01
Mod builds
Case, dial, hands, movement, crystal, strap — a watch put together from parts, start to finish. Parts lists, fitment problems, and what I'd change next time.
Mostly NH35 / NH36, because that is where modding starts.
Watch mods · Horology · On camera
Modding watches and learning how they actually work — one movement, one case, one lost screw at a time.
Builds, teardowns and bench notes, filmed as I learn. The mistakes stay in.
What you'll find here
On the channel
Four kinds of video. Some are builds you can follow along with; some are me finding out how something works by taking it apart.
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Learning horology
How a mechanical movement keeps time — mainspring to escapement to balance — explained at the pace I'm learning it, with the movement open on the bench.
No prior knowledge assumed. Mine certainly wasn't.
03
Teardowns & fixes
Opening up watches to see what's inside, servicing what can be serviced, and being honest about what went wrong when it doesn't go back together.
The mistakes are usually the useful part.
04
Bench & tools
What's actually on the bench, what's worth buying first, and which cheap tools are fine versus which ones will scratch a dial you waited three weeks for.
Starter kit is listed below.
Horology, in small pieces
How a movement works
Every mechanical watch, from your first mod to a grand complication, is the same five systems in a row. Learn these and every teardown starts to make sense.
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1 · Power
Mainspring
A coiled spring inside the barrel. Winding the crown — or the rotor, on an automatic — tightens it; everything else runs on it slowly letting go.
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2 · Transmission
Gear train
Centre, third, fourth and escape wheels step that energy down. The fourth wheel usually turns once a minute — which is why the seconds hand sits on it.
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3 · Distribution
Escapement
The escape wheel and pallet fork release the train one tooth at a time, and give the balance a small push each time. That release is the tick.
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4 · Regulation
Balance & hairspring
The timekeeper. It swings back and forth at a fixed rate; every swing lets the escapement advance once. Regulating a watch means adjusting this.
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5 · Indication
Motion works
Cannon pinion, minute wheel and hour wheel turn the minute hand's motion into the hour hand's, at 12 : 1. This is the bit you see.
Reading a spec sheet
What "vph" means
Vibrations per hour — how many times the balance swings. Each swing is one beat, and the seconds hand moves once per beat. Higher is smoother, not automatically better.
- 18,000 vph
- 2.5 Hz · 5 beats / s · common in vintage
- 21,600 vph
- 3 Hz · 6 beats / s · NH35, many workhorses
- 28,800 vph
- 4 Hz · 8 beats / s · most modern Swiss
Try them on the dial at the top of the page.
The modder's movement
Seiko NH35A, at a glance
- Type
- automatic, hand‑winding, hacking
- Jewels
- 24
- Beat
- 21,600 vph (3 Hz)
- Power reserve
- ≈ 41 hours
- Size
- Ø 27.4 mm · 5.32 mm tall
- Hand holes
- hour 1.50 · min 0.90 · sec 0.20 mm
- Rated accuracy
- −20 to +40 s / day
The NH36 is the same movement with a day‑date wheel.
Before your first mod
Starter bench kit
- Case-back opener — a friction ball for screw-downs, a knife for snap-backs
- Movement holder — so the movement isn't sitting on its stem
- Hand-setting presses and hand levers, with a dial protector
- Tweezers — brass or plastic near dials, steel for screws
- Rodico — cleaning putty; lifts dust and fingerprints off parts
- Air blower, finger cots, and a 3–5× loupe
- Spring-bar tool — for the strap, last of all
Follow along
Find Arka everywhere
Long builds live on YouTube. The quick stuff — bench shots, wrist shots, sixty‑second fixes — is heading to Instagram and TikTok.
YouTube
Full builds, teardowns and horology explainers.
Subscribe →
Instagram
Bench photos, finished pieces, and reels.
Coming soon
TikTok
Short mods, quick tips, satisfying close‑ups.
Coming soon
अर्क · arka · Sanskrit
Why Arka
Arka comes from the root √arc — to shine, to radiate, to praise. For a channel about timekeeping, two of its meanings fit almost too well.
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i
The sun
Arka is among the old names for Sūrya. For most of human history the sun was the only clock anyone owned — every watch is a small copy of it.
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ii
A ray
The line light draws. A ray is exactly what a sundial's gnomon throws and a hand traces: a straight edge sweeping over a marked ground.
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iii
Twelve
Classical Sanskrit could write numbers as words — bhūta-saṅkhyā, "object numerals" — so figures survived inside metrical verse. In that system any word for the sun stands for twelve, after the twelve Ādityas, one for each solar month. Arka = 12, and twelve is where every dial begins.
12
arka