Friday, February 5, 2021

Time Change, Battery Change, Spare Change - weekly column

 

Mack Hall, HSG

Mhall46184@aol.com

 

Time Change, Battery Change, Spare Change

 

“Time is but the stream I go a-fishing in.”

 

-Thoreau

 

One of my better ideas - well, okay, one of my few good ideas - was to learn from the InterGossip how to pop the back of a wristwatch and change the battery.

 

Most watches are electrical now, which saves the wearer the unspeakable agony of winding a watch once a day. Whew! Thank goodness for labor-saving gadgets. Now there’s time (so to speak) to write that book you’ve been planning.

 

Batteries fail, though, and jewelers charge an hour hand and a second hand to change them. If you can do it yourself, you can save lots of pocket change for that time change.

 

For watches with pop-off backs I use a jewelers’ screwdriver as a pry.

 

For a threaded back, you will need a watch wrench. A pipe wrench won’t do.

 

When my Swiss Army Watch (maybe or maybe not made in Switzerland; the band was labeled “Made in China”) battery failed I bought via the Intergossip an adjustable three-point wrench for opening watches with threaded backs.

 

The first time I opened my shiny, heavy, sturdy, manly Swiss Army Watch I was surprised to see that the functional gut of the thing was a tiny motor housed in tiny little plastic sleeve. And it didn’t last long. After my second disposable Swiss Army Watch I went back to cheap Timex watches, which have lasted much longer.

 

When you remove the back from a watch you should do so in a clean, dry atmosphere so that the watch’s innards don’t get dirty or damp. Before you remove the old battery take a picture of it so you can place the new battery correctly. Note the make and numbers on the battery, and then access a battery chart on the InterGossip – different makers of the same battery number it differently, and if you don’t have the same brand in your tool box or if it’s not available at the store, you will know what other brand will serve.

 

From the InterGossip I bought a big card of all sorts of different off-brand watch batteries / button batteries, and I can usually find what I need. If not, I then drive to the store and buy one that will do, although it will be pricier.

 

If I owned an expensive watch I would be reluctant to take off the back at all, but since I have only a couple of Wal-Mart Timex watches (one with a brown band, one with a black band), I don’t worry about it. And I haven’t botched a job yet. You’ve got an old Timex reposing peacefully in the back of a drawer; practice with that.

 

Young people don’t wear watches anymore; they check the time on their little Orwellian telescreens, but for a high school student a cheap watch is a nice beginning-of-term gift. During their junior and senior years students have to take so many STUPID tests for college admissions and scholarships, and pulling out a MePhone even to check the time is an instant turn-in-your-test-and-go-home-now thing; a watch for telling time (unless it’s got a little calculator in it) is safe.

 

Beside, the other students will be fascinated: “Is that a wristwatch? I’ve seen them in old movies!”

 

CAUTION: WATCH BATTERIES / BUTTON BATTERIES ARE DANGEROUS TO CHILDREN AND ANIMALS. Little batteries are tiny and shiny, attractive to little children, animals, and some sophomores. If swallowed there is enough electrical kick in a button battery to burn through the wall of the esophagus or stomach

(Swallowed Button Batteries Must be Removed: Study (webmd.com)).

 

When I change the batteries in a watch or toy I do so over the open drawer of my desk so that if I drop a battery or one of those tiny little screws it’s safe.

 

Watches, like pocket notebooks and fountain pens and pocketknives, are out of fashion now, but they’re useful and even fun.

 

-30-

 

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