There's nothing "urban legend" about that. To this day, most quartz watch
circuits are not temperature compensated (and obviously there is not enough
power available to put the crystal in an "oven" in a wris****ch) so their
timekeeping will vary slightly based on temperature. Typically a
manufacturer will pick some midpoint between body temperature and room
temperature (I have seen 31C used as at typical #) and use that as the
temperature at which their movements are calibrated at the factory. If the
actual operating conditions vary from that temperature, the watch will drift
slightly from the calibrated rate, but it's no big deal.



"daestrom" wrote in message
...


An old 'urban lengend' was that the first quartz watches were calibrated
assuming the temperature of the crystal was going to be controlled by the
body heat of the wearer. And that leaving your watch on the dresser over
the week-end would cause it to slow down slightly. Don't know if it is
really true, but it's a nice story.

daestrom