The Spring drive is majestic, and generally wonderful. Get one if you can, they make smashing dress watches. The tool watch side is a bit lacking for my taste (either too thick, or have massive pushers for the chronograph.)
There are watches you can buy for less than $300 that are controlled by a tuning fork. A no fooling humming tuning fork. Not only that, they are pretty accurate and easy to look after even by modern standards. They have wheels that have teeth that are 0.037mm apart. Your hair is 0.060mm wide.
Then there are battery powered watches with moving balances. Then there are both styles with quartz regulators as well.
One of the more fascinating aspects of these is how smooth the second hand movement is.
Second hands on Quartz jump once / second. This is to lengthen the battery life.
On mechanical watches, they are smoother than Quartz since the escapement releases power multiple times / sec. But still ever so slightly jumpy since power is still released in discrete increments.
Spring Drive is outta this world smooth…it can do this since battery life is not an issue since it’s mechanically generated power that can be rewound…for practical purposes, it is releasing power continuously, see for yourself here:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=jcHA5rBQxQc
It's so funny how the smoothness of the second hand has changed in desirability over time.
It started with mechanical watches that moved relatively smoothly at 3-6 beats per second. Then Quartz came along, and it became fashionable for seconds to move on the second (the "quartz crisis"). Then mechanical watches became fashionable again as quartz watches became commodities during the "Mechanical Renaissance", and it's now a sign of luxury for a "smooth sweeping" second hand again.
And then you have these modern outliers, like the F.P. Journe Tourbillon Souverain, which feature a "remontoire" that stores up energy before releasing it on the second for increased accuracy. So you can pay $250K for a watch that moves like a $10 quartz :)
Actually, at the very high end of luxury watchmaking they prefer lower beat movements as it increases the service interval, exotic escapements like the remontoir are primarily for exhibition purposes/bragging rights.
If you’re on a budget and want a deadbeat seconds hand, Jaeger LeCoultre has a deadbeat seconds watch, the Geophysic True Second, which is ‘only’ around $15k :) I believe it has been discontinued and is only available on the secondary market.
I had an electromechanical Timex with a dead beat seconds complication. Which means it was a battery powered watch with a balance that was supposed to be ticking 4 times / second and an extra complication added (the dead beat seconds) to make it tick once per second.
If you'd put your ear to it you could hear it tick 3 times in the background and then a loud tock.
I used to be fascinated with that, until I saw a wall clock that had a smooth second hand movement. It was a cheap $10 clock, because it's not an issue to put a larger battery into a wall clock.
Maybe I already got my kick out of seeing a smooth second hand movement and no longer feel the need to look at it on my wrist. Or perhaps my fascination was based on some gatekeeping, and seeing a cheap item with a similar feature made it disappear. Likely both.
I guess people who genuinely admire the engineering effort would be left unaffected.
I wear a mechanical because the loud tick of a full size 1Hz second handdrives me bonkers. Although I can handle the small seconds in a quartz chronograph.
While most quartz watches use cheaper stepping motors, there are also quartz watches which use synchronous motors, so the hands have a perfectly uniform and noiseless rotation movement.
I had some big wall clocks of this kind, and my father had such wrist watches.
The energy consumption of synchronous motors is lower, because they only have to overcome the friction forces, without having to also accelerate the mass of the hands.
Yeah, not that I perceive it to be an assumption that is entirely illogical, but why is smooth movement supposed to consume more power? I can understand that jumping less often conserves power but the power hierarchy should be more ticks > less ticks > no ticks, if we ignore potential increased frictions at lower angular velocity as well as challenges of resisting disturbances.
> On mechanical watches, they are smoother than Quartz since the escapement releases power multiple times / sec. But still ever so slightly jumpy since power is still released in discrete increments.
Yup, and the higher the beat rate, the "smoother" it looks. Grand Seiko Hi-Beats and Zenith El Primeros come to mind. There's a good Hodinkee article describing the tradeoffs of different beat rates [1].
Seiko has a 4Hz series of inexpensive quartz movements (VH31) that are at least as smooth as the entry level Seiko NH35. Bulova has a significantly smoother 15Hz quartz movement but you’re going to spend $600 getting it in a watch.
> Autonomy isn’t the only thing that matters when comparing mechanical to quartz.
says the caption beneath a photograph of a „A. Lange & Söhne with a 31-day power reserve“
So there’s the notion that —-in case your air plaine crashes and you land on a desert island—- a quartz watch‘s battery will drain in 5 years and you’re left without a watch, but the thing is: A mechanical watch needs to be serviced every five years (taken apart, lubricated).
But I agree: A mechanical watch is infinitely more appealing than a quartz. Considering how minuscule the parts are, what a Meisterleistung it is to produce something that works for decades. I also find the idea very appealing to have objects that can outlive their owners: Furniture, writing instruments, mechanical watches.
For this “desert island” use case, a solar powered quartz watch seems like it would work the longest, of COTS options today (although a mechanical watch might be fine without servicing).
Of course, my favorite watch in this case would be something like the Breitling Emergency (https://www.breitling.com/us-en/emergency/) which could call for rescue. Looking forward to a satellite connectivity version in the future — iPhones are able to do this now, so something like the Apple Watch Ultra 2 may be able to.
I’ve got a 20 year old G-shock with solar that’s never been serviced that’s been worn for thousands of miles of offshore sailing. It gets the time every day at 3am from some 60kHZ radio signal in Colorado and as long as I wear it a few times a year all day in the sun, it never dies. Its time has been within ~500ms of GPS time continuously since 2004. I leave it on a small metal rack near a south facing window with the antenna touching the rack for increased reception of the nightly time calibration, and a bit of solar in the morning.
One day it will die, or some of the rubber on it will rip and I will replace it with the same model from Casio. It’s still only ~$100 and looks identical just with a new battery and more modern antenna/electronics.
Hoping for an EPIRB on my wrist or maybe even just a 162 MHz emergency AIS transmitter that fits on the wrist sometime in the next 5 years.
There exist specialized quartz watches with battery lifes in the 15 years range - I am sure if there was any real demand it would be possible to build a digital watch that can survive a century without any service. While I appreciate the craft, let us not pretend the demand for mechanical watches in the modern day is nothing but a luxury vanity driven buy wealthy people with way too much money to spare.
> but the thing is: A mechanical watch needs to be serviced every five years (taken apart, lubricated).
A mechanical watch should be serviced about every five years. That doesn’t mean they magically stop working if you don’t. I have an inherited Omega from the 60s that hasn’t been serviced in decades and it still runs and keeps good time.
Yes, but as a counterpoint, I have a vintage Seiko of my father which missed one too many servicings and now has a broken date wheel (but otherwise works perfectly).
If I could find someone to fix it, I'd wear it special occasions (my day-to-day is a Solar Seiko) often enough to keep it wound and _would_ get it serviced every 5 years.
Yep. I recently serviced a Tissot from the late 1930s – it was running fine, it was just a reasonable thing to do after all these years to prolong its lifespan. You wouldn't be able to tell that it needs a service without looking at timegrapher readings.
> So there’s the notion that —-in case your air plaine crashes and you land on a desert island—- a quartz watch‘s battery will drain in 5 years and you’re left without a watch, but the thing is: A mechanical watch needs to be serviced every five years (taken apart, lubricated).
Except if you get a watch with Citizen's Eco-Drive, which is where the power comes from ambient light and not a battery:
I own a Casio solar (brand name "Tough Solar") watch, which is generally the same technology IIUC. I believe they indeed have long life, but there is actually still something of a "battery" inside (specifically, I think a kind of a capacitor, though not 100% sure), which still has some life expectancy and a number of cycles it can survive. Not to mention that even this kind of a watch has a number of potential other failure modes as well... just recently I stumbled and dropped it, and the back-plate sprung away. Surprisingly, even a watchmaker took a while to put it back in, and was similarly mildly amused that what looked like a trivial job proved to not be exactly so. That said, it was more of a suit watch, totally not a G-Shock.
Can confirm. I received an Eco-Drive as a gift from my father about 12 years ago, and the watch has never died (although I've had to replace a snapped band several times)
If I land on a desert island the very last thing I need is a watch. A watch is there to be able to synchronize with outside events, and those are in short supply on a desert island. If there are no other people that you need to meet, trains whose time tables matter or ships that need conning you don't need a watch. I'd trade you my watch for a book of matches or some canned food.
> If I land on a desert island the very last thing I need is a watch. A watch is there to be able to synchronize with outside events, and those are in short supply on a desert island. If there are no other people that you need to meet, trains whose time tables matter or ships that need conning you don't need a watch.
A watch lets you calculate longitude, which could be very valuable indeed.
There's a reason why accurate time keeping was one of the holy grails during the age of sail.
> A watch is there to be able to synchronize with outside events
And to better predict rising tides (the ideal time for fishing), to plan your day and your trips better, and to boil eggs exactly the way you like them.
It's a luxury item compared to a knife, but it has its uses.
If we’re being really realistic, I don’t think there are any desert islands in existence today that are both habitable and wouldn’t be visiting is a five years time span.
I honestly find mechanical watches quite ugly, irrespective of cost, brand, or notoriety.
To my eyes there's something inescapably crude about mechanical design with moving metal parts. It's still present when there are tiny components with even tinier tolerances.
I have a Seiko watch with capacitor charged by movement that worked for 18 years and it was't finished completely but it depleted in one or two days. It's a pity they stopped with this technique.
Well, you can navigate with the help of the sun. And keep sane having some sort of structure (when to wake up, when to go to bed, when to eat), monitor tidal changes. There is lots of value in knowing the time, even on a desert island.
as an approximate compass, if it has an hour hand (bisect the angle between the hour hand and noon, that's north or south, depending on your latitude, unless you're in the tropics where this doesn't work)
as a heliograph to flash signals to passing ships
if there's a date magnifier, you can use it to light fires
the engraving on the back may help identify your sun-bleached bones ("So, this poor devil was named WATER RESISTANT")
Generally I do wear it every day. I bought it because, after many many years of finding all mechanical watches ugly and tacky, I found one specific model that I find to be absolutely gorgeous and I adore the way it looks; a $300 Apple Watch keeps better time and has more functionality. A $20 Casio has equivalent functionality and way, way better timekeeping. It's jewelry and I wear it daily just as I wear an EDT and deodorant and clean clothes. I actually subscribe to the jwz theory of "if you need you to know what time it is that often, your life has gone dangerously wrong", and I have a radar filed because there are no Apple Watch faces without a time display.
It also has the added benefit whilst traveling of signaling to customer service staff (I fly commercial and not always in first) that I am a revenue opportunity (ie don't ignore me), as I am quite utilitarian and my 'fits are almost always sub-$200 (not counting shoes and scarf). My daily driver tshirt is plain black and costs $25, for example, and I loathe brands and visible labels. It's not immediately obvious to retail staff that it's profitable to provide me with good service.
Expensive watches aren't about timekeeping. They are jewelry and status signifiers.
Also, my daily driver watch is under $10k; theft no more enters my mind about it than it does for carrying my laptop; a maxxed out Macbook Pro ($6k) is approximately the same value as my watch and I never think about whether or not I should bring my laptop somewhere.
I also collect sunglasses and luggage; I'm not much of a clothes horse but I do adore stylish accessories.
Edit: I have friends who are "expensive watch guys" and one such new money friend, despite growing up poor, now personally grosses low double digit millions of USD annually. He recently told a story to our group about being in a 10 person business meeting where his $40k Rolex was the cheapest watch anyone had on, as a way of communicating how impressed he was and the gravitas of how many corporate heavy hitters were involved in his deal. Perhaps this sheds some light on their purpose and utility. (My $7k stainless steel daily driver doesn't even rank among these sorts of guys.)
Everyone could be saved a lot of trouble in the above scenario if it were socially acceptable to simply wear a yellow sticky note stating your annual income on your forehead.
I have to use 2 Apple Watch as they does not have enough battery to keep going for long. I just switch it for charge whenever I have time. I suspect all these hybrid watch is a compromise of energy.
I've tried googling this JWZ theory but can't find anything. I suspect I would like to read whatever he embedded this in though. Could you give a citation or hint on where to find it?
I collection (mechanical) watches I have 30-40, half are cheap as chips, usually old Soviet pieces, the other half are Swiss.
The most expensive watch I own is about €10k. Honestly I don't think of the value on the days I wear it - I just look at it and smile.
It used to be that I had about seven watches and I had one for each "activity". So I had a sauna-watch, a swimming watch, a photography watch. Later I got too many, so I switched into different styles - a pilot watch, a diver watch, a jump-hand watch, etc, etc.
I usually change watch every day, but sometimes I might wear the same one for 3-5 days. The only time I consciously think about it is when traveling for holidays - I think "Is this the watch I want to go through security with, and dive into a lake?" or "Am I gonna wear a suit, or not?"
Expensive watches are not comparable to cheap watches in my view. Just like a bottle of 50 year old whisky cannot be compared to a €10 cider - they are different things, with different audiences.
(Also: Get insurance. That takes away almost all worry :)
I have a watch that would be considered expensive by most. It’s not really about telling the time - I simply appreciate the complexity and beauty of handcrafted mechanical watches.
People spend years learning how to build them. It takes a long time to assemble one. They’re precisely made with small parts made of precious metals which are themselves expensive.
With companies like A Lange & Sohne, each watchmaker can only make about 6 watches per year. At a pace like that you’re not really paying for the watch, you’re paying for their labor and expertise. You’re paying to preserve the craft. You can’t make 6 of something in a year and sell it for $100 if it’s how you make a living.
I currently don't own a >=5k but I have previously, my currently daily is 3.5k (GBP).
> Do you wear it every day?
> Does it impact my plans?
I do wear it almost daily but it does vary, if I'm doing anything manual (gardening, working on my bike, painting/decorating) then I'll either not wear it or take it off during those activities where I'm likely bound to bash my wrist against something.
I'll often swap it out for one of my other cheaper ones sometimes.
> Why?
I've liked watches for God knows how long and I was fortunate to work at a luxury watch shop where I got some great discounts.
I've always said my collection is my funeral fund for once I go!
> Do I consider myself "well off"?
Personally, no. I just make very bad financial decisions.
In Switzerland I don't think there is any such thought. I see crazy expensive time pieces on people's wrists and no one give as hoot other than watch enthusiasts.
I don't currently own a watch over 5k but if I where to purchase such a piece it would be for the craftsmanship and the beauty of the mechanics. However you would never find me wearing a Rolex which is a mass produced status symbol IMO.
It's really no different than people who pay more than they need to for a car or a home.
It's some combination of it being a status symbol and an "I can afford it and it's fun" kind of a deal.
There is a variety of attitudes, as with fancy cars, McMansions, or other "premium" goods. Some people wax their car every week, some people let it rust.
Watch theft isn't particularly common. I have a nice watch, I wear it daily, and I don't think about it much.
when I first could afford to but before I had responsibilities, I bought a breguet classique off secondary market, which is already understated, and I wear it with an even more understated leather band. I consciously chose to wear it as a daily cary, which means that on more than one occasion I wore it through ghettos on the way to raves, including through one attempted and failed robbery. By now it's well worn in, and I prefer it to be a subtle signal: those who don't care don't notice, so it's not ostentatious, those who pay attention but don't know will figure it out through closer observation, and those who know, don't need to ask any questions. I do occasionally consciously take them off so as not to be flashing, when that would be particularly crass or foolhardy.
I've lost many watches in my life, but this one has trained me in the discipline of care and attentiveness towards my possessions, which extends to all things and not just the watch.
There was no particularly good reason for me to buy it though, except for the watch maker name's frequent mention in the 19th century literature, including a famous line from Pushkin's Onegin, "he strolls down boulevards, until a sleepless Breguet, calls out time for supper". now it's likely that Onegin specifically didn't wear an actual breguet, because that was a generic name for a chiming timepiece, but the imagery stuck. I grew up on 19th century literature, byronic heroes, this line is explicit reference to flaneur culture, a self-conscious decadent movement, associated with aimless strolling down boulevards dressed in provocative clothing, breguet fits here, and that's the joke of the line: at a time when a timepiece would be associated with a serious vocation, politics or military, it is being used for the most frivolous task of letting one man know when it's time to eat. I reflect on this point occasionally, when I look at my watch.
I wear them every day, but take them off if I'm going to high crime cities. The thing is I've been collecting watches for over a decade. My parents are into it, and so is my younger brother. I think it's very rare to share a common interest that won't bore anyone at the dinner table. Now onto the horological aspects - they're like the iPhone / app store back in the day. Keeping track of leap years and all in a 36mm package (think Patek 3940s). Various complications to address various "limitations" of mechanical time telling like the remontoire, co-axial escapements or solid block case constructions for better waterproofness. It's not too different than some of us on HN who fall in love with old Apple IIs, NES or Sega Genesis :)
I have an expensive omega. I don't normally need to worry about it, because its not a famous watch, its not one that most people would recognise.
If I had a massive rolex/richard mile or some other painfully obvious watch, then yes, I would be much more reticent.
I got it because its a pioneer watch: https://www.omegamegaquartz.com/ it was the first watch that was stonkingly accurate. There are some citizens and seikos that are probably now more accurate (some of the seikos look damn good too.) But none of them look like this massive lump of 70s engineering.
If you bought a Submariner in 2013, you could sell it today for more than you paid. From some perspectives, that Rolex is less expensive than a similar Timex or Casio.
Hybrid watches are pretty appealing, i can imagine they unlock a market of people that just can’t get past mechanical watches are a bit crap at their primary function.
High end watches are somewhat appealing - the craftsmanship & precision engineering appeal (although today even most high end stuff is machine assembled i think?). Still there’s that huge sting in the tail… they’re just not great timepieces[1].
Your (network connected) phone is going to be more accurate. I can’t help feel like an absolute plum if i were to part with 5k+ for a watch with less accuracy than an £8 Casio.
The article talks about spring drive and that i can get behind, the constant smooth movement is mesmerising, the accuracy is entirely respectable and it charges itself just by wearing so you still get the benefits of an automatic. Then, depending on the model you choose, you get a hand-finished casing that uses a polishing technique that takes a craftsman years to qualify in. To top it all off, these GS spring drives are some of the cheapest “high horology” options out there. I’m sold…
[1] one exception, i’ll never be able to own one, but the H. Moser & Cie “Swiss Alp Watch” which i think i like mostly for the complete absurdity of everything about it
As Teddy Baldassare puts it "Mechanical Watches are expensive toys". And as an owner of a couple of mechanical watches which I use daily, I'm pretty aware of it.
However, wearing a mechanical watch makes me happy. It's a fascinating thing to keep time completely mechanically, and creates a nice counterbalance in my life filled with electronics.
Can’t say anything about mechanical watches, but I’ll disagree with this: in my experience, fountain pens aren’t just toys. I was given a fountain pen a few years ago, and I immediately found it made my hand hurt less when writing, because I didn’t need to press nearly as hard. Since then I’ve found a few models of gel pens which are similar in this regard, but when it comes to handwriting, I still find fountain pens to be by far the most comfortable for me.
Seiko used to have a series of watches called Kinetic, where an oscillating weight charged a capacitor or battery. Weird that it's not mentioned in the article, as it seems to be just what's under discussion.
The issue is essentially solved for quartz, even Casio's electro-mechanic models can be powered by ambient light.
The article is about hybrid electronic and mechanical timekeeping though, not energy source.
While it has an analog display and a mechanical power source, the Kinetic's timekeeping is purely quartz. The Spring Drive has mechanical timekeeping which is automatically regulated by quartz.
I've recently become enamoured with the Seiko Spring Drive. I'm currently dreaming up (probably unrealistic) plans to try and DIY a Spring Drive type mechanism. I doubt I'd be able to actually make it fit in a real watch, but the goal is to have it at least working on a desk.
More or less the plan is to rip out the balance wheel/escape wheel and pallet fork from an existing movement and try and rig up a permanent magnet on a wheel, then a small electro magnet connected to something like an Arduino and see if I can even get something like that to regulate the speed of the watch.
If being exact to the extreme is your thing, you may look into either high-frequency quartz (these are exact to within seconds a year), or any bluetooth-adjusted Casio (these will quietly sync with your phone several times a day, and your phone is synced to an atomic clock).
Readit News
However If you like "funky" movements, then I urge you all to check out this website here: https://electric-watches.co.uk/movement-types/ (look at the drop down under movement types)
There are watches you can buy for less than $300 that are controlled by a tuning fork. A no fooling humming tuning fork. Not only that, they are pretty accurate and easy to look after even by modern standards. They have wheels that have teeth that are 0.037mm apart. Your hair is 0.060mm wide.
Then there are battery powered watches with moving balances. Then there are both styles with quartz regulators as well.
Now if you want something a bit more modern, and less electric, there are silicon balances https://frederiqueconstant.com/monolithic/ which are pretty wild.
and finally plugging my own stuff: https://www.secretbatcave.co.uk/projects/electromechanical-c... Which is a tuning fork controlled table clock using only discreet 7400 logic(more or less )
Second hands on Quartz jump once / second. This is to lengthen the battery life.
On mechanical watches, they are smoother than Quartz since the escapement releases power multiple times / sec. But still ever so slightly jumpy since power is still released in discrete increments.
Spring Drive is outta this world smooth…it can do this since battery life is not an issue since it’s mechanically generated power that can be rewound…for practical purposes, it is releasing power continuously, see for yourself here: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=jcHA5rBQxQc
It started with mechanical watches that moved relatively smoothly at 3-6 beats per second. Then Quartz came along, and it became fashionable for seconds to move on the second (the "quartz crisis"). Then mechanical watches became fashionable again as quartz watches became commodities during the "Mechanical Renaissance", and it's now a sign of luxury for a "smooth sweeping" second hand again.
And then you have these modern outliers, like the F.P. Journe Tourbillon Souverain, which feature a "remontoire" that stores up energy before releasing it on the second for increased accuracy. So you can pay $250K for a watch that moves like a $10 quartz :)
Quartz jumping seconds was a novelty back in the day. No one now views it that way, being interested in it was a fad.
Spring Drive now is not a fad, but IMO a sustained niche for enthusiasts. It’s been around a while and has stood the test of time (pun intended!)
The F. P. Journe is high end mechanical art/creativity. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
https://www.ablogtowatch.com/one-watch-quarantine-pandemic-j...
If you'd put your ear to it you could hear it tick 3 times in the background and then a loud tock.
Maybe I already got my kick out of seeing a smooth second hand movement and no longer feel the need to look at it on my wrist. Or perhaps my fascination was based on some gatekeeping, and seeing a cheap item with a similar feature made it disappear. Likely both.
I guess people who genuinely admire the engineering effort would be left unaffected.
Deleted Comment
I had some big wall clocks of this kind, and my father had such wrist watches.
The energy consumption of synchronous motors is lower, because they only have to overcome the friction forces, without having to also accelerate the mass of the hands.
A quartz wristwatch with a smooth seconds hand? How long does the battery last?
Some quartz movements tick more. Grand Seiko 9F has a multi-step tick that is so fast it’s mostly imperceptible. Bulova Accutron too.
Yup, and the higher the beat rate, the "smoother" it looks. Grand Seiko Hi-Beats and Zenith El Primeros come to mind. There's a good Hodinkee article describing the tradeoffs of different beat rates [1].
[1] - https://www.hodinkee.com/articles/watchs-frequency-hz-vph-me...
GS movements really are massively better than others in the 5-10k price range
says the caption beneath a photograph of a „A. Lange & Söhne with a 31-day power reserve“
So there’s the notion that —-in case your air plaine crashes and you land on a desert island—- a quartz watch‘s battery will drain in 5 years and you’re left without a watch, but the thing is: A mechanical watch needs to be serviced every five years (taken apart, lubricated).
But I agree: A mechanical watch is infinitely more appealing than a quartz. Considering how minuscule the parts are, what a Meisterleistung it is to produce something that works for decades. I also find the idea very appealing to have objects that can outlive their owners: Furniture, writing instruments, mechanical watches.
Of course, my favorite watch in this case would be something like the Breitling Emergency (https://www.breitling.com/us-en/emergency/) which could call for rescue. Looking forward to a satellite connectivity version in the future — iPhones are able to do this now, so something like the Apple Watch Ultra 2 may be able to.
Hoping for an EPIRB on my wrist or maybe even just a 162 MHz emergency AIS transmitter that fits on the wrist sometime in the next 5 years.
A mechanical watch should be serviced about every five years. That doesn’t mean they magically stop working if you don’t. I have an inherited Omega from the 60s that hasn’t been serviced in decades and it still runs and keeps good time.
If I could find someone to fix it, I'd wear it special occasions (my day-to-day is a Solar Seiko) often enough to keep it wound and _would_ get it serviced every 5 years.
Except if you get a watch with Citizen's Eco-Drive, which is where the power comes from ambient light and not a battery:
* https://www.citizenwatch.com/ca/en/technology-eco-drive.html
A watch lets you calculate longitude, which could be very valuable indeed.
There's a reason why accurate time keeping was one of the holy grails during the age of sail.
And to better predict rising tides (the ideal time for fishing), to plan your day and your trips better, and to boil eggs exactly the way you like them.
It's a luxury item compared to a knife, but it has its uses.
To my eyes there's something inescapably crude about mechanical design with moving metal parts. It's still present when there are tiny components with even tinier tolerances.
A Jaeger LeCoultre Memovox, a thing of beauty.
as an approximate compass, if it has an hour hand (bisect the angle between the hour hand and noon, that's north or south, depending on your latitude, unless you're in the tropics where this doesn't work)
as a heliograph to flash signals to passing ships
if there's a date magnifier, you can use it to light fires
the engraving on the back may help identify your sun-bleached bones ("So, this poor devil was named WATER RESISTANT")
parrots, tortoises
Deleted Comment
Do you wear it every day?
Does it impact your plans ie "I shouldn't wear it today because I might be targeted for a robbery"?
What is the reason you bought an expensive watch when there are plenty not expensive watches that are good at "time"?
Would you consider yourself "well off?"
Thanks :)
It also has the added benefit whilst traveling of signaling to customer service staff (I fly commercial and not always in first) that I am a revenue opportunity (ie don't ignore me), as I am quite utilitarian and my 'fits are almost always sub-$200 (not counting shoes and scarf). My daily driver tshirt is plain black and costs $25, for example, and I loathe brands and visible labels. It's not immediately obvious to retail staff that it's profitable to provide me with good service.
Expensive watches aren't about timekeeping. They are jewelry and status signifiers.
Also, my daily driver watch is under $10k; theft no more enters my mind about it than it does for carrying my laptop; a maxxed out Macbook Pro ($6k) is approximately the same value as my watch and I never think about whether or not I should bring my laptop somewhere.
I also collect sunglasses and luggage; I'm not much of a clothes horse but I do adore stylish accessories.
Edit: I have friends who are "expensive watch guys" and one such new money friend, despite growing up poor, now personally grosses low double digit millions of USD annually. He recently told a story to our group about being in a 10 person business meeting where his $40k Rolex was the cheapest watch anyone had on, as a way of communicating how impressed he was and the gravitas of how many corporate heavy hitters were involved in his deal. Perhaps this sheds some light on their purpose and utility. (My $7k stainless steel daily driver doesn't even rank among these sorts of guys.)
2. What does "I have a radar filed" mean?
Thanks for clarifications.
The most expensive watch I own is about €10k. Honestly I don't think of the value on the days I wear it - I just look at it and smile.
It used to be that I had about seven watches and I had one for each "activity". So I had a sauna-watch, a swimming watch, a photography watch. Later I got too many, so I switched into different styles - a pilot watch, a diver watch, a jump-hand watch, etc, etc.
I usually change watch every day, but sometimes I might wear the same one for 3-5 days. The only time I consciously think about it is when traveling for holidays - I think "Is this the watch I want to go through security with, and dive into a lake?" or "Am I gonna wear a suit, or not?"
Expensive watches are not comparable to cheap watches in my view. Just like a bottle of 50 year old whisky cannot be compared to a €10 cider - they are different things, with different audiences.
(Also: Get insurance. That takes away almost all worry :)
People spend years learning how to build them. It takes a long time to assemble one. They’re precisely made with small parts made of precious metals which are themselves expensive.
With companies like A Lange & Sohne, each watchmaker can only make about 6 watches per year. At a pace like that you’re not really paying for the watch, you’re paying for their labor and expertise. You’re paying to preserve the craft. You can’t make 6 of something in a year and sell it for $100 if it’s how you make a living.
> Do you wear it every day? > Does it impact my plans?
I do wear it almost daily but it does vary, if I'm doing anything manual (gardening, working on my bike, painting/decorating) then I'll either not wear it or take it off during those activities where I'm likely bound to bash my wrist against something.
I'll often swap it out for one of my other cheaper ones sometimes.
> Why?
I've liked watches for God knows how long and I was fortunate to work at a luxury watch shop where I got some great discounts.
I've always said my collection is my funeral fund for once I go!
> Do I consider myself "well off"?
Personally, no. I just make very bad financial decisions.
I don't currently own a watch over 5k but if I where to purchase such a piece it would be for the craftsmanship and the beauty of the mechanics. However you would never find me wearing a Rolex which is a mass produced status symbol IMO.
It's some combination of it being a status symbol and an "I can afford it and it's fun" kind of a deal.
There is a variety of attitudes, as with fancy cars, McMansions, or other "premium" goods. Some people wax their car every week, some people let it rust.
Watch theft isn't particularly common. I have a nice watch, I wear it daily, and I don't think about it much.
I've lost many watches in my life, but this one has trained me in the discipline of care and attentiveness towards my possessions, which extends to all things and not just the watch.
There was no particularly good reason for me to buy it though, except for the watch maker name's frequent mention in the 19th century literature, including a famous line from Pushkin's Onegin, "he strolls down boulevards, until a sleepless Breguet, calls out time for supper". now it's likely that Onegin specifically didn't wear an actual breguet, because that was a generic name for a chiming timepiece, but the imagery stuck. I grew up on 19th century literature, byronic heroes, this line is explicit reference to flaneur culture, a self-conscious decadent movement, associated with aimless strolling down boulevards dressed in provocative clothing, breguet fits here, and that's the joke of the line: at a time when a timepiece would be associated with a serious vocation, politics or military, it is being used for the most frivolous task of letting one man know when it's time to eat. I reflect on this point occasionally, when I look at my watch.
If I had a massive rolex/richard mile or some other painfully obvious watch, then yes, I would be much more reticent.
I got it because its a pioneer watch: https://www.omegamegaquartz.com/ it was the first watch that was stonkingly accurate. There are some citizens and seikos that are probably now more accurate (some of the seikos look damn good too.) But none of them look like this massive lump of 70s engineering.
Yes I am very fortunate to be temporarily rich.
High end watches are somewhat appealing - the craftsmanship & precision engineering appeal (although today even most high end stuff is machine assembled i think?). Still there’s that huge sting in the tail… they’re just not great timepieces[1].
Your (network connected) phone is going to be more accurate. I can’t help feel like an absolute plum if i were to part with 5k+ for a watch with less accuracy than an £8 Casio.
The article talks about spring drive and that i can get behind, the constant smooth movement is mesmerising, the accuracy is entirely respectable and it charges itself just by wearing so you still get the benefits of an automatic. Then, depending on the model you choose, you get a hand-finished casing that uses a polishing technique that takes a craftsman years to qualify in. To top it all off, these GS spring drives are some of the cheapest “high horology” options out there. I’m sold…
[1] one exception, i’ll never be able to own one, but the H. Moser & Cie “Swiss Alp Watch” which i think i like mostly for the complete absurdity of everything about it
However, wearing a mechanical watch makes me happy. It's a fascinating thing to keep time completely mechanically, and creates a nice counterbalance in my life filled with electronics.
Another similar item is fountain pens.
Can’t say anything about mechanical watches, but I’ll disagree with this: in my experience, fountain pens aren’t just toys. I was given a fountain pen a few years ago, and I immediately found it made my hand hurt less when writing, because I didn’t need to press nearly as hard. Since then I’ve found a few models of gel pens which are similar in this regard, but when it comes to handwriting, I still find fountain pens to be by far the most comfortable for me.
The issue is essentially solved for quartz, even Casio's electro-mechanic models can be powered by ambient light.
Edited, Seiko, not Citizen.
While it has an analog display and a mechanical power source, the Kinetic's timekeeping is purely quartz. The Spring Drive has mechanical timekeeping which is automatically regulated by quartz.
More or less the plan is to rip out the balance wheel/escape wheel and pallet fork from an existing movement and try and rig up a permanent magnet on a wheel, then a small electro magnet connected to something like an Arduino and see if I can even get something like that to regulate the speed of the watch.
That’s true, except for Zenith Defy Lab. It is purely mechanical and has a +/- 0.3s per day.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chip-scale_atomic_clock