Chopard

Hi
New member here, but a long time Chopard owner of twist, lunar one and two other non LUC dress watch.

So back on topic, I purchased my LUC twist back in 09 , cal 1.96, 29j , WG with black dial (dark blue? Can't really tell due to the blue AR on crystal ) and because all my selfwinding pieces sits in the winder array whenever they're off the wrist /off the rotation so I rarely had to set the time manually . That's until last week my winder stopped working.....VERY frustrating.

So while setting the time, I noticed that the seconds hand is non-hackable, that is the seconds hand keeps going with crown pulled all the way out.

Is this normal? I can't really remember since I purchased it years ago ..... The movement is 29J no. 107xxx so I assume it's quite early production. The watch is working quite admirably otherwise gaining only 2 sec / day

Regards

A

P.S. I don't check my pieces' accuracy unless functionality is in doubt . Approximate minutes is more than good enough for me ;-) IMO the seconds hand is there mainly for decoration purposes.

amblin_xi,

As far as I know, L.U.C 1.96 movements with seconds hand have a stop seconds utility.

In fact all L.U.C movements with seconds hand have this facility.

Let us know when it has been checked by Chopard.

Regards,

MTF

L.U.C 1.96




L.U.C 1.96

I just read a couple of posts here amongst purists as well as other sites that even 1.96 would not be hacking. Remembered that 4.96 was also not hacking.

We don't have an overview?

Cheers,
Kolosstt

Hi MTF, thanks a ton for the input, this is what I thought aswell. Very strange since the watch was in my formal wear rotation so haven't seen a lot of action . Already sent an email to info@chopard.ch and awaiting their official reply.

But the curious thing is that the 1.96 movement in my LUC twist is not exactly the same as the pictures above. While it's the supposedly updated 29j model, but the micro rotor is the older 32j 'Chopard 22k' design instead of 'LUC 22k' in the picture.

The boutique I got the watch from told me there were at least THREE versions, the earliest production 32j non-hackable, and the updated hackable 29 and 32j. I will report back when I got the official manufacturer reply set in stone. A

Ps. Been keeping a close eye on it the past 4 days, after almost 8 years the accuracy is still among the best of all my pieces , ticking away very admirably gaining an average of only 1.5s / day . Beating all the cosc certified big boys.

The 3.96 and 4.96 versions of the movement definitely do not come with hacking seconds (was surprised by it when getting my LUC Sport 2000) but I thought the 1.96 did hack. Quite curious what the answer from Chopard will be

I got the answer

Chopard actually called me back, from their HQ on Sunday, now that's what I call appropriate customer care and service.

Their reply is that there were THREE official versions as shown in the catalogue but also slight variations during the 32-29j transformation

the first being the original 32j cal. 1.96 we all know and love ,which is non-hackable and made in very small numbers .

Then came the updated hackable 32j 1.96 (the base unit for lunar one) ,and the non-hackable 29j 1.96 variation . And lastly the hackable 29j 1.96 (now called 96.01L) This is where things get cloudy.

Judging by the movement number, the 29j 1.96 in my LUC twist (107xxx) is apparently one of the few non-hackable 29j samples made during the 32j-29j transformation which were assembled by the then master watchmaker (now retired ) as prototype samples for the cut cost 3.96 and 4.96 . but since these sample movements were basically the same as the original non-hackable 1.96 and carry the Poinçon de Genève seal so Chopard for some reason decided to case and sell them anyway.

Interesting bit of history I must say .

Thought fellow board members would like to know, the total yearly production capability for the 'poinçon de genève' 1.96 and complication variants (96QP etc.) is around 4000-5000 .

A

And rather interestingly the movements in my twist and the lunar one were assembled by the same watchmaker, I guess this is one of the benefits buying a smaller brand with low production figures because you can actually feel that your piece was made by some very caring human hands and not some faceless robots and average workers in a production line. And I must say he did one hell of a job making pieces able to perform so consistently at +2s a day after almost a decade. I feel abit hard pressed sending them back for service worrying that the new guy might not be able to keep up with the same great work :-/

I think it is fair to say that this figure is more of todays age 2017.
Back in 1997 when cal 1.96 was born, these volumes were apparently much lower, weren't they?
P.S. thank for all your input especially about hacking of movements.
Best regards
Kolosstt

The quoted figure is for current rate of production. Back in the days when Chopard first introduced the original limited edition 1860 and 1.96 the number was much lower and up to around the year 2009 -2010 the number stayed at around 600-800 per year.

Regards

A

No message body

Interesting to read.

MTF