Watch Repair Toolkit
Although watchmaking and watch repair are very interesting careers.
It is quite simple to become overwhelmed or even get carried away with the wide variety of watch equipment available today.
In order to get started and build a watch repair kit.
I thought it could be useful to identify some of the most important equipment that any professional horologist should buy.
1. Case Opener for Watches
The back and/or front of the watch must be taken off before you can even open it up to see what might be the source of a problem or perform a routine maintenance procedure.
You might need to screw off the back or lever off the front and back of the watch, depending on the type.
Watches with screw backs require specialized tools, such as an adjustable Jaxa tool or the watchmaker’s own tool for removing the screw back.
A straightforward case opening knife can be used to remove timepieces with a snap-on front and back.
The Bergeon Case opener knives are made with a short, blunt blade that can be put into a case back’s chamfer and then rotated counterclockwise to release the case back.
On some case knives, the case knife is on one end and a sharp blade is on the other.
These are great since you can sharpen and shape your Pegwood with them in addition to opening watch cases.
2. A set of screwdrivers for watchmakers
The stem and case-retaining screws must also be removed in order to fully free the watch from its case once you have taken off the watch back.
A variety of watchmakers screwdrivers should be the second item in your watch repair kit as you’ll need them for this.
The best investment you can make is a high-quality set of screwdrivers for watchmakers. When used properly, screwdrivers can last a lifetime.
Avoid wasting your money on inexpensive screwdrivers from China or India because the metal is of poor quality and it is simple to break your watch screws with them.
You should think about the following three prominent Swiss-made brands: AF Switzerland, Bergeon, and Horotec.
There are lengthy discussions over which is superior; in my view, Horotec quality has a little advantage.
You will find that you utilize 4 of the sizes for the majority of your watches, so don’t waste your money on a wide variety of screwdrivers for your watch repair kit:
- Black – 100
- Yellow – 80
- Grey – 140
- Red – 120
Spare blades for each screwdriver are often included when you purchase a screwdriver from any of the aforementioned manufacturers.
They will also have smooth-operating ball bearing swivel heads.
It is always possible to resharpen watchmakers’ screwdrivers using a dressing stone and a tiny jig.
3. Tweezers for watchmakers
With a pair of Precision Tweezers Set XOOL, you can pick up the screw after you’ve used your screwdriver to remove it, move the watch pieces, and reinstall them.
Adding this component to your watch repair kit is essential.
Tweezers used by watchmakers are quite different from those used by cosmeticians. They are simple to use, have highly precise ends that fit together properly.
There are literally hundreds of different sorts and shapes available, however most watchmakers concur that at the very least, the following should be used:
- No. 2 – Strong with flat and fine-tipped
- No. 3 – Fine Tips
- No. 5 – Short and extra-fine hairsprings
- Brass AM stands for “for not marking watch parts”
- Plastic (optional if working with quartz movements)
Choosing non-magnetic tweezers is a smart idea because having watch screws attach to them may be a real pain.
With practice, you should be able to rotate the tweezers through 360 degrees while holding the watch parts between the tips of the tweezers.
The tweezers are gripped between the thumb and first two fingers like holding a pen.
The three primary tweezers brands to keep an eye out for are Dumont, Bergeon, and Horotec, despite their high price.
4. Glasses or Eye Loupe
I don’t need to tell you how tiny watch components and screws are. You should include eyeglasses or a loupe in your watch repair kit to ensure that you can see what you are doing.
Eyeglasses exist in a wide variety of shapes and sizes, just like the majority of watch tools. There’s no need to panic because you only truly need two kinds:
- Generic glasses (3 – 4 times magnification)
- Examination Glass (10 – 12 times magnification)
The majority of the time when disassembling and reassembling your watch, you wear your regular eyeglasses.
Only occasionally is the inspection eyewear used to gain a closer look at pivots, gems, or for closer inspection.
When it comes to protecting your eyesight, I wouldn’t buy inexpensive eyeglasses like I may with some of the other equipment.
Instead, I’d make a responsible investment in a quality pair from Bergeon or Horotec.
Eyeglasses of good quality have numbers, such as No. 1, No. 2.5, etc.
This number represents the focal length, so a No. 1 implies you would focus on an object that was 1 inch away, and a No. 2.5 would be at a distance of 2.5 inches.
Therefore, it is advisable to work at a good distance for as long as you can because eyestrain increases as you get closer to the thing.
Consider using a wire eyeglass holder if you have trouble keeping the glasses in place.
These are really simple to use, prevent you from losing your glasses on your work, and double as an excellent holder when you’re between jobs.
5. Watch hand lifting levers
Include some watch hand lifting levers in your watch repair kit as well because you will need to remove the hands from your watch before you can remove the dial.
Hand Lifting Levers and the Presto Automatic Hand Lifting Tool are two gadgets that can help you with this task.
Be careful to avoid breaking the hands or the dial when taking the hands off. The Hand Lifting Levers do an excellent job of driving the hands upward by rocking at an angle to remove them vertically.
To prevent damage to the dial, it is customary to place a dial protector or a thin plastic sealy bag on top of it.
The Presto hand removal tool can be effective, but you must take care to avoid scuffing the dial face with the tiny plastic feet that descend from the tool.
When not handled carefully, these feet have left marks on dials in the past.
To accommodate a range of hand sizes, hand lifting levers are available in different sizes.
Once more, be wary of cheap tools because their finishes are sometimes subpar and might harm your dial or the hands when in use.
6. Movement Holder
It is not advised to contact the watch movement with your fingers after removing it from the case.
Instead, a movement holder is used to keep the movement securely in place while being worked on.
Movement holders exist in a variety of sizes and forms.
But the typical holder can accommodate varying movement sizes by being reversible so that tiny movements can be accommodated on one side and greater movements on the other.
Once more, Horotec and Bergeon produce top-notch movement holders.
Look out for a variety of other strange and amazing designs, such as ones fashioned from bamboo, as some speciality brand watches have their own movement holders.
A movement holder ought to be included in your watch repair kit either way.
7. A parts box
I didn’t use a specific parts container when I initially started repairing watches, but now I can clearly see their advantages.
As you deconstruct and reassemble the watch, part containers let you keep the various components separate.
However, it’s more crucial that they have a cover that keeps dirt and debris from falling onto the watch parts after they’ve been taken off and cleaned.
There is no need to overspend on a parts container because you can purchase these for a reasonable price.
Although they are not necessary for your watch repair kit, these can really simplify your life.
8. Pegwood
Hardwood is used to make peg wood, which has a fairly regular size and shape.
Add some Pegwood to your watch repair kit instead of settling for toothpicks or wooden kebab sticks, which are too flimsy and won’t keep their shape.
Pegwood is used in the watch repair industry for a variety of activities.
But its two primary use are for cleaning jewel holes and watch parts before chemically cleaning the watch and for holding down parts and springs during assembly and reassembly.
To dress the end of the pegwood, you will also need a sharp knife; the two most typical shapes are point and flat.
9. Glass benzine jar and degreasing fluid for watches
You must use a watch cleaner to clean your watch once it has been disassembled and all of the jewel holes have been cleaned with peg wood.
To clean the watch parts of all the crusted oil, filth, and dirt, watch repair specialists utilize a machine that may be ultrasonic.
The novice can accomplish this by hand using a benzine jar and some cleaning fluid because watch cleaning equipment are very expensive.
The cleaning agent benzoine is no longer used, however a degreasing agent as Renata Essence will work.
Add a glass benzine jar with a degreasing fluid to your watch repair kit even if you decide to buy a watch cleaning machine.
Because it will always come in handy for swiftly removing grease in the event that an oiling job goes wrong or watch parts become recontaminated.
To prevent your liquid from evaporating, make sure your benzine jar has a tight-fitting lid.
To aid clean your watch parts after they have been immersed in the fluid, you might want to buy a little paintbrush to use with your benzine jar.
10. Rubber Dust Blower
As you surely well know, a watch’s worst enemy is dust and filth.
Never use your mouth to blow on a watch since it includes contaminants and moisture that will only worsen the way the watch works.
I therefore urge you to include one in your watch repair toolkit.
Rubber dust blowers are cheap and work well for fast cleaning your watch of dust and grime and for drying parts after cleaning.
Therefore, you would lay a watch part onto a piece of paper after cleaning it in your benzine jar.
With your tweezers still in place, you can use your dust blower to dry the watch part.
Be careful while using a blower to dry watch parts since they can be blown away if they are not held tightly. Dust blowers can be very powerful.
11. Watch Oils and Greases, Oiler and Oil Pots
It’s time to put the watch back together after you’ve cleaned every component.
Add this to your watch repair kit because you’ll need to add oil and grease to all the watch’s friction points when you reassemble it.
Although there are many different oils and greases available, the majority of seasoned watch repairmen will concur that Moebius produces a quality product.
Here are 4 that I would suggest:
- For balancing staff pivots and escape wheel pivots, use Moebius 9010 Oil (quick moving with low torque)
- D5 Moebius (HP1300) Oil: center wheel and barrel arbor (slow moving with high torque)
- Hand setting, winding mechanism, and cannon pinion grease for the Moebius 8300 (friction based)
- High speed escapements over 21,600 vibrations per hour on the Moebius 941/5 Grease
Oil pots should be used to store all of the oils and greases. You can either buy a stand with three or four pots or a separate pot for each oil or grease.
To keep them from getting dirty, the lids on all of the oil pots are a need.
Now that you have your oil and grease, you must find a way to get it from your oil pots to your watch parts. To do this, a watch oiler is needed.
The “spade-shaped” end of a watch oiler is attached to a colored handle by a metal stem. There are typically 4 sizes to choose from:
- Large red tip
- Medium-sized green tip
- Blue-tipped fine
- Very fine black tip
The oil is applied to the watch by simply dipping the oiler into the oil and touching the oil to the watch component.
The oil will be able to slip down and into small crevasses if you hold the oiler vertically.
Small amounts of oil can always be added, but excess oil would need to be removed, cleaned, dried, and reassembled, therefore it is always preferable to use a finer tip.
The oiler can be cleaned with a piece of pithwood in between oils.
12. Rodico Cleaning Putty
Since most watchmakers I know use Rodico, this is a great and reasonably priced addition to your watch repair kit.
Although Rodico is a cleaning compound with countless applications, it is most frequently used to wipe fingerprints, grease, dirt, and grime from watch movements.
To use Rodico, simply wipe or dab it into the watch movement. It functions just like a pencil eraser.
This fantastic putty can also be used to remove screws or diamonds that are difficult to grasp from your movement.
Simply spread your Rodico between your fingers to clean it up after getting soiled.
extremely affordable and practical.
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