Matt's Desk

Digital Watch

Made mostly with the manual milling machine, this is a custom aluminium case housing the internals of a Casio F-91W digital watch.

The core case was milled to house the circuity of the Casio, and has two main parts that attach to it:

1. Front mounting plate for glass screen, fixed by four hex screws
2. Rear stainless steel plate for access to battery and internals

A recess is cut into the front mounting plate to prevent movement of the glass.

The most challenging area of this project was making the push pins to interact with the watch’s settings. The original Casio uses small pins with C-clips to allow the pins to be pushed, with the C-clip preventing the pins being ejected fully from the case. It was essential for the pins to be:

• Of smooth fitting for good tactility
• Equal length between C-clip and end protrusion for uniform appearance

To recreate this, I used ground steel rod of a larger diameter to suit the larger size of the watch case. Using a parting tool on the lathe, a fine cut was made into the rod to fit a C-clip. Mounting a steel pin into aluminium would cause wear over time, and so steel bushings were pressed into the case to house the pins.

By far, the most rewarding part of this project was using the internal light for the first time after fitting the pins. Following in close second are the queries when wearing in public!