Seiko 7002 NH35

The Seiko 7002.


A picture I stole from the internet.

Caught between the 2nd generation "slim case" 6309s (which it replaced in 1988) and later 7S26 powered SKXs (which replaced it in 1996), and confused with both, the 7002 has always been a bit lost. The most obvious identifying feature is the lack of a day window, unlike both its predecessors and successors. Aside from this, and the simplified crown tube, its rather similar to a late 6309. Again like the 6309 but very importantly unlike the SKXs, the crown is at 4 o'clock.

7002s are not very valuable at the moment, so there is not a massive incentive to fix them. There seem to be plenty of dead ones or poorly working ones available cheaply on various internet auction sites. The cost of having a 7002 movement repaired or rebuilt is simply more, in any first world country, than even a good, let alone a fair, 7002 is worth.

Unable to resist I bought a 7002 as a project. Now the dilemma of how to fix it. Working 7002 movements are virtually unobtainable. The closely related 7009, common in many cheap Seiko 5s of the early 90s, is fairly easily to get, often still in said Seiko 5s. Unremarkable Seiko 5 dress watches of the early 90s, made and sold in the Phillipines etc are often very cheap. I managed to find two of these, one even with a 4 o'clock crown but for various reasons the attempts failed. Swopping over date wheels of the wrong colour, removing day wheels (the 7009 is the day/date version of the 7002) or just because the movements themselves were in poor condition. Maybe buying cheap watches on Ebay was a bad idea?
I may still revisit this idea as I have bits of another 7002 lying around. I see recently that an Ebay seller is offering refurbished what he calls "7002/7009 hybrid" movements for sale as replacements for 7002 divers. Clever man. 7002/7009 hybrid sounds fancy but appear just to be a 7009A with a 7002 dial fitted thereby covering the day wheel (which may or may not be removed.) And indeed why not, tis a good idea.

In the meantime however I found a source of reasonably priced new movements and so decided to go that route. SII non-branded Seiko movements, used by many micro-brand mechanical watch makers these days, and bigger outfits like Invicta and Vostok, are rather reasonably priced.
And so:

A lovely new SII NH35A, the date only version of the NH36A, the non-branded version of the Seiko 4R35, the upgraded version of the 7S36 successor to the 7S26, standard Seiko diver movement for many years and replacement for the 7002. And all of them are the same size. Isnt that handy?

NH35 sitting snugly in a second gen 7002 case. 

Now had this been a Seiko with a 3:45 or 3:00 crown our story would have ended here. In fact my wife has such a watch, a SKX031, and an NH36 proved to be a direct swop for the failed 7S26, some issues with the crown aside. 

But the 7002 has a 4 o'clock crown. So lining everything up was going to be a problem. In the end I chose the easy route and decided to ditch the date window, which meant going with a custom dial. I happened to have a custom 7002 dateless dial lying around from aforementioned failed (for now) 7002 repair project so I cut its feet off and attached it with the 3 and a half adhesive pads you should be able to make out in the above picture. Had a used a custom dial designed for a 7S26 or later movement it would probably just have fitted. 

The next issue was the crown. One easily forgotten thing to keep in mind which movement swopping: the stem must match the movement, but the crown must match the case. The supplied NH35 stem screwed happily into the 7002 crown. The only issue was getting the length EXACTLY right. This was achieved using a micrometer, some calculations, small sidecutters, 1000 grit sandpaper, patience and a few frustrating hours. Mainly spent

sanding. Slow, but the safest way to shorten a stem in tiny mounts. The NH35 hacks and winds so there is a lot going on with the stem.

Face stuck in place, on go the hands, in this case from some 60s Seiko dress watch that closely approximate second gen 6105 hands. Why? I felt they matched the face. Weirdly the second hand from that set refused to fit so I a strange black second hand that I think is from a fake set for a 7002 or SKX of some sort. Now rushing down the home straight, as one does at the end of a long project, in went a standard 7002 chapter ring, new standard 7002 bezel insert on old 7002 bezel, standard 7002 glass.
Case, case back, bezel, chapter ring and glass all came from the 7002 donor wreck.

Chucked it on a NATO I had lying around for now. I dont have an intact standard 7002 to compare it to, so here it is next to my second gen 6309. And a 6105 homage (more about it later) recently acquired just to show how far off my ideas of it looking 6105ish were.

You could of course do this with any dateless dial and hands and there are many things I could have done differently, but I quite like it. With a new NH35 it keeps time well and I rather appreciate the addition of winding and hacking.

Some winter testing up in the Swedish mountains.