zOwie Omega Discussion Forum

and it's a fact of life with any mechanical gear train that you will find in a watch (or any gear driven equipment). There has to be some slack in a series of gears to allow them to move, without too much rubbing and friction, and as a result setting the minute hand in one direction will leave the gears fully touching in the direction that the hand is about to move, while moving the hand into position from the other direction will leave some slack in the train that has to be taken up before the hand starts moving again. I can never remember whether it's supposed to be clockwise or counterclockwise either, but that's why there's a difference between the two.