Watch batteries .....well that was rather amusing...

I purchased a new every day watch from China, nice looking thing in stainless with a stainless band, date, time luminescent markers on the hands and dial... I did not even have it a year and it stopped working... this aggravated me..

I ordered a smart watch thinking a rechargeable watch linked to my phone made sense - particularly when I am on the boat sailing and I can leave my phone safely below deck and not risk it..

Anyways I ordered watch batteries from China... it was $1 more to get forty of them rather than a standard pack of ten..

My Wife buys cheap dollar store watches.. and when one stops running she buys another one.. There were five dead watches sitting in a box on the coffee table.. I grabbed all five of them and popped open the backs.. all of them use the same type of battery.. Ok I fix two I take them to her and she is not amused - then I do number 3.. it does not get better - ok I do #4 and she says "can you please stop it"... I did not have the balls to hand her #5 so I put it on her night table... I think if I handed it to her I would be sleeping on the couch... I really prefer to sleep with her so I will do my best to behave myself..

Meanwhile my every day watch is back and running again.. I set the date and the time...now I have three every day watches.. and a nice gold Swiss wristwatch which I keep locked in the safe... Most guys are like I have a pair of boat shoes, a black pair of dress shoes, a brown pair of dress shoes and perhaps a pair of running shoes.. we don't typically need a lot of stuff..

My Wife was getting mighty aggravated with me handing her the old watches working again... but honestly it was really funny... I have 34 batteries left...My Mother tells me she has four dead watches as well... this is hilarious..

Yes its the stupid little things that amuse me..

What I also find funny is that all these watches all use the same battery...

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ArishMell · 70-79, M

Sad really, to think your missus and mum-in-law are likely not the only ones not to realise firstly, the first reason for anything electronic not working, is no electricity because the battery is flat; and secondly that just because an item has stopped working does not necessarily mean it cannot be repaired. Though you can hardly count replacing a spent cell as a "repair": a primary cell is a "consumable" part.

I'm puzzled by your amusement that the watches use the same battery. Why wouldn't they? They all work in the same way. Moreover they all likely have the same circuit and movement, made in the same factory. Only the case differs; and many of those likely come from the same factories too.

Your Swiss watch may be an exception if it has a purely mechanical movement. If it uses an electronic movement that is likely to be identical to the one in the cheap "supermarket" brand watches, and from the same manufacturer. The expensive part is the case... and the name.

It's very common practice now. Even many items of workshop equipment, at least for small businesses and home users, are identical save only for the colour and apparent brand-name, and made by one manufacturer. It's called "badge engineering" - though the idea is not new at all.

pdqsailor1 · 61-69, M

@ArishMell Yes the Swiss watch - an heirloom from my Grandfather who got it in 1953// lovely piece - 18K gold case. is mechanical and we have a copy of the manufactures hand written log showing the date It was made and though which dealer it was sold..but what makes it special is it was my Grandfathers.. and left t me specifically.. This year one of my Daughters gave birth to a boy...and I became a Grandfather with someone to leave that watch to...

There is a huge range of button type batteries used for all sorts of things such as hearing aids .... but yes I checked first. before ordering a quantity of them and was actually delighted to see that they were standardized on one cell... There wee a selection of movements ...perhaps three different ones....all still using the same cell across the six watches.... This made the project very simple and so I put the unused batteries into the refrigerator to preserve them...really keeping them as a matter of convenience... and economy... a good thing to keep on hand like any other battery...

For other things I am making a change.. China makes rechargeable lithium batteries with USB type C charging ports - I got some 9 volt and type D batteries and so now these things are rechargeable and not disposable - the batteries costing about what the disposable ones cost at retail stores here... so I stop being a consumer and simply charge them when and as needed... This is all round a sensible thing to do...