I am a watch enthusiast, especially high-end mechanical watches (like Audemars, Patek, etc.).
These are very complex mechanisms comprised of hundreds of tiny little parts. I am wondering how these tiny little parts are made? I have seen some old school jewelers parts - mini lathes and such, but I don't think there is any way that a company like Rolex or Patek Philippe is using hand-made parts on production watches. They need to be repeatable with interchangeable parts.
So how are they made? And fixtured? What sort of tooling is used?
For those unfamiliar with the level of detail and precision - I'm talking stuff like this:
http://homepage.mac.com/d_halgren/WatchMvt2.jpg
...that entire mechanism could be just 1" across and must be so precise as to be accurate to within a few seconds a day.
It's fascinating to me. Anyone know about this stuff?
These are very complex mechanisms comprised of hundreds of tiny little parts. I am wondering how these tiny little parts are made? I have seen some old school jewelers parts - mini lathes and such, but I don't think there is any way that a company like Rolex or Patek Philippe is using hand-made parts on production watches. They need to be repeatable with interchangeable parts.
So how are they made? And fixtured? What sort of tooling is used?
For those unfamiliar with the level of detail and precision - I'm talking stuff like this:
http://homepage.mac.com/d_halgren/WatchMvt2.jpg
...that entire mechanism could be just 1" across and must be so precise as to be accurate to within a few seconds a day.
It's fascinating to me. Anyone know about this stuff?