Jilin Watch Factory
Jilin Watch Factory (吉林手表厂) was founded in 1958 in Jilin City in Jilin Province, as one of the eight original Chinese watch factories founded that year. After a brief early period manufacturing wristwatches, the factory's primary focus shifted to producing pocket watches. In its early years, Jilin also produced a number of clocks and timing devices for military use. In the 1970s, focus shifted to civilian goods, including pocket watches powered by an oversized version of the Chinese Standard Movement, known as the HJ1A. Later in the decade, wrist watch production resumed and regular sized versions of the standard movement were manufactured with the factory code ZJL. The factory's main brand was Meihualu (Sika deer), which was used from the earliest days, but a number of other brands were used for standard movement wristwatches, most notably Hangtian and Jixing. The factory did not fare well during the crisis that faced China's watch industry in the 1980s and 1990s, and it folded in 2000.
History
Early output
Little is known about the earliest output of Jilin Watch Factory, which included wood-cased clocks, a wristwatch movement which was either a clone or close derivative of an unknown Enicar design, and a pocket watch movement which was either a clone or close derivaaive of an unknown Soviet design. The factory also produced a local version of the ST2 movement used in Tianjin Watch Factory's WuYi branded watches. The watches containing these movements were branded Meihualu and featured a logo of a Sika Deer. Only 142 of these watches were produced until, in 1962, the Ministry of Light Industry instructed Jilin to cease trial production of wristwatches and focus instead on pocket watch movement, in response to a perceived deficit of domestic pocket watch production. These early Meihualu watches are therefore extremely rare, although the brand was resurrected in the 1970s for more extensively produced products.
The first pocket watch to have apparently been mass-produced by Jilin was a local version of the 584 pin-lever design developed by Shanghai in 1958. The first five trial movements were manufactured in August 1963, and so the movement was designated 638. In October of the same year, the Ministry of Light Industry approved the design for mass production, and allocated a budget of 6.88 million Yuan to facilitate the production of 638 as well as 100,000 stop watches and 10,000 military instruments.
Military projects
During the 1960s, Jilin was a major supplier of timing devices to the People's Liberation Army. One such project, project 307, was a timing device derived from the 638 pocket watch movement. In the years after China's communist revolution, the People's Republic of China on the mainland and the Republic of China on Taiwain engaged in a propaganda war, and one of the techniques employed by both sides was to drop propaganda leaflets from balloons flown over the other's territory. The project 307 timer was developed for this purpose. Envisaged as a cheap, reliable and disposable device, the 307 has no complex functions and its sole purpose was to close an electric circuit after a preset time had elapsed, triggering the release of the leaflets. After a trial production run of some 73 units, the device was not put into mass production for various reasons. Nevertheless, factory employee Wang Gensheng received a "May 1" Labor Medal in recognition of significant contributions to the development of the 307 timer.
In the 1970s, the factory's focus began to shift away from military work and toward production of wristwatches and pocket watches for civilian use. By 1972, all military projects had ceased except for two exceptions: project 301 was an aviation clock for installation in the cockpits of PLAAF fighters, and project 105 was a heavily waterproofed and shock-protected marine clock for installation onboard PLAN speedboats. Both clocks were originally developed at Shanghai Watch Factory's "608 workshop", which specialised in military and security projects.
Factory codes
- Factory code: ZJL
- Possible factory codes: SJ, SLJ
