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Lots of watch stems mixed

Wgm63
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Wgm63 New Member

Wgm63

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Hi there all a quick question I've been given a box of stems all mixed up. How can I find out which stem relates to a make or caliber of a watch.

William

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watchweasol Distinguished Member

watchweasol

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Hi. With a great deal of patience and difficulty as any two stems may look alike but have subltle differences. You could try the web site. WINDINGSTEMS.COM to look for similarities.  Not an easy job.

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Neverenoughwatches Distinguished Member

Neverenoughwatches

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1 hour ago, Wgm63 said:

Hi there all a quick question I've been given a box of stems all mixed up. How can I find out which stem relates to a make or caliber of a watch.

William

Yes there is a way, I've done lots and lots of stem and staff identifications over the last two years. Either by catalogs or as WW has mentioned balance staff and stem .com. you do  need an accurate bench micrometer. Quite a slow process though, i managed to get to around 40 id's per hour, some you find straight away some take a little while. Stems are easier to measure up than staffs. There are two basic reference sizes to search for initially then the search narrows down to find the remain sizes and then a final match.  I actually find it a therapeutic treasure hunt.

1 hour ago, Wgm63 said:

Hi there all a quick question I've been given a box of stems all mixed up. How can I find out which stem relates to a make or caliber of a watch.

William

Heres an example of a lovely big omega pocket watch stem

Screenshot_20240122-204633_Samsung Internet.jpg

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Wgm63 New Member

Wgm63

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Thank you all for the advice ect I will endeavour to sort them out with neverenoughwatches suggestion hopefully.

Thanks again it's much appreciated 👏 

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Neverenoughwatches Distinguished Member

Neverenoughwatches

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2 minutes ago, Wgm63 said:

Thank you all for the advice ect I will endeavour to sort them out with neverenoughwatches suggestion hopefully.

Thanks again it's much appreciated 👏 

Once you have done a few you become much quicker. But you really need an accurate bench micrometer, digital calipers are a bit fiddly and not super accurate, they can vary from the tips of the caliper to the head of them. Some stems are also very close, staffs even more so, there can be differences of 10 - 20 microns between a particular dimension. But its certainly doable with the right tools. Not sure on the scope of different stems, i think about 3000 ronda upto 1965 the reference numbers go higher but there missing numbers that are not used. Staffs i would guess at double that. Plus all the old ones that aren't even listed.

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