Powered watch winder

[mklotz]

I have one of those wristwatches with the tiny date window at the 3 o'clock position. Unfortunately it's mechanization assumes that every month has 31 days so, with every <31 day month, the date indicated falls behind a day. I don't wear the watch often so, every time I pick it up, it needs correcting.

To advance the indicated date means using the tiny winding stem to wind the watch through 24 hours. With big and old hands, this can be annoying and even slightly painful. It occurred to me that I needed a motor drive to turn the stem for me.

I took one of the smallest Dremel sanding drums (~1/4" diameter) and removed the sandpaper sleeve. This leaves a nice, grabby rubber cylinder to drive the watch stem. The sanding drum was mounted in a tiny chuck with a 1/4" hex shaft that fits into the electric screwdriver chuck.

It worked beautifully. I simply held the sanding drum in place by hand although I suppose one could build a fixture if one had a lot of watches to wind forward.

Fortunately, my every day watch is fully electronic and has a built-in calendar that will outlast me.