I have acquired a British Military Stopwatch which has a Series 904 stopwatch movement. I have a couple of questions which I thought someone here might be able to help with... Is the 904 movement unique to Heuer or is it found in the watches of any other supplier? The watch pre-dates 1936 but what year was the 904 movement first manufactured? Any assistance would be much appreciated...
Hi @Q-Rog Tell me more about this one? Is it signed Heuer anywhere? I'm not familiar with the 904 movement- many of these older Heuers used Valjoux movements
Movement is only marked as Swiss Made. I think this is pretty common on military issued watches as I understand makers did not want movements sold on after service use? The movement is shown in the 1936 Heuer catalogue as being the movement used in the series 900 chronometers, of which the 904 is the variant which has the side slide as present here. Whilst the 904 variant then seems to disappear the movement persists in later catalogues... Movement shown in later Heuer catalogue Movement shown in 1936 catalogue....
I have seen a very similar watch dated as 1914-1918 and the case serial number on this example suggests it is of a similar date which would make a certain amount of sense. I wondered if the movement had a date when it was first used which would give me an 'earliest possible' date? What would be even better would be if anyone had any idea about the movement serial number as that might be much more specific....
A few images of the same movement (though not the side slide variant) in a much later non-military version...
Very interesting find- and I think you already know more about these than I do. However, I suspect that the reference to this watch is 904 and that the movement is from Valjoux. Looks like a 1/5th second timer with a small 30-minute counter.
http://www.onthedash.com/Guide/_DashMounted/Auto_Rallye/ This shows a version of this movement in the second variant of the Heuer Auto Rallye and identifies it as an A. Schild 1564 movement.