Interesting Problem

[Robbie68]

I recently picked up a barely used 352. The condition was great, the watch being about two years old but looked like new. After initial winding I noticed it was gaining time quite dramatically, up to ten seconds per hour. My first thought, it was magnetized but I was away on business so couldn't degausse. Anyway, I started to check it every hour and it began to slow and run okay, about +10, a bit fast I know but not terrible. The weird thing was though it would run around + 10 but then suddenly gain 10-15 seconds in one hour, then run okay for the next few hours. I've owned "nice" mechanical watches for twenty years and never had one that could run accurately for up to a day and then suddenly gain time so to put it mildly I wasn't happy. My theory is the rotor was magnetized so if I was moving a lot it wasn't having a significant effect on timing, if I was still and the rotor happened to be lying over the balance for an hour or so, it would gain. Degaussed when I got home and now runs at a steady +4. Thought I'd share in case anyone else had encountered such erratic running.