Audemars Piguet

Let's take each of your points to examine:

1. Quality - I have witnessed Caliber 3120 being finished and assembled at the AP Manufacture.  It is nothing short of a canvas for traditional watchmaking.  Hand applied finishing, beveled and polished edges, a beautiful 22 carat gold rotor.  High quality.

2. Sturdiness - I believe this point is one of the key advantages of Caliber 3120.  It is highly robust.  The movement has a double balance bridge and the rotor glides on ceramic ball bearings.  The power reserve is 60 hours.  I personally do not exercise with a watch of any kind on my wrist, but if inclined, I would not hesitate to wear a 3120 based watch while doing so.  It is an easy winding movement with the gold rotor and bidirectional winding.

3. Serviceability - I have been told by AP that the movement is easily serviced by their watchmakers.  I have serviced Caliber 3126 Offshores before, and they have never needed anything beyond new lubrication.  Obviously, AP will have parts for this motor indefinitely.

4. Reliability - again, in my personal ownership experiences, EXCELLENT.  I wore a steel 15300 Royal Oak about a year straight around 2007.  It worked flawlessly.  I owned a gold 15300, and while it was more of a special occasion piece, it too never had an issue.  More recently, my AP Diver  functions perfectly.  I have found 3120 / 3126 based APs to easily perform within 5 seconds / day in terms of accuracy.  Highly acceptable in my opinion.  A security mechanism that blocks the date disc presents piece of mind for not accidentally damaging the movement when making rapid date corrections.  60 hours of power reserve allows you to not wear it for 2 days and it can still be operating.

I would place my personal experiences with these calibers over 8 years up against any random remarks you have come across around the internet.  Has every Caliber 3120 been perfect?  Surely not, but issues are easily addressed and AP stands well behind their products.

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