Just bought a brand new Portuguese Yacht Club and have questions regarding accuracy

Hello, I am the proud new owner of a new Portuguese Yacht Club. This is my second IWC watch, with an ingenieur automatic being my first. I set my watch yesterday to the atomic clock found online, and already after the first day running it seems it is running 2 seconds faster than the atomic clock. Should I be concerned? I have read that there is a "break-in" time required for the watches internal parts to be oiled, and that the deviance might be high during this period. I guess I'm just spoiled as my ingenieur was tested at a Tourneau watch boutique on their machine, and the result was a deviance of -1 second per day. I guess given the much higher price tag I was expecting this to be the same if not more accurate than my Ingenieur. If I am over-reacting please let me know. Thanks!

Daniel

Hello Daniel
Daily Rate tolerance for IWC watches is 0 to +7 secs per day. So your Portuguese is within specification, whereas your Inge is not (but we are splitting seconds here). Far better for a watch to gain time - it's better to be early than late for that important meeting ;-) Many factors can influence accuracy such as resting positions at night. Crown up or crown down position overnight can vary the rate by several seconds. Once you know the particular variance in different positions, the rate can be easily adjusted this way.

I'd would want my watch to run at +2 instead of -1.

I guess I kind of thought about it as either way the watch was either losing time or gaining time I thought 1 second lost was better than 2 seconds gained. I guess I see the logic of better to be fast and be early for something than be slow and wind up late. Thank you for your replies. I didn't realize that it was acceptable to gain as many as 7 seconds per day. I would not be very happy spending as much as I have on these watches and have a deviation that high.

We love mechanical watches, not only because the movements are works of art, but because they are beautiful machines of springs and wheels. Therefore they display certain quirks and this is what makes them interesting. There are more accurate timekeeping devices based on the oscillations of a quartz crystal, but they are not nearly as interesting and lack the soul of a ticking watch.

A deviation of 1 sec a day is 6 minutes a year! I think that's plenty accurate.

Enjoy your beautiful Portugeuse. It will give you years and years of joy.

Well said.

Very well put Mark, I agree with you 100%. I guess I need to come to terms with the fact that like you said, these complicated small machines have their quirks. Thank you for your excellent replies.

It's a beautiful watch. Enjoy it.

And just to put your investment in perspective, any multi million dollar watch from Patek, Vacheron or any other manufacture will have an "inaccuracy" measured in seconds per day - that is just the nature of all mechanical watches. You can regulate you watch to zero deviation but eventually it will start to deviate - like Mark says though, that is part of loving these mechnical wonders :-)

Well I am happy to report that the watch is running magnificently! It barely gains ANY time whatsoever during the day when I am wearing it, and I have been experimenting with different positions overnight to see which is the best, and it seems as though with the dial up, it gains the least amount of time, which is perfect since I can just put it in my watch case. Yesterday it only gained 1.2 seconds over a 24 hour period of time, and so far today during the 10 hours I have been wearing it, it has only gained .2 seconds! Needless to say I am very happy with the accuracy, and having fun using the app called Watchtracker to keep track of it. (although my wife thinks I'm nuts)