Restore 1950s OMEGA Seamaster

Historical automatic movement cal.562

Restoring Historical model

The Seamaster series is the most historical in the OMEGA watches. This model was developed in 1950s, it was the golden age of the mechanical watch. A water resitant case was formed one piece part. A movement is great automatic caliber 562.

Now watching this watch closely, the case, the glass and the bracelet had been scratched and stained for several decades.

[NOTICE!]】
I did it as hobby and did not have high skill as same as the watchmaker. Please ask them if you want to restore your vintage watches.

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クリックで完成写真へ
Old Seamaster

Specification

OMEGA Seamaster(made in switzerland)/SS case/34mmx10.3mm/Automatic cal.562/24 jewels/18,000bph

Condition

- Hard to winding
- Sometimes stopped. Unstable running
- Very wounded glass, case, bracelet

Index

Disassembly of watch

The case is one-piece structure. It does not have a caseback. At first, pull the crown by a pliers and remove the bezel. Releasing the lock which fixes the movement inside the case, the movement with the dial can be taken out.

One piece case Remove the crown Release the lock

The dial and the movement are nice condition only a water resitant case by OMEGA.
Caliber 562 has thick bridges and a swan neck regulator for high precision.

Round dial with Applied bar indexs Cal.562 24 jewels Automatic

Glass, Bezel, Case, Dial, Movement

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Disassembly of movement

The screw is too tight and the tip of the screwdriver is damaged. I sharpened the driver tip to fit the slot of the screwtop and try several times.

Damaged driver tip Main plate Automatic winding parts

The disassembly step is as same as "Re-production of OMEGA Consteration". Please referthat explanation page.

Caliber 562 was disassembled

Now, it is ready to clean the parts with benzine. I use an ultrasonic cleaner for the jewelry and eyeglasses.
After the clean, they should be dried with the microfiber cloth and blown dust off.
The congealed grease is stuck to the mainspring and the keyless works. So, they should be scrubed in benzine.

Really, It was too dirty to wind the spring. The oil congealed.

Dirty mainspring Clean up Ultrasonic cleaner

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Assembly and rublication

Coil and install the main spring into the barrel by hands. Place some of the oil on two or three places on the coil and barrel floor, and rub the remainder on some surface of the inner coils.

installing mainspring coiled mainspring set the barrel

Assemble the wheel train, the keyless works(winding mechanism) and the calender disk. Place the automatic winding bridge.

Wheel train Calendar mechanism Automatic winding bridge

Beautiful caliber 562.

Assemby finished

Problem

In the test running, the balance stopped shortly. I observed that the click did not engage the ratchet wheel and then it cannot wind up the barrel.

not engaged click error click spring(right)

The click spring is not functioning properly because it contacts the wall of the click space.

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Adjustment in 3 positions

I use Microset Watch Time. It is veryt usable to check the rate on my PC screen.

Befor After Microset

My adjustment got following result,

Position Before After
Daily rate Beat error Daily rate Beat error
Dial down -98.8sec/day 9.7ms +7.5sec/day 1.1ms
6 o'clock up -194.4sec/day 11.4ms +5.2sec/day 0.6ms
3 o'clock down -110.2sec/day 10.2ms +1.2sec/day 0.2ms

Casing the watch

Polish all hands and press them.

stained hands polished hands hand press

Attach the hour hand and the minute hand at 12 o'clock position.
There is clearance between hour and minute hand and the dial surface.

Rub off the rust and polish the case closely. And set the movement inside the case and lock it.

Put the OMEGA genuine palstic glass and cover it by the bezel.

OMEGA genuine crystal Transparent OMEGA emblem

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Finish

Attach the Bracelet cleaned by the ultrasonic cleaner.
It seems to be quite another watch now !
Winding is softy, the accurary is recovered. I am surprised the performance of the caliber 562 which was manufactured before 60 years.

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