Teddy Baldassarre
How to Demagnetize A Watch
Since their invention hundreds of years ago, watches and other timekeepers have had one consistent and implacable foe: magnetism. Magnetic fields are the arch-enemy of a watch’s ability to run reliably and accurately, as they can adversely affect the tiny metal parts in a traditional mechanical movement like the wheels, gears, and hairspring. The ill effects of magnetic fields on watches’ reliability first emerged as early as the 1920s, when electrical power became more ubiquitous in both homes and businesses, and the challenges for watchmakers have only multiplied in the years since. Today, we’re surrounded by magnetic fields in almost every area of our everyday lives, from microwave ovens and refrigerators to computers, cell phones, and electrical motors. The watch industry’s decades-long battle against magnetic fields, explored in greater detail in this article, has been a largely successful one, with the use of protective inner cages and non-ferrous movement components now commonplace. Omega, for example, makes watches with movements that can resist magnetism up to 15,000 gauss, as in the Railmaster watch shown above. However, most of us, at one time or another, have still experienced a situation in which a watch falls victim to being magnetized, and it can be a bit intimidating to figure out how to fix it. [toc-section heading="How to Tell if Your Watch is Magnetized"] A watch that has had its movement magnetized might be difficult to notice at first. It mig...
