This depends on whether you're planning to wear it daily or not. If you do, it should look after itself pretty much but if it's only worn on and off, it will need some winding. I like to give mine a few turns of manual wind first to get it ticking and then let the rotor wind itself. Some automatics need a deliberate "jiggle" to get them ticking again after manual winding if they have been allowed to run down, but in my experience the Cal 11/12 and the 15 are normally happy to start up from scratch. It could be a sign that the movement needs a service if they don't start easily.

: When the watch is wound and ticking the two registers do not move,
: ie...what is the left register for and what is the right
: register for AND SHOULD THEY BE MOVING!!

I think this can be quite a surprise for new owners - there is no perpetual seconds register on the Cal 11/12, so in normal operation only the main timekeeping hands will move. Dan described this really well as "Sometimes the cal.11/12s can seem sleepy until you activate the chrono mechanism".

The two registers are for various capacities of the chronograph function, so will only move when the stopwatch is in operation. The right-hand register records elapsed minutes up to 30 minutes. The left-hand one records elapsed hours up to 12 hours.

"Only 30 minutes?", you might think. "Not 60?". That's where the divisions on the hour register come into play. When you look at the hour register, each hour is marked with a bold line as well as the numeral (always all hours 1-12 on the Silverstones and its contemporaries; early auto Carreras and Autavias just have 3-6-9-12; the Monaco makes up its own rules!). In between the bold lines that denote the hour is a fainter line - this denotes which half of the hour is being shown on the minutes register.

If the left hand register is indicating a bold line, then it is the first 30 minutes of that hour that is being shown on the right register e.g. left register shows 1, right register shows 20 means an hour and 20 minutes have elapsed.

If, however, the chrono needle on the left hand register is pointing to the faint line after the 1 hour position, then effectively you need to add 30 minutes to whatever is showing on the right register. In the above example, with the right register in the same position but the left at the fainter line after 1, 1 hour and 50 minutes would have elapsed.

I probably made that explanation more difficult than it needed to be, but I hope it's clear - because the right register only has a 30 minute capacity, the left register shows half-hours as well as whole hours.

: Also is there a "quick date" spot on the crown when you
: pull it out OR do you have to go all the way around until the
: desired date comes.

Unfortunately, the Cal 11/12 doesn't have the quick date setting mechanism we're familiar with from modern watches. You can turn the time back and forward between 10-10:30 and 12 to hack the date, but vintage watches don't always appreciate the hands being turned backwards - not so much of a problem for our cal 11/12s as it is with movements with perpetual seconds where the mechanism for advancing seconds isn't always interrupted by pulling out the crown. As Jeff has pointed out in the past, we have so many ways of telling the date nowadays (mobile phones, Blackberries, laptops etc etc) that we often don't need our watches to be showing the correct date - some still always like to have it correct though, so it comes down to personal preference.

: I really appreciate your help and expertise, as usual!!!

You're welcome - enjoy the Silverstone! And feel free to ask questions directly if you like, we promise not to bite!