Thanks for posting.
Also these would be awesome display pieces for a jewellers selling watches. Not sure there'd be a correlation with sales, but it'd give people being dragged around those shops something to pay attention to.
This is incredible… congratulations on creating such an amazing piece.
What’s a decent vintage watch that is simple to buy these days on eBay? I don’t care for the brand but I would love to have a vintage watch with a Swiss movement.
Beware, buying vintage watches on eBay is 'hard mode' even for longtime collectors. The number of 'Frankenstein' Omegas and other older pieces likely outnumbers the legit ones, and the degree to which -- and skill level with which -- things have been refinished or repaired is often very difficult to ascertain.
The other thing to beware is that the fake market ("replicas") is now unbelievably good - and also include vintage pieces. So scammers could buy very good fakes, artificially age them, and charge a fortune.
The only thing that works is to 'buy the seller' meaning: only buy from reputable sellers/dealers.
Chrono24 and (carefully) using r/WatchExchange are your best bets, but even there - diligence the sellers very well.
Adam Savage took on a similar style of project trying to make an exploded cellphone cast in resin - with the added challenge of making the screen work. It was evidently a sponsored project and some of the work was rushed a bit - the outcome feels more like a prototype rather than the display quality piece he was going for - but the same kind of problem solving and techniques were involved.
Still, if you’re interested in more of the same sort of thing, worth a look:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jfEIstmyZaM
Thank you! That video somehow slipped by my feed, but I'll make sure to check it out.
I'd imagine Adam getting a kick out of my resin project, but I don't think he hangs out on HN.
Agree he’d love it (and likely have some solid tips for how to get that glass-mirror finish…)
Well, if Bartosz doesn't reach out (I offered to send it to him), I'll consider sending it to Adam. My favorite builds of his are boxes that reflect their contents, and I'd love to see what he'd consider for something like this.
but I don't think he hangs out on HN.
I mean, given sufficient resin to attract and then encase him...
Plot twist, OP is Adam Savage and is throwing us off the trail!
This is such a cool idea! You could potentially sell this or contact some watchmakers!
This is a labor of love, there’s no way the 15+ hours would be worth it commercially.I think it’s cool and if you start looking at things like this as a business idea they get unfun really fast.
There is currently no competition, so he gets to set the price.
Except that above a certain price, demand falls to zero.
The question is whether there is any overlap at all where the price would be high enough to motivate supply (worth it to him) but low enough that there's still demand (worth buying). Also factoring in the cost of marketing, since potential buyers don't just automatically find you.
There are a huge number of business ideas where there is no overlap at all. Finding an overlap even without competition is hard enough. (Then add competition and it gets even harder, of course.)
I'd wager OP will get some DMs from people willing to pay $1k+ for this sort of thing. Watch people can be very spendy, especially for something unique like this.
Rich watch people can be spendy because it's fashion and, for mechanical watches, the idea of timeless functionality at the highest levels of craftsmanship.
This is exceptionally cool to me. But it's not something you get to subtly show off in public, it's going to (hopefully) involve a cheap watch, and therefore the "timeless functionality" appeal is gone.
Make a couple of them using Rolexes in a cube shape, and somebody would pay lots to have them as "fuzzy dice" to hang from the rear view mirror of their high end car.
But seriously, it doesn't have to be displayed with subtlety. Somebody offer OP $10K for this so you can use it as a paperweight on your desk.
Nothing of the sort has happened yet.
That's a shame, might just have to circulate in front of the right people.
I don’t think I’d pay $1000 but a couple hundred would be reasonable to me. This is so cool!
The problem is if this takes 20 or so hours for someone who is highly skilled and could likely make a much safer easier income doing something else, so even $2000 would be $100 an hour which if OP’s hanging out on HN there’s a good chance they could just straight up make that amount in a day job.
Let’s go really pie in the sky, maybe some billionaire sees this (surely there’s some hanging out on hacker news) imagine them giving OP a $30,000 pocket watch owned by Ulysses S Grant or something and asking them to take that one of a kind art piece and encase it in resin. What would the pay rate be for such a project? The sky’s the limit, really.
Hand made pieces that only an expert could assemble are extremely expensive.
While it might not have the same cachet, an easier way to get this done would be to use a laser printing inside an glass or acrylic block --- just model all the parts:
This company works from photos:
https://beyond-memories.com
but there should be companies doing 3D --- I distinctly remember a company doing a 3D map of the nearby star systems (which the _Universe_ role-player in me desperately wanted) --- perhaps:
https://www.skyatnightmagazine.com/advice/diy/3d-model-neare...
could be modeled in Lego bricks?
l'm curious if Bartosz will actually contact him for that final casting, i know i would definitely love to own one. And mainly because I love mechanical watches, especially what's inside, but I don't like to wear or really use them, this is a great solution for this "problem".
The Bartosz Ciechanowski's blog post referenced here is arguably the best thing you can currently find on the Internet
https://ciechanow.ski/mechanical-watch/
I'd just like to highlight that this is one of quite a few things of a similar incredible amount of detail that they have done: https://ciechanow.ski/archives/
Discussed here three years ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31261533
With +4K points, it is being ranked #8 of best HN submissions of all time, a true classic indeed!
Where can one see the list of best ranked HN posts?
Pressing enter in the search field on the bottom of the page takes you to a search with no filters, sorted on popularity. Or like this, I guess: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...
This is basically true of every single Ciechanowski post. They are true works of art.
As well as the YouTube channel Branch Education's amazing explanation.
https://youtu.be/oEC5fIw0bL0
Anyone know how these animations are created and displayed? Very well done.
I believe he hand-codes everything from scratch in WebGL and plain js. Which is amazing. [0] is an example.
[0] https://ciechanow.ski/js/watch.js
Ha when I saw this I love mechanical watches so I clicked on the link enthusiastically but skeptical that it could live up to Ciechanowski's blog post
Nice to see that it was a tribute post in a way
It was a nice surprise
> The hands are set to an invalid time. 10:10 is the way to go.
What made the time invalid? The synchronization of the seconds didn't match the position of the minute hand midway between the minute markers?
The minute hand is set to 43-ish minutes past the hour while the hour hand is showing 15-ish minutes past noon/midnight. If you’re used to reading analog watches it’s jarring.
Index matching UV cure optical adhesives could in principle be used in an SLA printer to make scaffolding structures for the exploded system that should completely disappear. Provided you can get an adhesive that matches the index of your resin of course.
It seems like it should be possible to make exploded models that way with more investment in upfront cad and less assembly labor. Perhaps very useful if you want to make many of them.
I don't get why pouring resin, let it dry, place an item, repour, let it dry, place an item, repeat doesn't work. Why do we see the layers?
I like this, and respect the craft which went into making it. I still think an immersive 3D model you can interact with may be more functional to illustrate mechanisms.
The room of clockwork/ratchet mechanisms in "Musee des arts et metiers" in Paris is fantastic.
Or if nothing else, just put it on the center of a record player platter and film it for us please!
This! Yes please!
I proposed an archival function at my uni, for historical artifacts held in static collections e.g. the physics lab old computing gear. Turntable, slow rotate, static camera film, done.
This was actually pre-web: I wanted this put in the campus gopher!
You might also find the open source mechanical Swiss watch movement interesting: https://openmovement.org/
> I don't have the tools or knowledge required to sand this down to a perfect mirror finish, but that's okay.
That was my only note: it would look incredible if squared off and polished to perfection.
I've done some projects like that, although not with as many parts! I think the main disappointment that awaits the author is that within two years or so, the epoxy will turn yellow. These resins are unfortunately not UV-stable, even if kept in a reasonably well-lit area indoors (bookshelf, etc).
There are resins you can use for projects like that if you want them to last, but they're less fun to work with.
Modern epoxies often claim to be UV stabilized, and as far as I can tell, this is a relatively recent advancement. For reference, I used Entropy CCR (slow cure) for the final model: https://entropyresins.com/product/ccr-clear-casting-epoxy/
I guess we'll wait and see!
We had UV-stabilized resins for the past two decades or so, but it just slows down the process. I used several UV-stabilized products and it just doesn't last.
For the UV-stable options, you have polyesters (which are very smelly) and premium aliphatic polyurethanes (which are finicky to work with).
Would putting some UV filter glass, the kind often used in museums, work to protect it the resin? I'm wondering if you fixed a glass casing around it that way... granted you'd have corner seems for the glass though
Maybe a cylindrical glass instead?
I tried that. Refraction makes it hard to understand what you're even looking at. https://fellerts.no/img/epoch/first-cast.jpg
I was thinking about a larger with less curvature glass. It might also be interesting to see if it's possible to match the refractive indexes of the epoxy and the glass.
Yellow and not transparent anymore?
Or just a yellow tint?
Just an orange-yellow tint. Here's a good example: https://preview.redd.it/k98iwl9flsk71.jpg?width=1080&crop=sm...
Hm, the left example does indeed looks bad in the sense of loosing transparency. But it was kept in direct sunlight.
If I saw that in a shop I'd be super tempted to buy it.
can you do a Ferrari v12 engine next please?
Makes me wish, you could explode the watch- and still have it working.. like viewing a working, exploded model..
You'd probably need things to be mechanically coupled somehow, no?
Transparent plastic, in sheets? Or thin holes with transparent hydraulics?
Wow. As a mechanical engineer, these things totally fascinate me!! DO MORE!!
next step do one that can somehow still work as a clock, maybe by projecting the hands down into the watch face from above with lasers, or just have a super thin working watch hidden in the face, or hardcore mode somehow connect all those parts with real functional shafts ^^
You will have to wait a hundred years for 3D e-paper displays to be good enough.
Hope i can implement ths soon
Wouldn't it make more sense to add the parts and epoxy layer-by-layer? So you don't need the sticks to hold everything together.
(Of course that means creating a new vacuum for every layer, probably).
perhaps you did not read the post—the author attempted layer-by-layer first but discovered it was impossible to get a smooth final result.
This is apparently a well known issue among people who create resin-cast structures.
I think it may still work if you don't wait until the last layer has completely cured. The viscosity just has to be high enough to be able to suspend the artifacts.
Again, you may want to read tfa
This sums it up:
"To achieve the effect I want, I need around 20 layers for a regular pocket watch movement. If I were to cast each layer in a transparent container, adding components and epoxy as the previous layer was half-cured, I would be doing nothing else for a solid week."
TK Jewelers is a scam. The jewelry's fake. Watch exploded on date. Bent wrist, thing fucking exploded.
Just incredible
Amazing
That is so cool, I really want one lol.
I wear mechanical watches and have a small (and growing) collection. It’s irrational, but I like them anyway :) I’d appreciate an art piece like this.
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Would love to see a gaussian splat of this