HAMILTON FIELD GUIDE

A vintage Hamilton watch can usually be dated and identified by model name from external design features alone. Follow the steps below and then use the SEARCH feature to identify your watch. 

1. CASE SHAPE:  Watches used a defined vocabulary of shapes, and it's arguably the easiest thing to identify in addition to the dial shape without touching anything. 

2. DIAL SHAPE: Combined with the case shape, these are two design elements of a watch that will help to eliminate a large number of non-matching possibilities. Dial shapes use the same vocabulary as case shapes. You can use the case shape definitions to identify your dial shape. 

3. DIAL DESIGN ELEMENTS: These data points can really narrow down the possibilities. What color are the numbers, markers, or dots. Are all the numbers displayed or just 3-6-9-12? Does the watch have a date window? Is the second hand a sub-second or sweep second hand? What is the design of the minute track and sub-second register? A word of warning, it's common to find dials that have been refinished. So a dial that doesn't match may mean a replacement rather than a wrong identification.

4. CASE METAL: Even if you don't have the watch in your physical possession, a photo of the case back will often reveal the case metal. Hamilton used a lot of different combinations so pay attention whether something is stamped 14K Gold Filled or 14K RGP.

5. MOVEMENT TYPE: Most of the time Hamilton made it obvious is something is a manual or automatic wind model. They usually printed "Automatic" or "Self-Winding" on the dials.

With all of these things noted, you should be able to use the SEARCH feature to narrow down the list quite a lot. You'll then need to spend just a few minutes looking at pictures. Pay special attention to the lugs. That can be the difference maker between two similar looking models.