Independents

DonCorson
[AHCI]
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Romain Delafontaine - r-watch - a New Independent

Romain Delafontaine - r-watch - a New Independent

As an avid glider pilot and watchmaker Romain Delafontaine is busy realising his dreams.  You have all certainly seen (maybe even tried on and purchased) watches that Romain Delafontaine has assembled and adjusted.  He is a watchmaker specialised in prototypes and small series and does the initial assembly and debugging of new high end watches as well as assuring the entire production of some small series.  He has assembled and adjusted many of the high end sensations of the last couple of years, as examples I mention only the Harry Winston Opus 10 and the Cyrus Klepsis.














His first watch under his own brand name, r-watch, is a handsome pilots watch.  This is a natural considering his passion for flying.  And so it came that we took the first pictures of the watch at the airport in Yverdon along with a glider.  You will note that the references on the dial make this watch particularly interesting for the members of the flying club at the Yverdon Airport.  One of the features of this watch is that Romain can simply do dial customisation for his customers.














In keeping with the high reliability needed for a pilot watch the movement is an ETA 2824-2 in its highest finishing level.











The automatic rotor is cast 22 carat gold with the r-watch logo, a falcon flying a convoluted "R".  Note the discrete but effective crown protection.











In the r-watch workshop I saw some steps in the mounting of a watch.







The maximum possible disaster in a watch workshop.  (Note that dogs are always welcome, they don't climb across the tables )






Cleaning up after the cat and mounting the dial.







Securing the dial feet.


Before mounting the hands the watch is set so the date has just jumped so we can set the hands correctly. Mounting the hour hand and pressing it in place.









Next comes the minute hand






And finally the second hand.


Now the movement is ready to be cased up (after another a careful check for cat hairs)






Romain Delafontaine’s first watch of his own production is a high quality pilots watch with an attractive design.  Its good possibilities of customisation should make it interesting for flying clubs and individual pilots as well as for everyone else who just likes the style.
Check it out.
Don

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