Dab or Wipe Motion? Most of the time a light dabbing motion is all you need and will provide you with residue free cleaning, a rolling or kneading motion may also be used. Where as a wiping or rubbing motion gives you a higher chance of the rodico leaving a slight residue behind, especially in the case of using older Rodico. Don’t use Rodico on warm watches, warm parts, or warm tools, as it will turn to a slime consistency from the heat. This includes where you store it while not in use, avoid leaving it in warm areas like directly below a bench light or next to a heated cleaner. Don't depend on Rodico too much. The use of Rodico should a last case scenario. Rodico is great! Except the fact that most watchmakers keep them for years on end and never change/throw them out. If you do use Rodico, make sure it's less than a week old since opening. Call it what you want, magic, a watchmaker’s best friend, watchmaker’s putty, no matter how you put it the little bar of Bergeon Rodico cleaning compound is something a watchmaker should never go without. Although the original green putty was designed to clean small and delicate watch parts, it’s just as commonly used for a variety of other handy reasons while working on watches. Due to the consistency of the putty it gives you precise control over where and what you are cleaning or grabbing. Take a look below at the many ways you can use Rodico cleaning putty and learn expert tips on getting the most use out of a single bar of Bergeon 6033 Rodico.

HP 1000 or HP 1300 - (Fun fact, HP stands for High Pressure) Heavy synthetic oils. Generally used for high pressure/torque and low speed areas. Commonly used for: Barrel arbors, center wheel, and third wheel. Some brands will also use this for the setting system and calendar mechanisms. There are differences between HP 1000 and HP 1300 (such as viscosity etc.) but we’ll go into that another time. Rodico will age in time, discontinue the use of a bar once it starts leaving a residue behind. Some watchmakers swear that a well kept bar of Rodico can stay fresh and last for more than 10 years, while others who use it religiously can easily go through a single bar within a few months time.You always want oil in the cup, not on top of the cup. It should not be anywhere else other then inside the cup where the pivot is. Any oil anywhere outside of the cup will cause oil to spread and or attract unwanted build up. Oil containers and the surroundings of it should always be kept cleaned. Any build up around your oil container will make its way into the oil irregardless of the lid being closed So, my interpretation is that there is really nothing against it other than people getting into bad habits. It’s true, if Rolex or Omega don’t allow it, it’s so that in principle you will take all actions and precautions not to need it in the first place. It is indeed handy for getting stubborn cap jewels out of settings and many things, but should be kept off clean parts and dials, away from oil/jewels, and when used to "clean" already clean parts, use fresh stuff. If you need to handle it with your finger, do it with finger cots. Let's assume for a moment that I uh... know a guy... and he wanted me to ask this. Not me, y`see, nope nope.

It seems from what I hear, rodico is so effective that it has allowed watchmakers to cut corners at various steps. Examples are oiling; if you get a mini drop on the periphery of the jewel, careful rodico can correct it rather than cleaning up the whole jewel and reapply. Also not using the finger cots that someone mentioned here already, doable because at the end you could remove the marks with... rodico! Expired lubricants lose it’s effectiveness and may shorten a service cycle. A good rule of thumb is to minimize any amount of chances that may cause a functional issue. Replacing expired oils is CHEAP in the grand scheme of things. Watchmaking lubricants used to be purely animal and vegetable oil. This is also the reason why older watches may smell like fish when you open it up. Watchmakers used to use sperm oil from sperm whales as a lubricant. It worked really well (considering the technology at the time)except the fact that it would gum up within several months.

When getting oil from the actual bottle- make sure you do not contaminate it. You have no idea how many watchmakers I’ve seen with contaminated bottles that still had 9/10 of the bottle to go. I must admit, I use Tesco supermarket brand "Bluetac" in place or Rodico (but then again, I'm not doing this for a living). Tesco's stuff is an off white colour, and I would say slightly less refined (i.e. cheap). I always wondered about this. Say you have the main plate all the train and bridges together and oiled to perfection on both sides save for one last cup. You dip your oiler into that cup , everything is looking good for the home stretch. But as you are lifting the oiler out of the cup your fingers have the tiniest spasm. Oh no. Under 20x magnification you can just about make out the tiniest smidge of oil on the rim of that cup. Can barely even see it honestly . Well? What do you do? Leave it as is? Rodico that sombich? Soak it up with pegwood? What would be the proper/non corner cutting approach? Dismantle the whole thing put it through the cycles and try again? Really?