Breguet

Dear All,

I was able to handle a friends La Tradition model 7027BA (cal. 507DR) recently and was surprised to see that is has a hacking feature – although it does not have a second hand, the balance wheel is stopped when the crown is pulled. This was unexpected, and a feature that is not common on other Breguet’s (admittedly the Piguet-related movements), even those with sporting aspirations where a hack feature might be more at home.

I was wondering if PuristS knew why the cal. 507DR was designed with this feature? Was it for the planned automatic La Tradition (cal. 505SR) with retrograde seconds, which followed? Does stopping the balance wheel serve another purpose or perhaps is related to some historical cue from the souscription watches? A hacking feature seems rather unnecessary on a watch without a second hand.

I look forward to your insights.

Kind regards

Hi All,

Can a La Tradition owner confirm that this movement indeed hacks, and particularly whether the same feature is present on the automatic version?

Do PuristS know of any other 2 hand (minutes & hours) watches that have a hacking feature - I don't believe I have come across this before.

Thanks

Andrew

Thanks Melvyn,

I haven’t seen this aspect of the La Tradition mentioned or discussed before and I am interested to understand why it was designed that way.

Perhaps it is not even appropriate to use the term “hacking”, which probably more specifically applies to the second hand. Perhaps something like a “stop balance mechanism” would be more precise? Is there a correct description?

I look forward to hearing whatever you can find out.

Kind regards as always,

who actually has one as his personal watch.

He could not see the point either of having balance wheel stop when there is no seconds hand on this model. However, he noted that the base movement for La Tradition had much upgrade module possibility and perhaps it's a redundancy built in for future...

chronometer seconds display?

chronograph?

flyback rattrapante?

MTF

Thanks Melvyn,

I appreciate you following up on this.  Expansion capability for future models is the most likely explanation. It will be interesting to see what Breguet come up with.

Regards

Andrew