Ever have something that just follows you around constantly, and you can’t quite even remember how it ends up going from place to place? For me, thats this rectangular Iron Maiden aluminum tin. It has been a staple in my work bench for the last 12 years, and for the last 12+ years I have no idea why I have it, where I got it, or what came in it. For all I know it was a promotional pack of mints from a teenage year concert.
Of course I keep it around because if you did not know, I am an Iron Maiden super fan. I would choose an Iron Maiden labeled product over most alternatives, and I surely would never throw away an Iron Maiden labeled tin. Apparently, I will also do absolutely nothing with it, as it’s just been slotted in my main tool drawer for god knows how long totally empty.
I was looking through my old belongings in my parents garage some time ago to find old school yearbooks and ended up coming up on a plastic set of drawers full of guitar picks and old concert ticket stubs (a relic of a much, much less expensive era) and in said drawer was the watch pictured below (sorry ebay guy who I stole the image from). Of course the watch was dead and the faux leather strap was coming apart from years of baking in said garage. I took it home and decided to see what I could do with it.
When I got home, first thing I did is what any ADHD person does when they find deteriorating goods, and that is complete the process of deterioration and completely rip apart the faux leather strap until it was just specs of crud all over the sofa. Now all I have is a watch head.
Next on the docket was to research it on eBay to see if I somehow came across some expensive Maiden relic that they didn’t make many of (and of course I already destroyed it). I found asking prices over $100, they made plenty of em, but more so was surprised to see a familiar aluminum tin! I took this as a calling to of course take it straight to my workbench and rip it apart and see what kind of battery I need for it and clean it up.
Once I got it into my workshop, I realized I have no watch making tools but plenty of synth repair tools that were small enough to make do. I was able to open up the snap back and test the battery with my meter which actually was still reading just fine. I ordered some replacements on amazon for next morning delivery, popped them in that night, and guess what… it worked!… for like 3 hours. By the time I woke up, the watch was stuck at 1:10 or so, and was not running. Opened it up and cleaned the battery terminals (thinking like a synth tech here) and put it together and once again…. worked for some time, and then didn’t work at all.
Now, at this point there is no way I am going to accept defeat. I love a challenge, and I love Iron Maiden, and I find meaning in the tin following me around for life, so surely I must be destined to fix this damn watch I don’t remember ever wearing.
Turns out, like many products produced by multi national bands and entities, this thing was a whole lot of nothing special inside. The Killers album cover was just printed on some shiny paper and a cheap as sin quartz movement was the brain of the whole operation. Cheap as sin is putting it lightly, as you can’t even buy a single movement without buying 3… for $10… The movement is a PC21, and I will say calling it a “movement” feels funny seeing as generally I am wearing an automatic watch with a real movement in it.
While waiting for the movement, I got to enjoy the process of buying the wrong sized strap, and realizing I could’ve got it right the first time had I just used my calipers, another exciting cross hobby to synthesizers (though much less specific to synths). I ended up with a black leather strap, but later I ended up with the green fabric one you’ll see below.. I think it fits it better.
The movement showed up some weeks later from overseas. Replacing the movement got me going down the youtube rabbit hole of watch making. It’s hard to find too many tutorials outside of automatic watches, but I was able to get the gist… pop the hands out when they’re aligned, put them back aligned at midnight ordered hours, minutes, than seconds, wear gloves, clean it up, pop a battery in it and it should just work, and that’s exactly how it happened.
A couple trimming tweakers worked for hand removal levers, and a molex pin remover worked fine to set the hands. I popped a battery it in and suddenly, the watch starts to tick! The endorphin rush was not too dissimilar to fixing a synth issue, to be honest, and was equally tapered back when I realized that I now have to let it run overnight to see if it’s keeping time (like burning in a synth).
Overnight it ran, and I woke up to it keeping time just as well as the automatic it sat next to. Now, I’m happy. I fixed something, which is generally something I like doing, and hey, now I have another watch! Cool! Up till this point, I was a 2 watch man; a Rolex Submariner my boss bought me for staying in business for 10 years (I am the boss), and a Pono Fissure 8 I got in Hawaii that I quite literally got so I could go to certain places and not be a dickhead wearing a Rolex (and I liked how it looked, was automatic, and I was very high on Aloha). Now I have a third watch, and hey, this one doesn’t need watch winder to stay current in my rotation.
Now that the watch is finished, I of course showed my wife and kids and wore it around the house. At some point I took it off probably to shower or something and put my submariner back on for whatever reason. At dinner time, our nanny had mentioned that my youngest son (5yo) went into my room, took it, put it on, and refuses to take it off. Now, my son is not a big Maiden head like dad (he’s seen them once and knows many of their songs), but how could I possibly not recognize and accept that my son has rightfully commandeered my new-to-me-even-though-its-been-mine-for-20-years-and-I-just-fixed-it watch? Not possible. Though, I did explain that he is only borrowing it but it’s otherwise okay with me so long as he doesn’t get it wet… though I do still have 2 more replacement movements if he did wreck it!
While talking to my wife about it again the next day or something, I wanted to show her the asking prices for the thing on eBay since I couldn’t believe it could be worth more than $50 or so. While doing so, I saw a guy in Poland was selling Iron Maiden watch dials he made using presumably lasers for not too much dough. I thought it was strange to just sell a dial as I imagine not everyone is just swapping watch dials. I put the listing and some more information in to good ol’ chatGPT and while I did get some useful info, turns out it was of course wrong about much of it but it did get me thinking about and researching the idea of building my own watch.
Turns out there is a whole world of watch parts out there that are often compatible with one another and can be put together if you have the tools. A new hobby where I get to buy a bunch of very specific use tools? Count me in. I ordered the dial the gentleman had available, and I listened to chatGPT to make sense of the rest.
I ended up with the parts much faster than the dial, coming from Poland and all. This was okay as I kept telling myself “you’ll make a watch or two, practice, and when the Iron Maiden dial shows up, you will expertly change the dial without a hitch and you’ll have an automatic Iron Maiden watch and your kid can really hold onto the quartz one”. Anyway, now I have a couple NH35 movements, a smooth date-less watch case sporting a sapphire crystal, and your amazon bargain bin hand setting tools, hand lifters, a case cushion, and even a movement holder. Everything else, of course, would be repurposed from my synthesizer repair tool chests.
So now I have some generic watch I made with an NH35 movement. There’s no branding, I have no idea how well it’s keeping time, but hey, it’s another automatic watch for me to buy a winder for that can chill until my Iron Maiden dial shows up. I bought multiple sets of hands, but ended up putting on these Rolex style Mercedes hands which I would later change.
Finally the Iron Maiden dial shows up, and of course I find out reason #18274 that I hate AI, because it totally biffed the sizing. The dial I got, frankly, was enormous. So big I actually have no idea what it’s true intended use is… but hey… what do I know… I’m just a synth technician moonlighting as a watch maker now. Turns out our Polish friend indeed makes a similar Iron Maiden dial in the correct NH35 size of 28.5mm. I order it and know that now… I must wait.
In the meanwhile while I wait, I do more research and decide hey, this could be a fun hobby to get in to so I can make gifts for family and friends. Like most of my interests, I also hid it from fam and friends until I knew I was going to stick with it, a rare feat for ADHD types who explore hobbies by going all in.
I eventually share my creations with my good friend Bob who is totally floored by the idea of making watches and likes the 2 I built. The next watch I built was just a typical dive watch (pictured right). I liked the idea of having a watch with a date that I could wear, for example, to a foreign country where it can be robbed from my arm and I wouldn’t care because it wasn’t a luxury watch.
At this point in the photo below, you can see the original watch on the left now sports non luminous metal hands, which I determined to be the best match for my soon-arriving Iron Maiden dial which would be inevitably stuck into this case. You can’t see the date through the cyclops on the watch to the right, but it’s there and it really ain’t bad looking at all. The cyclops magnification is one of the biggest tell-tale signs for fake Rolex’s, so I was surprised to be impressed with how it magnified the date on the NH35… not because it’s authentic or Rolex like… it just looks good! I do think the Lume on the dial and hands for that one are really cool. I like that the Mercedes hands lume is on the edges of the hands and not in the black parts, which would be inverse in lume and color on my submariner, for example. Overall, even though the right side one isn’t particularly good looking, I’m going to keep it around as a… watch! Another watch I can wear and not worry about if it breaks or gets stolen.
I of course in this time also obliged to the pressure of building Bob his own watch. He chose the dial and strap and used an extra case I had in the workshop. He chose those colors to rep his home town Mets and Islanders. I think it turned out great!.. much more stylish than the two to the left. Style is to be expected from New Yorkers. I think Bob is onto something with that time piece ;).
Finally, at long last, the fucking Iron Maiden dial shows up from Poland. It showed up certified mail, which I found kind of strange as the last one just plunked down the mail hole… but whatever. Instantly the first watch was pilfered of its movement and hands and it was time to put my practice to the test knowing I could get from A-Z and not have to worry about not having anything. At this point, I have most damn things to fix a watch, let alone put one together from Amazon parts.
Since this dial was generic, I had to use “dial dots” to affix it to the NH35. This isn’t super easy as theres not a lot of surface area to affix those to. I suppose one could disable the date wheel and use dots on that, and I may try that in the future now that I know enough about watch making to be dangerous. I also chose not to use the case I had originally got for it as I had this other dive watch knock off case laying around and since I plan to wear the watch regularly, I thought it would be nice to have the rotating bezel, as believe it or not, I do use that, even with my submariner. It’s a brilliant way to time things, even if it’s just how long you’ve been at the super market, or how long it was since you signed in at the doctors office vs when they actually call you in. Yeah, I’m not using it to see how much more oxygen I have in the tank…
Finally, my “replacement” Iron Maiden watch. With the Killers Eddie, to boot!
Behold, on the wrist. I did eventually put a silicone strap on it as faux leather seems like low hanging fruit.
It’s remarkable to me how having a tin sit in your drawer for years can somehow make you feel the need to start a new hobby. It’s also notable to me that what I originally set out to do probably wouldn’t have killed the hobby right away had it been successful, but that it failing and having to be put off did bring others joy. In the time it took the new dial to come, I built myself 2 watches, built one for a friend, planned others, and fixed 3 watches my late mother left to my wife.
Now that this original project is done, the overwhelming feeling of needing to use all these tools I got to build the watches is done, and now I can focus on buying old watches and doing probably just an okay job at fixing them. I have obtained case back opening tools, tiny screw drivers, oils, finger cots, a broken Omega, a broken Gruen, and even a vintage Tudor (which I spent way too much money on), all of which I intend to restore myself since I feel an overwhelming cockiness that I can probably do most intricate things seeing as I’m fairly good at my day job.
Now I am to watch makers what I see as the worst kind of synth tech; one who is good enough to be dangerous but truly has no idea what they’re doing beyond the line that is so naive, yet also so responsible for changing the world… “how hard can it be?…”