What Is a Watch Winder and How Does It Work?

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There’s a huge chance that you have never had to wind a watch in your life. But there are certain types of watches that indeed do need regular winding. And for such timepieces, a watch winder comes in nicely. In this article, I will do my best to explain what exactly is this mysterious tool all about and how does it work.

To understand the concept of watch winders and see if you really need one, let me remind you about the three primary types of watches first:

mechanical (manual) watches
automatic watches
Quartz watches

I highlighted the second type on purpose. This is because, on a pragmatic level, a watch winder is dedicated to automatic timepieces only. And here’s why.

Unlike the manually-wound mechanical watches (the most retro type out there), the “automatics” run automatically. But there’s a catch!

These watches are self-winding thanks to a moving weight that’s inside them. For the weight to rotate or swing, the watch needs to feel some motion from the outside. When worn, your wrist guarantees that motion.

As soon as you take it off, the watch will stop receiving the necessary stimulus, slowly decreasing its precision before finally coming to a halt altogether. Of course, any automatic watch can then be manually wound again – but not all people love doing that. And that’s where a watch winder box comes to the rescue.

How Does an Automatic Watch Winder Work?

We already know that once you put your automatic watch to rest, it will slowly wind down just like a mechanical watch would. We also know that similarly to mechanical timepieces, automatic models can be manually wound again. Whether you pick them up after a night’s rest or after a few months of flirting with another watch, it doesn’t matter.

Still, many fans of automatic watches don’t like the fact that they need to interfere with the watch movement. This is because, in their opinion, it collides with the sole purpose of the watch being “automatic” in the first place. Luckily, a watch winder solves the problem.

To put it very short, a watch winder is a form of a container for automatic watches. Depending on your own preferences, you can get a box with a holder for a single watch or a bigger one that can fit more timepieces.

The way a watch winder works is pretty much straight-forward. Once you take off your wristwatch, you place it in the holder and switch it on. The mechanism of a watch winder ideally mimics the everyday movement of your wrist, providing enough energy for the watch to continue running.

Abstracted from timepiecekinghttps://timepieceking.info