Strange watch behavior

[[email protected]]

At about 6:50 this morning whilst having breakfast I noticed a burst of
interferance on the radio (FM). It went on for about 20 secs - enough
time for me to fiddle with the radio before it came back to normal. Ten
minutes later upstairs in the bathroom I noticed my watch had stopped
and then restarted and was some 5 mins slow. The battery is no more
than six months old and as I write this at 7:53 my watch says 7:46.

Ok - was I transported through a time warp? Or, perhaps more likely,
could the radio interference have affected my watch?

Any ideas?

PS I'm not mad!!!

 

[St. John Smythe]

At about 6:50 this morning whilst having breakfast I noticed a burst of
interferance on the radio (FM). It went on for about 20 secs - enough
time for me to fiddle with the radio before it came back to normal. Ten
minutes later upstairs in the bathroom I noticed my watch had stopped
and then restarted

You didn't witness stopping and restarting, but inferred it, right?

and was some 5 mins slow. The battery is no more
than six months old and as I write this at 7:53 my watch says 7:46.

Ok - was I transported through a time warp? Or, perhaps more likely,
could the radio interference have affected my watch?

Any ideas?

More than once, I'm afraid, that's happened to me. But it was always
because I had mistakenly set the watch five minutes off (not that hard
to do), but only noticed it later. How long had it been since you last
set it?

 

[[email protected]]

Weird. It might have been broad band electrical interference, some
watches have a pretty thin casing.

Have you checked for any circular holes in your windows? there have
been reported cases of equipment malfunction associated with anomalous
luminous phenomena (ALP's)

20 seconds is a bit longer than usual but not unheard of- these things
can hang around for minutes at a time. Reported sources include
malfunctioning electrical transmission gear, circuit breakers,
thunderstorms, etc.

-A

 

[Pete L]

Thanks chaps. My watch is still perfectly fine now having adjusted it
after I posted my first message. I had not adjusted it since I had a
new battery - about six months ago. There were definitely no
thunderstorms around (high pressure and strong inversion). Just
thinking about electrical transmissions, I do from time to time have my
router for internet go off on me for no good reason. I just reset it
and it goes ok then. My house is needing re-wiring as it's not been
done since the '70s. Could I have an insulation fault developing which
is generating a transmission?

 

[[email protected]]

Inversion, interesting. I wonder if that would be enough to set up a
weak electrostatic field..

I've heard of a similar effect being caused by snowstorms, in fact
lightning is more often than not intracloud and never reaches the
ground directly.

-A

 

[Ken Taylor]

Thanks chaps. My watch is still perfectly fine now having adjusted it
after I posted my first message. I had not adjusted it since I had a
new battery - about six months ago. There were definitely no
thunderstorms around (high pressure and strong inversion). Just
thinking about electrical transmissions, I do from time to time have my
router for internet go off on me for no good reason. I just reset it
and it goes ok then. My house is needing re-wiring as it's not been
done since the '70s. Could I have an insulation fault developing which
is generating a transmission?

Have you had your wiring checked by a competent electrician or are you
just assuming it needs rewiring? I don't see any reason why a house
wired in the 70's would need rewiring now if it was done properly then
(assuming no unremedied incidences of damage in the meantime).

Regards the router, what sort of connection is it, and what do you mean
by 'go off'? If it does it periodically and you've only had the radio
incident once, I suspect that they are unrelated. The watch I *strongly*
suspect is unrelated.

Cheers.

Ken

 

[Ken Taylor]

Inversion, interesting. I wonder if that would be enough to set up a
weak electrostatic field..

I've heard of a similar effect being caused by snowstorms, in fact
lightning is more often than not intracloud and never reaches the
ground directly.

-A

From inversion to 'weak electrostatic field' to snowstorms and
lightning. Nice job. The lightning is probably on the grassy knoll.

Ken

 

[Yukio YANO]

At about 6:50 this morning whilst having breakfast I noticed a burst of
interferance on the radio (FM). It went on for about 20 secs - enough
time for me to fiddle with the radio before it came back to normal. Ten
minutes later upstairs in the bathroom I noticed my watch had stopped
and then restarted and was some 5 mins slow. The battery is no more
than six months old and as I write this at 7:53 my watch says 7:46.

Ok - was I transported through a time warp? Or, perhaps more likely,
could the radio interference have affected my watch?

Any ideas?

PS I'm not mad!!!

Microwave Oven ?

A Short (20 second burst) from a VERY leaky Microwave Oven might explain
burst of FM RFI and RESET of watch else a RADAR transmitter, aircraft ?
nearby.
Would have to be a fairly intense source of EMI to affect a watch !!

What is your location, QTH

?????

Yukio YANO

 

[Pete L]

The router 'going off' - what i meant was from time to time I go to use
the internet and can't get into IE - just says 'can't find server'.
When this happens pull out the plug and put it back in again. The
router goes through it's starting up process and all is ok then. I have
often suspected that electrical spikes in the mains supply cause the
problem.

 

[Pete L]

Sounds good to me. I'm about 2 miles from Exeter airport on the flight
path! The microwave wasn't on at the time - all I heard was a very loud
interferance from the FM radio

 

[Ken Taylor]

Sounds good to me. I'm about 2 miles from Exeter airport on the flight
path! The microwave wasn't on at the time - all I heard was a very loud
interferance from the FM radio

If you don't get it all the time it's not the airport radar.

Ken

 

[Ken Taylor]

The router 'going off' - what i meant was from time to time I go to use
the internet and can't get into IE - just says 'can't find server'.
When this happens pull out the plug and put it back in again. The
router goes through it's starting up process and all is ok then. I have
often suspected that electrical spikes in the mains supply cause the
problem.

My ISP just drops out every so often - I wait for a while and it comes
back. You should try logging onto the admin page for your router and
looking to see what it thinks is happening and maybe trying to kick it
into logging on again. Maybe the line is down, maybe it's been logged
off, maybe it's gone into la-la land.... if you don't check a few things
then guesses are just going to have you running in circles looking for a
solution. Of course continuing to do a cold restart gets you out of
trouble..... depends what trouble you want to go to.

Cheers.

Ken

 

[Mike Berger]

Did you have a cellphone nearby?
My two latest cellphones periodically transmit noise through
anything convenient -- radio scanner, telephone, stereo....
I suppose it could affect an electronic watch too.

 

[:-)]

USA have alot of nuclear warheads, it might be one who blow of near you!

 

[JANA]

You must have set your watch wrong. Or, you really went through a time
warp!!!

--

JANA
_____


At about 6:50 this morning whilst having breakfast I noticed a burst of
interferance on the radio (FM). It went on for about 20 secs - enough
time for me to fiddle with the radio before it came back to normal. Ten
minutes later upstairs in the bathroom I noticed my watch had stopped
and then restarted and was some 5 mins slow. The battery is no more
than six months old and as I write this at 7:53 my watch says 7:46.

Ok - was I transported through a time warp? Or, perhaps more likely,
could the radio interference have affected my watch?

Any ideas?

PS I'm not mad!!!