Horological Meandering

G99
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my 3000th post. a dream and long search has finally come to fruition

i'm amazed to see that in 2 years i have made 3000 posts. i know i dont have a lot else to do all day, but that is still a lot. looking back i hope that at least some of them have been well written and informative, giving you an insight into my likes, dislikes, dreams and aspirations. i know that a lot have been in response to others posts, but that is the way of things. you cant express your appreciation of a piece without clicking up a number and there have been many many pieces that i have had to show my appreciation of.

anyway, i've been holding back for the last couple of days as i was waiting for this watch to arrive and wanted my 3000th post to describe the long search for something i have thought about and tried to achieve for several years, so here goes.

as most of you know i like unusual watches. single handers, 24 hour dials etc. i've owned several 24 hour watches, a breitling Cosmonaute, a Glycine Airman, a Hamilton military pocket watch and others, but they all have one fault. they have 24 at the top which to me doesnt make sense. to me it seems better to have the 12 at the top so that when it is midday the hand is pointing upwards. i'm not alone in this thought as there are now several companies that do a '12 at the top' dial. even Breitling have released a ltd ed Cosmonaute with this configuration.

several years ago, long before jaquet Droz did it, i thought about a 24 hour single handed watch. i may not be a multi millionaire, but i thought it would be a fun piece which showed the time accurately enough for my lifestyle. over the years everytime i have seen a 24 hour watch i like i have contacted the company to see if it is possible to remove the minute hand. most of the big companies didnt even reply. its not the sort of thing they would bother doing just for one person. most of the smaller companies didnt have a dial that suited just one hand as there are usually 5 markers between the hands not 4 which would suit 15 minute intervals. i have spoken to many people about having a dial made for the watch, but the cost of a custom dial put any idea out of the equation. in the end the idea was put on the back burner as it seemed a bit of a non starter.

then along came Jaquet Droz with their Grand Heure. absolutely perfect i thought so i read all about it. everything made me thing this was the watch for me until i found out the price and the fact that there are only 88 of them(if i'm wrong on that please correct me). i knew i would never be able to gather that amount of money together before they all sold out, however, if circumstances change dramatically i'll jump on one straight away. so the idea went onto the back burner yet again.

i occasionally go onto another forum looking at what is for sale and about 18 months ago i became aware, via that site of a company called Ocean 7. the whole idea was that they provided the best quality possible for the lowest price by selling direct over the internet. all of their watches are divers watches, many homages to long discontinued models. they use ETA movements, high quality German made cases are assembled in Switzerland, but sold from the US. they have been going since, i believe, 2004 and a lot of their early models are sold out. late last year they even produced a Ploprof homage. its over 30 years since the ploprof was discontinued and at the time Omega hadnt released their new model so i consider a homage acceptable not that i bought one even though they seem to be very popular.

anyway, to continue the story, about 9 months ago i became aware of an off shoot of Ocean 7 called Airnautic. these watches are of equal quality to the Ocean 7's, but are 24 hour dialled watches. one a pilot and another entitled 'submarine' as the whole dial glows rather than just the numerals. perfect for reading underwater apparently. they again have high quality German steel cases with screwdown crown, sapphire crystal front and rear and WR to 100m, an ETA 2824 auto movement, 2 straps, leather and rubber and nice looking dials with a small date at 4 oclock and most importantly, the 12 at the top!

when i initially saw them i thought they were nice, but not unusual enough and put them to one side until a couple of months ago when i took another look at the AN24 Pilot. it has 2 chapter rings, one on the outside for minutes and seconds and an inner one for hours. on closer inspection i realised that the hour ring had 15 minute intervals between the hours. this gave me an idea. if i removed the minute hand, but left on the second hand the outer index wouldnt look out of place and the hour ring would be perfect for my single hander(i dont count the second hand). the price of these watches are very affordable, less than the ABR PPro and they look to be pretty bombproof. i initially contacted my watchmaker who said that it was a 10 minute job to customise it to my specs so i then contacted the owner of the company, Mitch Feig who was quite happy to remove the minute hand for me despite it being the first time that request had ever been made.

i ordered the watch which i had to wait for as Mitch was away and was the only one who could do the work. in the meantime Bigdaddy who knew of my plan kindly sent me his copy of International Watch from may 2009 which featured Airnautic. on reading the article i was pleased to see that i was unlikely to be disappointed.

the watch arrived this morning and it is everything i hoped it would be. it comes in a very nice double box with cleaning cloth, rubber strap with deployment and leather strap with tang buckle. the leather is a very thick high quality item. the case which is 41.5mm diameter is very high quality brushed steel and quite hefty, the movement is undecorated so there really is no need for the display back, but its there and looks ok. the dial is superb. it is divided horizontally with blue at the top and black at the bottom to show day and night. the intervals are small but easy to read and the lume is fabulous. i know that if i wake up without my specs on i'll be able to tell if its near 2am than 3am which is good enough for me. i'm looking at it now and its about quarter past 12. that again, is good enough for me. the date is quite small, but is easy to read at a glance.

i'm now a very happy man as i've achieved something i've dreamt about for years, but i've done it for very little cost and inconvenience. for all i know, apart from the Jaquet Droz pieces this may be the only single handed 24 hour watch ever made. who knows?

anyway, here's the pics i took this morning.

the obligatory wrist shot.

i hope you've enjoyed my 3000th post and the watch that is included in it.

Graham