GEARS - Watches and Derailleurs

Let's be clear about it - vintage watches are about fun and collecting as opposed to being a necessary functional item.   Sure they tell time reasonably well, but still they pale in comparison to the always up to date and split second accurate time on your smart phone. And even among watches, a $25 quartz watch from Wal-Mart will blow away even the most accurate mechanical watch let alone a fifty or more year old vintage watch.   But, like I said, there is something fun about vintage watches with their tiny gears, springs and levers moving repetitively within a relatively small enclosure to provide a wholly mechanical measure of time with no batteries necessary.   With the foregoing in mind, I have expanded Mechanical Aesthetics offerings to include one of the most important American brands ever, Timex.   Sure, Timex watches are not heavily jeweled horological masterpieces but mass produced utilitarian devices masking as a fine fashion accessory. And yet, t...

A Change in Course I initially started this blog with the intent of writing about my personal watch collection and my collection of bicycle derailleurs.  A quick look at the past posts and a lack of new posts in quite some time will show you this blog has not been particularly successful.  I won't even mention the lack of views of the few amazing overlooked posts.  Sigh... SO... It is time for a change. From hereon out this blog will be devoted to discussing the watches and the types of watches I am selling through my online store, Mechanical Aesthetics , on Etsy.    Fingers crossed for greater success and readership.  Ciao, Kurt

Like the watch assembly of the previous post, the strap, guard and watch are a marriage of items acquired separately. The watch itself is notable on several fronts: (1) it is a pinset; (2) its case is steel; and (3) dial comprises roman numerals including a red XII instead of outlined Arabic numbers configured to received illuminating paint. I will discuss each feature briefly herein. I have no idea as to the date of manufacture of the watch: the pinset mechanism tends to point to an earlier date; whereas, the roman numerals point to either a post or pre-war date since they are not configured to accept lume. In the end dating this watch would be no more than pure speculation. The strap is likely a bit newer than the watch.  My guess would be that it is closer to a WWII vintage than WWI.  It is made of cotton and is fraying in places.  The self-tightening buckle includes an indication that patent protection has been applied for but because there is no da...

The Shrapnel Guard Sometime in 1915 Harry Daw, an Englishman, came up with the lath design represented below.  According to www.vintagewatchstraps.com , he received a patent for it in Britain 1916 with a priority date of August 11, 2016.  A U.S. patent was also received in 1917.  See a forum discussion at  Watchuseek.com  about this type of guard. Accordingly to the foregoing referenced sites and my additional research, Mr. Daw made these guards of several different materials (Nickel, Gold Filled, 9ct Gold and Sterling Silver) in a variety of sizes. This particular guard is a size 3 in Sterling Silver. Mr. Daw's guards were quite substantial pieces unlike thin stamped and cast guards made of pot metal or steel. This particular guard is highly marked.  If you scroll down through the photographs you will see four marks that were stamped on the inside of the guard.  The HD is Mr. Daw's mark.  The second mark of a lion indicates the material is...

Well, I started this blog in June of 2018, wrote four entries and stopped. I went back to check on it recently and found that essentially no one has seen any of the posts. Hmmm ... I may need to change my strategy, or perhaps more accurately stated, employ a strategy to drive traffic to it. But at the very least a new post is in order. This time, another trench watch is profiled. Actually, the accouterments are more interesting than the watch itself. Let’s begin. The watch itself is another Patria similar to the watch discussed in my prior post. It is not exactly the same: the case and dial are a little different as is the movement but to the uninitiated they look nearly identical. I bought this watch off of eBay likely from a US seller, since Patrias were mostly marketed in the US. European trench watches tend to be either unbranded or branded in the name of the department store through which they were sold. The watch did not come with a strap or shrapnel guard: the ...

The legacy of the Campagnolo Gran Sport was clearly evident in the company's derailleurs into 1985.  The look of their derailleurs departed from the standard of the previous 30+ years in 1985 with the introduction of the C-record line; however, functionally things didn't change much until well into the 90's. For your perusal today is the Record derailleur.  At a quick glance, it is hard to see how it differs from the Gran Sport, so I have included some side by side pics as well. There essentially two significant differences: 1) the lower spring cover is much deeper than that of the Gran Sport housing a longer spring; and  2) the pulley cage’s connection to the lower pivot is no longer centered between the pulleys but offset forwardly and upwardly. These changes allow the Record derailleur to have a greater throw and to be used with 6 & even 7 speed freewheels of a much greater spread in teeth. In other respects the Record is substantially similar to the Gran Sport...