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Version 3.29
03-Feb-2013

Welcome!

This web site is dedicated to that short period between 1957 and the mid 1970s when reigned! By "electric", I mean they have a battery, either a balance wheel or a tuning fork and either electrical contacts or a transistor. This was a very short-lived transitional phase: transistors were just becoming available and mass-produced quartz watches had not yet appeared. So there are no mechanical watches (manuals or automatics) on the site but I have included one or two very early quartz watches.

really have died out. Quartz is king in the 21st century, but conventional spring-driven manual and automatic mechanical watches are enjoying a revival both at the top end of the market as well as at the bottom end. Not so with the electrics; the last one was probably made in the mid 1970s.

In strict terms, "electric" watches are those without any electronic components i.e. no resistors, diodes or transistors; just a coil, contact and battery such as the Hamilton 500 and 505. But this site also includes the early "electronic" watches. Some key facts:

• Hamilton : world's first electric watch
• LIP : world's first watch to employ an electronic component (a diode to reduce sparking on the contacts)
• Bulova Accutron : world's first watch to employ a transistor
• ESA Dynotron : world's first watch to employ a balance wheel and a transistor

Looking for information on Richard Arbib? Visit the Hamilton section under "Watch Makers"!

Servicing and Repairs: Accutron repair? Hamilton repair? Other electric watch repair? No problem! I offer a servicing and repair service for most . If you are interested in getting your electric watch serviced or repaired, then please either click one of these links above or use the link on the lefthand side. I also work on mechanical watches, both manual wind and automatics, so get in touch if you have one that needs some attention!

I've created an Electric Watches Community on . I'm still trying to understand how this new Community and this website will co-exist. I suspect the latter will continue to be my main reference place on all things to do with these interesting watches while the Facebook Community will be a place where I post the occassional new photos, discuss things etc. We'll see how it goes, but please feel free to try the Community (click below) and post some messages on how you think it should (or could) work; post some of your electric watch photos as well! In addition, I've added a new "Facebook Like" button at the bottom of each page on this website; if you like a particular watch or page, please tell other Facebook users by clicking it!

Virtually all the photographs of movements and watches on this site are photographs of my actual watches! Please do not copy these photographs without my permission. Various other photographs and scans are shown with full permission of the owner and this is usually acknowledged on the page but also on the Acknowledgements page --- please don't copy these.

Most site navigation is performed via the lefthand navigation menu but there are also additional links in the main text as well as at the top of each page to more detailed information, so look out for those.

There are three main sections:

• "Watch Makers" shows you the watch makers / assemblers and their watches that use electric/electronic movements; this section also covers those movement makers whose name never, or very rarely, appeared on a dial e.g. ESA, Landeron.
• "Movement Gallery" helps you identify the electric or electronic movement in your watch and also gives battery, year and movement type information.
• "Movement Types" goes into more detail about how each of the various type of movement works and shows examples of each type of movement.
• The "Cross Reference" link on the left attempts to marry these three groups together.

I'm always on the look out for interesting early , so if you have one or more For Sale, I may well be interested! Please email me!