Victorinox 24974 Watch Battery Replacement

If you own a Swiss Army Victorinox model 24974, and need to replace the battery, here are easy step by step instructions on how to open it, remove the battery, and insert a new battery.

watch
Swiss Army Victorinox 24974
watch
Swiss Army Victorinox 24974

First I purchased a watch battery replacement tool kit from Amazon. The kit I purchased was the Paxcoo Watch Battery Replacement Tool Kit for Watch Back Remover Opener and Watch Repair. It only cost around $12 and had all the tools I needed to do the battery replacement. The primary tool being the blue watch battery cover opener.

Next order a replacement battery. The battery you will need is a 371 Watch Battery. I bought my replacement battery on Amazon.

watch battery
371 replacement battery

To replace the battery I placed the watch face down on a piece of non-skid grip liner that I had. It is soft and won’t scratch the face, and it won’t slip around on the table. Size the battery cover opener to fit into the notches on the back of the watch. Spin the cover to open it. The battery to replace is easy to find. Take not of which way the battery is facing, you will need to place the replacement battery in the same direction.

open watch
watch cover open

Remove the old battery and place the new battery inside. At this point I carefully turned the watch over to make sure it was now ticking. I didn’t want to close it all up if the watch wasn’t working. Now follow the steps in reverse and carefully place the cover back on and spin it closed. All done.

watch back
Watch back

I hope someone found this helpful. I felt the need to replace my own watch batteries because it was easy to do, not very expensive, and I was tired of paying a lot of money to go to a jeweler or a watch / jewelry repair store in the mall, where the employee was not very careful with my watches, and scrapped up the backs and faces of them.

Collings Foundation WW2 and Hanger

In October 2015, my friend Mark and I went to Stow Massachusetts on a sunny Saturday to watch the Collings Foundation World War 2 re-enactment and walk the grounds and hanger to view all the neat things on site. There are pictures of the WW2 re-enactment on my flickr page, I wanted to post some of the other pictures of the fantastic car collection in the hanger on this site. There is a large aircraft hanger with multiple levels that houses some airplanes, tanks, heavy vehicles, and race cars.

Collings Foundation Hanger
Collings Foundation Hanger
View into the hanger from the front.
Prime Mover
Prime Mover
SdKfz 8 12 Ton Prime Mover, Germany

Here are some of the really neat cars that were stored on the upper levels of the hanger.

MkIII Ford
MkIII Ford
Riley & Scott Mk III / Ford, 1996. Riley & Scpott’s legacy goes back to the Ford GT MkIV Coyote, so when it came time to produce a new prototype for international sports car racing they were up to the challenge. R&S MkIII’s went on to forge a legacy of winning that is only equaled by the legendary Prosche 962. The Dyson team commissioned R&S to produce 001 in 1994 with a Ford powerplant. The chassis proceeded to win over ten races for the Dyson team including the 1997 Rolex 24 hours of Daytona and runner up in the 12 hours of Sebring and the Prototype championship. The car remained a front runner until 2001 when it retired after leading Daytona. It is believed that 001 led more laps at Daytona than any other car in history. Drivers have included: James Weaver, Andy Wallace, Elliot Forbes-Robinson, Rob Dyson, Hurley Haywood, and Derrick Bell.
Andretti Car
Andretti Car
Lola / Ford XB Indy Car 1995. The 1995 Lola Ford was produced for the Championship winning Newman-Haas team for the 1995 season with Michael Andretti. Some of racing’s greatest names have been associated with this car, Paul Newman and Carl Haas as owners and Michael Andretti as the driver. Michael holds more Indycar wins than any other driver in history. At the Toronto Grand Prix he notched up yet another victory in this particular car. Micahel finished 3rd in the Championship in the last season that included the Indy 500 in which he was leading when he dropped out due to a mechanical failure.
Gurney Eagle
Gurney Eagle
Gurney Eagle Turbo Offy 1972. One of America’s most famous drivers, Dan Gurney, winner of the 24-Hours of Le Mans and the only American to win a Grand Prix in a car of his own construction took that experience and started Eagle. The Gurney Eagle Indy Car ranks amongst the most successful in Brickyard history. This particular car was sold to the famous Leader Cards Racing Team of A.J. Watson. The car raced at Indianapolis multiple times and in 1980 became the last ever Offenhauser powerd car qualified for the 500-mile race, heralding the end of an era. Powered by a 168 cu. Inch turbocharged Offenhauser engine producing in excess of 800 horsepower.
Andretti Mears Penske
Andretti Mears Penske
Penske PC-9 Indy Car 1980. Built by Penske in Poole, England for Mario Andretti who teamed with Rick Mears and Al Unser when his Formula 1 schedule would permit. This was the second season that Mario Andretti a F-1 world champion, Indy 500 winner, Indycar Champion, NASCAR winner, and winner in every racing category that had wheels teamed with the Penske team, which has won more Indy 500’s than any other team. Indy 500: Mario qualified 2nd fot the great race but failed to finish when his Cosworth DFX failed. Michigan 500 – Mario captured the pole and won the other 500 mile race. Copa 125 Rick Mears, a four time Indy 500 winner, captures a win at CART’s first ever international race. This chassis is the only Indycar in history to have race wins with both Mario Andretti and Rick Mears, arguably Indy’s most legendary drivers.

More of the cars in the museum.

Collings Cars
Collings Cars
Collings Cars
Collings Cars
Collings Cars
Collings Cars
Collings Cars
Collings Cars
Collings Vehicles
Collings Vehicles
Collings BMW R75
Collings BMW R75

Over all a pretty neat place to visit.

Highland Park

This year the Lilac Festival seemed to come before the lilacs peaked, and was a little rainy, but that’s good for me, as I visited the park a full week after the closing day, and the flowers and lilacs were just past peak bloom. It was pretty nice, as everything seemed to be blooming on Saturday June 24th this year. Lilacs, Azaleas, Peonies, Dogwoods, and even a few Magnolias were still blooming. About all that wasn’t blooming was the lilies, and ours bloomed a day or two later at home. I walked around the park for a few hours and spotted a few of my favorite lilacs that made it through another year, including the yellowish primrose. It was a nice day, the park is really nice and well thought out. The giant sycamore trees that surround the reservoir are really huge, and way cool. Here’s a few photos.

Newer Pergola Area
Newer Pergola Area
Magnolia
Magnolia
Highland Infrared
Highland Infrared
Deep Purple
Deep Purple
Highland Reservoir
Highland Reservoir
Sycamore Trees
Sycamore Trees

Beautiful Spring

Spring turned out really well here in Rochester. It was a little cool, but mostly sunny. I think this was perfect lilac season, as our lilacs started blooming around the 16th of June, and they are still blooming 2 weeks later. We got a lot of really nice blooms this year, and our one lilac (the primrose) that got hit with the pesticide last year is growing bigger than ever. Looks like a full recovery. Our cherry trees and dogwood we planted last summer survived the winter and are doing great. Everything is blooming and still looks nice. Our blueberry plants made it through the winter too, and this year we planted some pepper plants and a watermelon too. Here’s a few photos.

Sensation Lilac
Sensation Lilac

Cherokee Chief Dogwood
Cherokee Chief Dogwood

Katherine Havemeyer lavender pink
Katherine Havemeyer lavender pink

Primrose Growing
Primrose Growing

Violet Glory
Violet Glory

Beauty of Moscow
Beauty of Moscow

More Creatures!

We’ve been catching more and more creatures on our critter cam this spring. This time we think we saw a skunk, and one of the pictures may have a fox visiting our bird bath for water. One night a deer showed up and “trimmed” Tracy’s bonsai plants! Still exciting, still a lot of cats around, and some bunnies as well.

Pretty sure this is a skunk
Pretty sure this is a skunk
Night Cat
Night Cat
Possible Fox, or Creature?
Possible Fox, or Creature?
Bunny
Bunny
Bonsai Trimming
Bonsai Trimming
Trimmed Bonsai
Trimmed Bonsai

2014 Frozen Four

Tracy and I traveled to Philadelphia this year for the Frozen Four College Hockey Tournament, the hockey version of the more well known basketball final four. This year Union, Boston College, Minnesota, and North Dakota faced off for the title. BC did not bring their A game, and was defeated by Union in the first game. Though the score was 5-4, it really wasn’t that close of a game. The next game was a thriller, with Minnesota scoring the game winning goal with less than a second left. The final game was on Saturday night, and Union beat Minnesota and a high scoring affair 7-4. It was a lot of fun going to the games, and so much easier since we didn’t need to get a hotel and could stay with family. Craig and I dressed up as hockey refs and got to dance around and act like idiots on the jumbo-tron several times. On Friday we went to Winterthur gardens to look at all the blooming flowers and plants. It was a fun trip.

BC and Union
BC and Union

BC Loses to Union
BC Loses to Union

Minnesota and the Sioux
Minnesota and the Sioux

Minnesota and the Sioux
Minnesota and the Sioux

Flowers at Winterthur
Flowers at Winterthur

Two idiot Refs
Two idiot Refs

Red Sox Opening Day

This year Tracy and I won the Red Sox opening day lottery giving us the opportunity to purchase opening day tickets. We were able to get second row seats in right field. So off to Boston we went for a quick 2 day trip to the game. It was really cool to be at opening day after the Red Sox won the World Series. We got to see the opening ceremony, ring presentation, banner raising, and they had the giant pennants covering the Green Monster. We got to boo Ryan Braun, and the weather wasn’t that bad either. In the 40’s but the rain held off. It definitely got cooler in the final innings. Here’s a few photos from the day.

Red Sox Opening Day Banner
Red Sox Opening Day Banner
Boston Sports Trophies
Boston Sports Trophies
USA Flag, Fenway
USA Flag, Fenway
Welcome to Opening Day
Welcome to Opening Day

Cat Cam

Since it is still the middle of winter in the North East, and there isn’t much to do outside, and all I’ve been up to is taking photos of hockey games, today I bring you more offerings from the critter camera. These are some of our best shots yet I’d say, as now we know for sure there are plenty of outdoor cats prowling the area.

deer
More Deer
Cat outdoors
A Tiger Cat
Outdoor cats
Two Cats!
deer
Bridbath deer
Outdoor cat
Fancy Cat
outdoor rabbit
Bunny Rabbit

Ah the excitement, this game camera has paid for itself!

Critter Cam

For Christmas this year I was able to pick up 2 refurbished “Game Cameras” at a very reasonable price. I gave one to my Mom and Dad and one to Tracy for Christmas. Cue the excitement as we wait and see what we can capture with the cameras. We stuck our camera outside at the beginning of February and aimed it at our bird feeders and birdbath water. We caught deer photos the second night the camera was out there. The night mode is pretty good. So far, the deer seem really interested in it, as we have captured a few pictures that appear to be the deer looking right at it or sniffing it. One photo even has one of the cat’s two eyes watching out the sliding glass door. Should provide fun for months to come. Here’s a few photos.

deer photo
Deer Photo
deer photo
Deer camera
deer cat
Monkey Eyes
deer cam
Backyard Deer