A Citizen Eco-Drive lack of info gripe...

[mtngunr]

Oh, forgot to mention conflicting data from Citizen....
they state in movement charging manual accessed from site for charging that it gets a guaranteed full charge (from dead to full) in 7hrs outdoors in sun and 14hrs outdoors if overcast....

Then they state in watch manual that it is 12hrs exterior/sunny and 45hrs exterior/cloudy...

AND they state in first manual that charging in a window doubles the cloudy/overcast times...so, I have one source of 28hrs and another of 90hrs to fully charge in a window...

Can you blame me for being unsure of full charge?

 

[rawhide]

My Citizen ecodrive has run flawlessly for about a decade and can't remember the last time it was worn in the sun. When working outside at home I wear no watch or a G Shock.

The band buckle broke a few months ago and it's been laying on my desk with only fluorescent light. Checked it today and it is right on time.

 

[mtngunr]

My Citizen ecodrive has run flawlessly for about a decade and can't remember the last time it was worn in the sun. When working outside at home I wear no watch or a G Shock.

The band buckle broke a few months ago and it's been laying on my desk with only fluorescent light. Checked it today and it is right on time.

Yep, another "don't worry/be happy" success story, of which I very much doubt will be different with me. But I simply wished I KNEW it was at full charge as winter closes in, own no bright desk lamps and not buying one just for a watch, and want to depend on a full charge to get me through winter when it sees no light at all during the day under a sleeve, and only a lower power LED bedside lamp, or stove hood light while cooking, it generally not in the high humidity brightly lit bathroom...am sure the cell was fully charged when it went in the box, but no idea how close it was to circa 6mths past it not warning of it going to quit in four days....it could have been near death, or may have been at 99.9% and made two weeks before I received it (actually just deciphered DOM from SN as TEN months before receipt).....all I can do is charge the snot out of it now, somewhere between indicated 28 and 90hrs, and hope it doesn't want to quit until Spring, where meanwhile it may as well be back in the box, for all the effective light it will receive....it'll be fine with seasonal wear, but starting with me this time of year is not a happy place for a watch which lives for/on light.

 

[Shadowrider]

Oh, forgot to mention conflicting data from Citizen....
they state in movement charging manual accessed from site for charging that it gets a guaranteed full charge (from dead to full) in 7hrs outdoors in sun and 14hrs outdoors if overcast....

Then they state in watch manual that it is 12hrs exterior/sunny and 45hrs exterior/cloudy...

AND they state in first manual that charging in a window doubles the cloudy/overcast times...so, I have one source of 28hrs and another of 90hrs to fully charge in a window...

Can you blame me for being unsure of full charge?

Make sure you are reading the part for your movement. My manual covers two different movements and it gave me fits getting it setup, which is a bit fiddly to begin with and made worse by the perpetual calendar.. When I realized the part for my movement stared on page 34, it got a lot better!

 

[mtngunr]

This manual covers only the one watch, so no confusion possible there, while the Citizen website lets you look up charging info by movement, which vastly differs from watch manual....in any case, with a DOM of 10mths prior to receipt, watch running on arrival (no idea if turned on just prior to leaving Citizen USA), my fixation on trying to get in a dead watch full charge seems warranted...personally think all such watches should have a way of determining charge past a "WARNING! Your watch is preparing to die!" indicator...not a meter, just simply some nearly invisible fully charged indicator, like second hand moves fwd in 5sec jumps when fully charged, and resumes normal movement with normal crown reset.

 

[mtngunr]

For any one or two who followed my incessant whining on making sure a 10mth old new watch of possible near empty charge was fully charged for winter under sleeves, outside of a few hours nightly under a low wattage LED bedside lamp...

And the wildly varying amounts of charge time through window glass (28-90hrs) given by two manufacturer sources...

One source flatly stated the low charge available thru a window was due to filtering and coatings, assumedly them using city building glass/Tokyo code glass/whatever.

My windows are plain glass, single pane, unfiltered past dust on exterior or losses from reflection with sun at an angle.

Found that plain glass of normal pane thickness exceeds 90% light transmission dead on, drops to 70% at a 30° angle...

Assuming a worst case only 50% getting through glass, and worst case of only saying light entering was worth a damn only between 10am-2pm on a south facing window, I would be getting 2hrs equiv full outdoor sunlight per day...

Conflicting maker manuals say 7hrs and 12hrs of full outdoor sunlight to fully charge a dead battery (assumedly pointed dead at sun for all that time, which is impossible while wearing)....

my worst case 2hrs equiv. full sunlight per day would be six days max, and I made sure the watch was in the window on sunny days during those times for 8 days and periodically clocked towards sun like a sunflower over the course of the day....this took longer as every day is not sunny, but charge losses negligible on no-sun days, only 2 mins full outdoor sun or 4mins of my fake indoor sun needed to power the watch for a day of operation.

It surely must be fully charged now and I can stop with the nonsense that a full charge indication on the watch would have saved, and can park it under my LED lamp for 4hrs each evening and hopefully have no problems the rest of long sleeve/coat season.

Wish all this scientific sounding determination was more than a SWAG, but it ain't, minus a full charge indicator on the watch.