Guido's open face quartz pocket watch collection

I really like pocket watches. They are convenient and beautiful. To have the watch in your pocket makes sense. The watch is well protected and you have nothing on your wrist that hinders the mobility of your hand.

For most watches I do not yet have pictures of the movement. The reason is that I did not want to open the watches just for a picture. I will add pictures of the movement whenever I open a watch for other reasons.

The railroad and pocket watches

The history of the pocket watch was influenced by the railroad. Railroad companies published specifications for pocket watches and railroad grade pocket watches remained the only watches approved for railroad service until the 1950's.

Many train lines in north America had only a single track for both directions. It was imperative that the conductor followed a precise train schedule such that no two trains would occupy the same track in both directions and collide. The conductor's pocket watch was therefore an important part of railroad security.

The specifications for an American railroad approved pocket watch related not only to the design of the movement and its accuracy but as well to the style. Quartz watches fulfill the accuracy requirement easily and it is the style of a watch that we are referring to when we talk about a quartz railroad watch.

open face (no lid over the dial)
plain white dial
bold black hands
bold Arabic numbers
lever set with the winding stem at 12 o'clock

The site railswest.com has a very nice page about the railroad and watches http://www.railswest.com/time/watches.html.

This page shows some of the open face quartz pocket watches that I have.

Vintage quartz pocket watches from the 70's, 80's and 90's

Bulova Quartz railroad approved

This Swiss Bulova pocket watch is my all time favorite. It has just the right weight and size. It is as well very easy to read because the hands are all very different from another. Unlike most watches it has no plastic bezel around the movement. Instead a precision milled metal ring is holding the movement in place. It has a rubber seal on the back cover. The watch runs more than 5 years on single large V391 battery. The production of these watches started in 1973. This particular model is however from 1980. It has a Montgomery Dial (each individual minute numbered in Arabic figures) and a gold-tone case. The original retail piece was $175.00.

Diameter: 46mm
Case Thickness: 11mm
Case material: gold plated brass
Serial number on the inside of the case: 52004
Serial number on the back of the case: 52346
Serial number at the bottom of the dial: 7179
Date code: P0 (1980)
Battery: V391
Weight: 66g
Dial window material: Mineral glass
Movement: Swiss, Bulova caliber number: 2631.10, no jewels

Wikipedia has a nice description about the history of the Bulova watch company:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bulova

Bulova Quartz railroad approved, stainless steel case

This one is very similar to the one above. It has a Montgomery Dial with exactly the same colors but with additional numbers from 13-24. Again a metal bezel is holding the movement in place and there is a rubber seal on the back cover. The watch is a newer generation of the one above and has a different movement. The battery was changed to a smaller but more common V371 and the movement is now fully jeweled. The watch is special because of it's stainless steel case. Most pocket watch cases at that time were still made from brass, gold or silver.

Diameter: 46mm
Case Thickness: 8mm
Battery: V371
Case material: stainless steel
Serial number on the back of the case: 10020923
Serial number at the bottom of the dial: 82396
Date code: P2 (1982)
Weight: 56g
Dial window material: Mineral glass
Movement: Swiss, Bulova caliber number: 2801.10, 7 jewels

Wikipedia has a nice description about the history of the Bulova watch company:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bulova

Belair Quartz pocket watch

These are two quartz watches from the 80's with beautifully decorated brass cases. Belair is an American watch company founded in 1945 and it exists to this date (www.beltime.com). It's a familly owned company and they assemble all quartz watches and movements in the USA using Swiss parts.

Diameter: 49mm
Case Thickness: 7mm
Battery: V371
Weight: 52g
Dial window material: mineral glass
Movement: Swiss, 7 jewels

I belies that the below watch is the predecessor model of the above belair model. It has a screw-on back and no plastic movement holder.

Diameter: 49mm
Case Thickness: 11mm
Battery: V395/V399
Weight: 65g
Dial window material: plastic
Movement: Swiss ISA1198, no jewels
Full movement documentation: isa-1198-movement.pdf

These Belair watches have a both a nice train pattern on the back. This makes it possible to feel with your hand which side is the front and which side is the back while you are pulling the watch out of your pocket.

Byron Nelson Eleven Straight golf pocket watch

This is a Byron Nelson Eleven Straight golf victories commemorative pocket watch. This particular watch is number 2089 out of a limited edition of 2500 watches made by Fossil in 1997.

In 1945 Byron won 18 of his 52 tournament titles, including a record 11 wins in a row. The watch came originally with a wooden box and a signed picture by Byron Nelson (1912 - 2006). I do not have the box.

This is a watch that I bought second hand and the little clip holding the battery was missing. I made a new clip out of a thin stainless steel sheet and formed it such that a bigger higher capacity v394 battery can be used. The case has enough room to accomodate such a battery. The Fossil watch uses swiss parts but is made in Hongkong. The watch has a perfect size and weight. It has a small crown which is a prefect choice for a battery powered quartz watch since one rarely needs to change the time and it is more important that the crown does not get accidently pulled while taking the watch out of your pocket. The case is made out of gold plated steel.

Diameter: 47mm
Case Thickness: 11mm
Battery: V394 
Weight: 60g
Dial window material: plastic
Movement: Swiss parts, ISA1198 movement, 1 jewel
Year: 1997 
Model number: LI-1417 
Limited Edition number:- #2089/2500
Full movement documentation: isa-1198-movement.pdf

LeJour Quartz pocket watch

LeJour Watches was a private, medium size watch manufacturing company established in 1965. At one time, it was headquartered in New York and had offices in Switzerland as well as China, France, Hong Kong, and Mexico. They built a reputation for building high quality watches, and owned patents and trademarks on a few different watches.

Some of their chronographs are highly prized by serious watch collectors, as they used the finest watch movements in their watches.

The two watches shown below can be found in a LeJour's watch catalog from the mid 80's and they are in "as good as new" condition.

Diameter: 48mm
Case Thickness: 11mm
Battery: V395
Weight: 38g
Dial window material: plastic
Movement: Swiss parts, ISA1198 movement, 1 jewel
Full movement documentation: isa-1198-movement.pdf

This is a slightly smaller LeJour:

Diameter: 42mm
Case Thickness: 11mm
Battery: V371
Weight: 29g
Dial window material: plastic
Movement: Swiss, 2 jewels

These LeJour watches have a both a nice pattern on the back. This makes it possible to feel with your hand which side is the front and which side is the back while you are pulling the watch out of your pocket.

KMC Quartz watches, made in Germany, Evaco SA

These are totally amazing watches. They have the best quartz movements I have ever seen. They are quartz movements with 7 jewels and the mechanical precisson and finishing of the movements is just of outstanding quality. The coil of the motor has an extra plastic foil around it to protect the fine wires against mechanical damage. When you open then watch then you can change the battery but you will not see the full movement because it has an extra plastic case around it to protect it. The watch can take a V390 or a very big V386 battery. It will probably run 10 years on one V386 battery (that's a guess, I have not yet changed the battery). I believe that these watches are from the late 70's.

I don't have much historic information about those KMC watches. It seems that the swiss Evaco SA watch company (http://evaco.ch) had produced movements and watches in Germany and used the brand name KMC for those "Made in West Germany" watches. They made at the same time similar watches in Switzerland under the name Marcel Quartz. Those had a totally different movement and it said "swiss" on the dial.

Diameter: 47mm
Case Thickness: 13mm
Battery: V390 or V386 
Weight: 56g
Dial window material: plastic
Movement: Evaco SA, 667.50, made in Germany, 7jewels

The following "KMC Quartz watch, Movement West Germany" is very similar to the Marcel Quartz watch by Evaco SA (see further down). It is infact using the exact same swiss made case.

Diameter: 50mm
Case Thickness: 13mm
Battery: V390 or V386
Weight: 60g
Dial window material: plastic
Movement: Evaco SA, 667.50, made in Germany, 7jewels

Diameter: 47mm
Case Thickness: 13mm
Battery: V390 or V386
Weight: 60g
Dial window material: plastic
Movement: Evaco SA, 667.50, made in Germany, 7jewels
Date: May 1981

Woodford Quartz

Woodford Clocks is a UK based company that manufacturers clocks and watches since 1860. Recent woodfort watches are no longer made in the UK. The Swiss Ronda movement inside this watch is a swiss movement but assembled in Hong Kong. It says at the bottom of the dial in very small print "SWISS MOVT".

The case material is brass with a chrome plating on the outside. The inside has a thin gold plating. The watch has a very classic desing and a good size.

Diameter: 51mm
Case Thickness: 12mm
Battery: V371
Weight: 56g
Dial window material: plastic
Movement: Swiss, Ronda, 1 jewel

Rotary quartz pocket watch

This is a very nice thin watch with a clean dial design and a date at 6 o'clock. The case is made of gold plated brass (not just polished and painted brass). I bought the watch on Ebay and it had this problem that the battery would drain much faster than expected. I was first suspecting gummed-up oil in the movement to be the cause of the problem but it took me a couple of month to really understand what was going on: The case design is very slim and the battery in this type of movement is installed in an unusual way. The minus pole is facing the back with the case being connected to the plus pole of the battery. There is only an air gap of 0.5 mm between the battery and the back. A little bit of pressure on the back and the case would hit the battery resulting in a short circuit. It was easy to fix this once I understood the problem. I just insulated the inside of the back cover with a bit of clear scotch tape.

Diameter: 49mm
Case Thickness: 9mm
Battery: V395/V399
Weight: 46g
Dial window material: plastic
Movement: ESA, 6 jewels (it says GY-82 on it, not sure what number that is)
Movement serial number: 963121

Bucherer Thin Quartz pocket watch

Carl F. Bucherer is a precious swiss watchmaker based in Luzern (Lucerne) Switzerland. Bucherer focuses on the premium market segment. The company is an old family business and was founded in 1888. This particular watch is from the 1980's. It is a remarkably thin watch, only 8mm thick, and it is in very good condition.

Diameter: 42mm
Case Thickness: 8mm
Battery: V391
Weight: 41g
Dial window material: plastic
Movement: Swiss ESA 944.111 movement, 7 jewels

Marcel Quartz, swiss railroad

A beautiful classic railroad watch with Montgomery dial. It says "Evaco SA, swiss" inside the case. Evaco SA is a swiss watch company founded in 1972. They are still producing watches to this date (http://www.evaco.ch). It seems that Marcel Quartz was one of their early pocket watches. The movement desing with the big wheel for the minutes/hour hand and the unconventional ceramic enclosed quartz crystal oscillator is completely non standard. This big wheel has a friction fit to its axis and is the equivalent of the canon pinion in normal watches. Note as well that the battery is "the wrong way round" compared to most watches.

Diameter: 50mm
Case Thickness: 13.5mm
Battery: V390
Weight: 56g
Dial window material: plastic
Movement: Swiss

Vintage japanese pocket watch, Seiko quartz

Most quartz pocket watches have the seconds hand in the center. A watch like this one which has an eccentric seconds hand is very rare. It's a small and light watch with the winding stem at 3-o'clock.

Diameter: 38mm
Case Thickness: 7mm
Battery: V397
Weight: 32g
Dial window material: glass
Movement: seiko japan 2628A, 2 jewels, ec-centric seconds
Full movement documentation: seiko-2628A-movement.pdf

KB quartz pocket watch

This is a quartz watch from around 1975. The case is solid brass, gold plated, and no plastic parts (not even a plastic spacer around the movement). It has therefore a good weight for its size. The case opens to the front and you do not need to pull out the stem to take the movement out. The case is basically made of two halfs which come apart exactly at he line where the stem goes through the case.

Diameter: 42mm
Case Thickness: 11mm
Battery: V371
Weight: 56g
Dial window material: plastic
Movement: swiss

Timex quartz pocket watch

Timex was originally a Dutch watch company and it produced watches since 1850. The main Timex company is today in the US (http://www.timexgroup.com/). Timex focused always on the affordable watches and as an US american company they started early on production in countries with low labor cost. On the back of the watch it says "assembled in Philippines" inside it says Hongkong and at the very bottom of the dial one can read Taiwan. Timex embraced the quartz movement early on but focused on the main stream wrist watch market and they made only very few pocket watches.

Diameter: 42mm
Case Thickness: 10.5mm
Battery: V371
Weight: 41g
Dial window material: plastic
Case material: brass, gold plated
Movement: timex Philippines, no jewels

Yves Renoir quartz pocket watch

This is a large swiss watch with a gold plated brass case. The watch has a large crown and it was very easy to pull the crown. The force needed to pull the crown was too small and the crown would somehow get pulled while I had the watch in my pocket. To fix this problem a took a thin titanium sheet and I cut a 0.8mm wide slot into it. The stem of this watch is slightly thicker where the thread ends. I pushed this titanium sheet over the threaded part of the stem as shown in the picture of the movement (small picture below, click on it). Titanium is a very hard material and it acts like a spring making it harder to pull the stem.

Diameter: 51mm
Case Thickness: 13mm
Battery: V371 or V395
Weight: 67g
Dial window material: plastic
Movement: swiss ronda harley 373, one jewel

Royal Quartz Moon phases

This is really a beautiful watch with moon phases and date. I really like the dial design.

The previous owner of this watch lost the little metal clamp which is holding the battery. I made a new one out of a 0.025mm thick stainless steel sheet.

Diameter: 41mm
Case Thickness: 10mm
Battery: V371
Weight: 32g
Dial window material: plastic
Movement: Swiss Ronda Harley, no jewels

Russian Molnija quartz

Most Молния watches where analog mechanical watches however in the 80's they started to produce a small amount of open face quartz pocket watches with a motorcyclist on the back. As opposed to most western watches it is not plastic watch. It's all metal and the movement is fully jeweled. A bit of a problem is how the date setting mechanism on these watches. I have seen a couple of watches where that part in not functioning.
The word Molnija ("Молния") at the top of the dial is the brand and means means lightning in Russian. The word "КВАРЦ" below the center of the dial means quartz. At the very bottom of the dial (not visible in the picture) it says "Сделанo в СССР" which means "Made in USSR".
(No, I don't speak Russian. I had to ask around.)

Diameter: 50mm
Case Thickness: 16mm
Battery: V371
Weight: 75g
Dial window material: plastic
Movement: 2460, 7 jeweles

Bulova Accutron Quartz, Queens University

Accutron watches were the fist small and precise electrical watches.

They were known as "tuning fork watches" and a small metal tuning fork with an electrical coil was brought into oscillation. It was both the motor and the time keeping source at the same time. The Bulova company symbol with the fork at the top reminds us that they invented that technology. Bulova did of course adapt quartz watch technology because it was technically superior and the whole industry was going there. It did however keep the name for a while and added the word "quartz".

Diameter: 42mm
Case Thickness: 9.5mm
Battery: V391
Case material: brass, gold plated
Serial number on the the case: 8443
Date code: 11 P0 (1980)
Weight: 34g
Dial window material: plastic
Movement: Swiss, Bulova caliber number: 2631.10, no jewels

The watch is engraved on the back with the letters "AWC". The person who sold me that watch did unfortunately not know who that was or what it stands for.

Bulova Accutron Quartz

The outside of the watch looks similar to the one above but inside is a totally different movement. It uses a very unusual and small V384 battery. The crystal is made of a slightly milky plastic.

The movement has a little metal cover and it says "no jewels" on it but I can clearly see at least one jewel. I am wondering if there where two variants of this movement one with jewels and one without and the wrong cover was used for this movement.

Diameter: 42mm
Case Thickness: 10mm
Battery: V384
Case material: brass with a high copper gold plating (slightly red looking gold)
Date code: 1 N9 (1979)
Weight: 40g
Dial window material: plastic, slightly mikly
Movement: Swiss, Bulova caliber number: 2461.10, jewels ?

SEIKO 7011-0010, Japanese Railroad pocket watch

This is a watch specifically designed for the Japanese railroad and is actually used to this date by Japanese train drivers:

The dash board has a little illuminated hole where each driver puts his own watch (click on the images for a bigger picture).

Most Japanese consumer level quartz pocket watches have small v377 batteries and the Japanese watches are generally not known to be high quality pocket watches. This one is however an amazing exception and they got every aspect of the watch right: Big and long lasting battery (5 years), easy to read dial, all metal construction (not even plastic spacers), a fully jeweled movement. The 7C11A movement in this watch was first produced in 1986 and was later replaced by the 7C21 movement which has an even longer lasting litium battery (10 years).

Diameter: 49mm
Case Thickness: 12mm
Battery: SR43 
Case material: Steel
Weight: 80g
Dial window material: plastic
Movement: SEIKO 7C11A, 7 jewels.

Recent quartz pocket watches (made after year 2000)

Delweaco Railroad Quartz pocket watch

This is a watch sold by Andy H Weaver Inc. He has a store in Farmington (near Parkman), Ohio, USA where he sells everything from boots to pocket watches. This area of Ohio is home to a large Amish and Mennonite farming community. A pocket watch is certainly a very good option for any farmer who likes to work in the field with his hands. The watch has a solid metal design and it is by far the heaviest quartz watch that I have. It's a quartz watch but feels like an old hand winding mechanical watch. It has a screw-on front bezel and a screw-on back cover.

A very nice watch that can take a hit and is meant to be used by a farmer working in the fields every day. The Weavers take catalogue orders and orders over the internet but ships unfortunately only to destinations in the US and he does not even make any exceptions for small items such as this pocket watch.

This is really a watch that I can recommend if you want a modern railroad pocket watch. It's made in China but the quality and the design is very good.

Diameter: 49mm
Case Thickness: 14mm
Battery: V395
Weight: 80g
Dial window material: plastic
Movement: Swiss ISA1198 assembled in China, one jewel
Year: 2013
Full movement documentation: isa-1198-movement.pdf

Gotham Quartz pocket watches

Gotham Watch is a venture from Dave Robbins and he imports watches (made in China) at competitive prices. The watches are not the typical Chinese low cost watches. Dave seems to pay attention to quality. They are all very usable watches made to last. His storefront at http://www.gothamwatch.com does not offer shipping outside the US but he is a very nice person and he had no problems to send a few watches to Canada after I had contacted him by email.

GWC14061G Gotham Quartz pocket watch, movement with swiss parts, gold tone

This watch is made in china but the design and quality is good. It has rubber seals on the stem and on the back cover. The Ronda 513 is a good movement and the weight of the watch is just right.

The design and the internals of the watch are actually identical to the Charles Hubert Stainless Steel watch shown further down. It must have been produced in the same Chinese watch factory.

Diameter: 47mm
Case Thickness: 11mm
Battery: V371
Weight: 52g
Dial window material: mineral glass
Movement: Swiss parts, assembled in china, Ronda 513 movement with one jewel
Year: 2013
Full movement documentation: ronda_513_movement.pdf

Gotham GWC15026G Gold-Tone Ultra Thin Railroad Open Face / Gotham GWC15022SB Silver-Tone Ultra Thin Open Face black dial

These two watches are a bit simpler in their mechanical design. You do not need to pull out the stem to remove the dial with the movement for from the case. The case is basically made of two halfs which come apart exactly at he line where the stem goes through the case. Assembly is therefore much faster but dust can theoretically get more easily into the watch through the opening where the stem comes out. They have a small Japanese movement with a very small v377 battery. I recommend to use silver oxide batteries with this watch otherwise you end up changing the battery every year.

The watches look good and are usable but my biggest concern with those watches is that they are too light. A pocket watch has to have some weight in order to glide properly back into your pocket. They cost 40$ each and that is half the price of the above Gotham watch.

Diameter: 42mm
Case Thickness: 10mm
Battery: V377
Weight: 28g
Dial window material: plastic
Movement: Citizen Miyota 2036 
Year: 2013
Full movement documentation: citizen-miyota-2036.pdf

Charles Hubert Stainless Steel Quartz Pocket Watch, water resistant to 3ATM (100ft)

It has rubber seals on the stem and on the back cover. The Ronda 513 is a very good movement and the weight of the watch is just right. I am not sure that the watch is really water thight but the rubber seals are certainly good to keep dust from getting into the watch.

The problem with this watch was that it was defect on arrival. I investigated the problem and I found that the case was internally not properly cleaned after production. It was full of steel dust and it seems those particles made it into the movement during shipping and caused it to fail. I bought the watch at www.pocketwatchsite.com and I can only say that this a place to avoid. Attitude and customer service have a lot of room for improvement. Production faults can obviously happen especially with items coming out of china where shortcuts in quality control are taken to keep the pice low but any merchant should handle those cases in such a way that it does not become a problem for the customer. The people at www.pocketwatchsite.com never reveal their real names in any conversation and they seem to have no way to replace a watch without causing the customer any extra expenses. This was unacceptable to me given that the watch was dead on arrival. You may have better experiences with www.pocketwatchsite.com but this is the story of that watch.

It's working now after I had spent a couple of hours taking the movement apart and cleaning it. It helped a lot that the movement manufacturer Ronda has all the assembly drawings on the web.

Diameter: 47mm
Case Thickness: 11mm
Battery: V371
Weight: 48g
Dial window material: mineral glass
Movement: Swiss parts, assembled in china, Ronda 513 movement with one jewel
Year: 2013
Full movement documentation: ronda_513_movement.pdf

Mondaine, swiss railways pocket watch

The design of this watch goes back to 1944 when Hans Hilfiker, a Swiss Engineer , Designer and employee of the Federal Swiss Railways (SBB) created a clock that became the "official swiss railways clock". A very simple design and unmistakable easy-to-read face with distinctive hands. The design is copyrighted by the Swiss Railways and a license is needed to produce even a small watch with this design. The Mondaine watch company obtained such a license and makes those watches since 1986. This watch design has been selected by the London Design Museum and the MoMa (Museum of Modern Art) as one of the most iconic examples of 20th century design.

It's beautiful swiss quality with a higly polished stainless steel case.

Diameter: 42mm
Case Thickness: 12mm
Battery: don't know, still original
Weight: 42g
Dial window material: mineral glass
Movement: Swiss
Year: 2013

What makes a good quartz pocket watch?

One of the most important things about any watch is that you like the watch's design and style and that is of course very subjective.

Next on the list would be usability and readability of the watch. Some watches come with a lot of decorations on the dial and you have to look carefully at the watch to clearly identify the positions of the hands. This is not good. You want to take a quick glance at the watch and know reliably what the time is. Most quartz watches have the seconds hand in the middle and it can be very problematic if the seconds hand has the same width and color at the tip as one of the other hands. I have noticed that I read sometimes the wrong time on watches where the seconds hand is not much different form the other two hands.

Weight is important too. Watches that are too light don't slide properly into the pocket. I find that the ideal weight for a quartz watch is around 60g. Smaller watches (40mm) could be a bit lighter, around 40g is still OK.

The force needed to pull the stem is too low. This can be a significant problem with cheap watches. Those watches have all a small generic movement with a v377 battery. Such movements are meant for lady's watches where the crown is small. Combining such a movement with a pocket watch crown that is big and exposed will result in the crown being pulled while the watch is in your pocket. The two small Gotham watches have solved that problem by using a small crown and hiding it directly above the case.

The quality of the movement is very important. The battery should not be too small and a couple of jewels will not only reduce power consumption due to reduced friction but as well extend the life time of such a movement. Swiss movements have a good reputation.