# Lining Up The Second Hand



## TomWazza (Feb 11, 2008)

Hi Chaps,

My RLT 29's second hand seems to not 'land' on the indices, it's always in between two. Does anyone know if this can be fixed?

Cheers,

Tom.


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## eelblady (Sep 6, 2006)

TomWazza said:


> Hi Chaps,
> 
> My RLT 29's second hand seems to not 'land' on the indices, it's always in between two. Does anyone know if this can be fixed?
> 
> ...


If its always between two indices by the same distancess, then it should be possible to reset the hand on an index and it should be good from there. However, my understanding is that a quartz's 'tick' is relatively violent so you could find that the second hand shifts slightly over time, unaligning itself. I've had CWC quartzs that have stayed lined up nicely.

No doubt other 29 owners will be along to confirm whether their's hit the markers soon


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## Time Please! (Aug 23, 2010)

TomWazza said:


> Hi Chaps,
> 
> My RLT 29's second hand seems to not 'land' on the indices, it's always in between two. Does anyone know if this can be fixed?
> 
> ...


As eelblady says, if the seconds hand is consistently off, then this is an easy problem to fix. Any watch repairer could just ease the seconds hand off & reposition it. However Tom.... you may just have discovered something you don't really want to know. If you look carefully through the shop window of any modern Jeweller at their latest quartz watch offerings, then you will notice that just about all modern quartz watches exhibit this problem at some point around the dial - and this is true across the complete price range!!! Be it a high end Breitling/Omega or a low end Chinese movement, expect to see the same effect (although oddly, some Casios are reasonably OK!). Hold a modern quartz watch in the vertical plane & you'll likely see the seconds hand fall slightly behind the markers as it it goes "uphill" and vice versa once you pass 12 O'clock.

You'll see all kinds of partially-informed explanations for this, but it is basically down to the stepping motor mechanism (and, IMHO, in the weakly magnetised poles employed nowadays to help achieve super long battery life - but I may be wrong here). The best seconds hand registration accuracy seems to come from vintage watches ie those with more "battleship" grade engineering stepping motors (eg Omega's calibre 1310 Megaquartz watches from the early 1970s).

I think lack of seconds hand alignment bugs some people more than others.... But it does seem odd, to me at least, to market a super accurate-to-a-few-seconds-a-month watch incapable of displaying unambiguously exactly which second has just been reached!

BTW, if you exchange a new (but poorly aligned) watch for a replacement of exactly the same model, you may well find the new one is better.. but could be worse. From your description, it could only be better in your case!


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## tixntox (Jul 17, 2009)

I have to admit that I'm a bit autistic when it comes to lining up the hands. I solved it by buying a "smooth sweeper" electric Omega :notworthy: - a pleasure to behold. I did however find that the humming means that I have to take it off when sleeping! (or I couldn't!) :wallbash:

Mike


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## Haggis (Apr 20, 2009)

Time Please! said:


> TomWazza said:
> 
> 
> > Hi Chaps,
> ...


Thanks for this explanation, I thought that I was becoming obsessed noting the different positions of the second hand, I thought it might be the glass that was distorting the true position. I have found the same model of Rotary for example out of 14 watches 1 was correct. The shop assistant was all for phoneing the men in white coats. I have also found that when you change the time the second hand position changes. :wallbash: :comando: :crybaby: :hammer:


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