Stories from my Portfolio • Eskola Family Watches

In this series of writings I will share stories from my portfolio of my studies in the Finnish School of Watchmaking. The first writing of this series introduces all the family watches that I worked with during my studies. They all have a special place in my journey becoming a watchmaker.

My Father's Ceventic

After servicing four pocket watches it was time for my first wrist watch. It was a watch from the 50’s and it belongs to my father (or at least it used to). This watch received a complete overhaul with balance staff polished and balance wheel balanced. Few parts were replaced including a new setting bridge, crown and drive shaft. The case was pretty beaten up but after polishing the case and installing a new glass it looked very cool. In fact, it looked so good I decided to keep it to myself. I added a cognac brown leather strap and it goes very well with my brown brogue shoes.

Even though the movement and parts in it were much smaller than the ones in pocket watches, the service job was much easier as it was possible to replace broken parts with spare parts. This watch service would set the base for the third and final year of my studies.

This Ceventic joined the elite club of my first services with first year Junghans clock and second year Leijona pocket watch. After this Ceventic watch I had serviced Eskola family watches from three generations.

My Grandfather's Leijona Pocket Watch

Second pocket watch I got to work on was a Leijona pocket watch. It used to belong to my grandfather and was given to my brother as a confirmation gift in 1997. This “lion” had definitely seen better days. It had clearly been handled by incompetent “watchmaker” as the dial was glued onto the mainplate. Further, it had seen its share of humidity and hard day-to-day use.

Leijona received a complete overhaul but my brother wanted to keep it as original as possible. The original plexiglass got polished and I sanded and gold plated the original rusty steel hands. The dial had an ugly repair that got redone. At some point the watch was given a new balance wheel that was too light and the watch was running +300 seconds a day. Patiently I added more than 20 weight plates under the weight screws on the balance wheel and got the watch running properly. I also reshaped the tips of the balance staff to achieve better accuracy in different positions. Finally, it was ready to be wrapped up and given back to its owner just in time for Christmas.​

My First mechanical watch: Novus Pocket Watch

First pocket watch I serviced was the pocket watch I received from my grandparents as a confirmation gift back in 2004. Conveniently enough the movement in this watch was ETA 6497 which is also the movement we get for our course watch. As I have only used the watch when wearing a tailcoat, it was basically flawless. I performed a complete overhaul for the watch and as a final touch I adjusted the pallet jewels to make the escapement bit more refined.

Even though this service work did not include anything special it was still very special for me as it was my first ever mechanical watch service. Further, I think my grandfather, being a craftsman himself, was looking down smiling when I was working on this watch.

N1 Prototype

I had a pretty good idea what I wanted this watch to be. I wanted a self-made german silver three quarter plate bridge, big bevels, engraved balance bridge, self-designed case, moonphase complication, applied hour markers, hand-made hands and dial with frosted-like texture. I always knew that it’s A LOT but I also had a feeling that I could pull it off. Did I? Yes and no. I got most of it done but wasn’t quite able to put it all together. However, the picture on the right and in the following pages give you an idea what I was able to finish. 

I made the dial out of brass and silver plated it. Printing on the dial was done in Helsinki-based company and they did a really good job. Having actual printed text and minute markers was always a must for me. They really give watch a lot of credibility. Another thing I was insisting on was the applied indexes. I spend probably 40 hours in lathing, filing and finishing them. I still think that it was time well spent and along with the center part of the dial they give the dial a nice 3D effect.

​I first designed dauphine style hands but because the hour wheel tube is so thick it would have made the hour hand comically wide. I decided to go with a traditional leaf design. I sawed the hands out of brass plate and finished the with file and polishing papers.

Micromechanic ‘Aki the man’ helped me to 3D design the case and it was 3D printed out of stainless steel. Finishing the case was a painful experience and I need to find a better place to get the 3D printing done in the future. Further, I wasn’t able to gold plate the case like I wanted to. Making my own case was really the reason this watch is not in “wear it in your wrist condition” just yet.​

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