So, finally, here it is. The winder review on this lowcost watchwinder.

Click here to see the review

I am between jobs, last friday was the last day of my old job and tomorrow I start working at a new place. So today I had a day off, and I could use that Finishing all your work and leaving behind your former employer is energyconsuming, at least that’s what I found out. This was my first job and I enjoyed it, but now it is time to look for new challenges.

Anyway, today I spent most of the time doing stuff inside the house. Cleaning, arranging all my shirts (my new job makes me wear suits) and finally.. finally writing the review on the winder for WatchUseek. I just mailed the finished version to Ernie Romers so it can be posted in a short time. I hope this evening.

I also went to the postoffice where there was a book for me waiting since last week. It is a Japanese book on Omega Seamaster watches. I have a weakness for Omega watches, and the guy who wrote Time Capsule, a book on Speedmasters, now wrote a book on Seamasters. Ofcourse, I can’t read it, it is in Japanese, but it is nice to have some sort of reference material. It is full of photos and I can read the productionyears and numbering of special editions.

I will keep you posted on the link to the winderreview.

I promised to have some reviews ready by this weekend, but I didn’t succeed… Oh well, the winder review is almost ready, the Panerai review is only waiting for more pictures.

It seems that Silvio Berlusconi (the president of Italy for those who don’t know) wears the most expensive watch of all presidents, a 540.000 USD Vacheron et Constantin. Although I also know he wears Eberhard once in a while

Anyway, this Russian paper writes about a few presidents and ex-presidents and their watches.

http://english.pravda.ru/main/18/90/361/14979_watch.html

Thanks to Jack Freedman for pointing out the URL on WatchRap.

The AIHH, Assiociation Interprofessionnelle De La Haute Horlogerie, a platform that is initiated by several watchbrands (like Audemars Piguet, Brequet, JLC, IWC, Panerai, Roger Dubuis etc) to form some kind of ‘quality seal’ for customers who buy at jewelers who are connected to the AIHH, offer a nice watchrelated book for people who answer 10 questions on their website.

So visit http://www.aihh.com/ and click (left-below) the “Time for Oneself” start button.

Although Omega is one of my favorite brands, I remain critical to their latest additions like the DeVille Co-Axial (they should have named this ‘Constellation’ since it has a lot of characteristics from the ’50s and ’60s Constellation pie-pan models), Broad Arrow (the watch itself is nice, but the way how Omega markets this watch.. tribute to the Moonwatch, give me a break) and the Aqua Terra (the design is too similair with the Rolex Oyster Date, Airking and Explorer models). Taste is personal ofcourse, so I don’t mind if you don’t agree.

However, their latest addition, Planet Ocean of the Seamaster range is a refreshing watch! I am still not certain about the hands, but the watch itself is great! I had a Seamaster Professional (Bond) for a long time, and I loved it. This one also comes with helium valve crown, but that never bothered me on the Seamaster Professional.

I guess this watch will officialy being introduced on the Basel fair.

I will be away for a few days (I’ll be back on the 17th of february) and if all goes well, I’ll have a nice set of reviews coming up before next weekend.

Have a nice weekend!

It is the Tour de l’Ile, the world’s most complicated wristwatch by Vacheron et Constantin. It has:

hours and minutes
seconds at 6 o’clock
repetition of the quarters and minutes on request
“Tourbillon” device
power reserve
second time zone
phases of the moon
age of the moon
torque of the striking mechanism
perpetual calendar
- day
- date
- month
- leap years
perpetual equation of time
sunrise
sunset
sky chart

Click here for a Purists introduction on this watch

Although the author Jack Forster is quite enthusiastic, I rather see them stick to watches, like Montblanc should stick to pens.

Click here to find out

Although I have lots of respect for Brequet (here is a boring story about the brand), I never put one on my long-term “want” list, where the Royal Oak Jumbo and Rolex Day-Date (ref.18239) still fight for a first place. Brequet is too classic, and the XX-models are also not what I am looking for in a watch. Anyway, I just read at Europastar that Brequet introduces their new Marine watch, the “Marine 5817″.

Here is what’s up:

The latest MARINE 5817 automatic introduces a new movement, a bigger case, a rubber strap and a redesigned dial to Breguet’s popular
sports model.

The Marine watches trace their ancestry to the chronometers A. -L. Breguet made for the French royal navy from 1815. Designed for reliability, they achieve their elegance through the modern application of
Breguet’s traditional aesthetic values.
The tough steel case has protected crown and increased water - resistance. It holds a gold dial that is silvered or blued, and engine - turned in the centre with a fine wave pattern. Facetted, open -tipped Breguet hands with luminous coating point to a chapter -ring of Roman numerals punctuated with luminous dots. Concern for clarity is also apparent in the centre-seconds and the large date with separate numbers at 6 o’clock.

The sapphire-crystal display-back reveals the superb finish of the automatic movement with its chamfered edges, blued-steel screws and its winding-rotor decorate d in the trademark wave pattern of the Marine
models.

Both the steel bracelet and the rubber strap highlight the uncompromising character of this watch on your wrist — bred from ancient traditions and executed with modern flair.

Some specs:

Case: in steel with fluted caseband. Rounded horns welded to the case, with screw-pins to secure the strap. Engine-turned caseback with sapphire crystal. Screwlocked crown. Water-resistant to 100m.

Dial: in engine -turned and silvered 18K gold,
individually numbered and signed BREGUET. Chapter - ring with Roman hours and luminous points. Centreseconds. Large date at 6 o’clock. Facetted, open -tipped BREGUET hands in 18K gold, with applied luminous material.

Movement: automatic, 111?2-ligne, 35-jewel, Cal. 517GG, numbered and signed Breguet. 65 -hour power reserve. Engine-turned 18K gold rotor. Straight -line lever escapement. Monometallic, 4Hz balance -wheel. Adjusted in five positions.

Also available in 18K yellow gold.

Source: Europastar

Eagle Eye Chuck Maddox spots a TAG-Heuer Monaco “Steve McQueen” Edition in the movie ‘Thunderbirds’.

Oh, don’t worry, although I am fetching my first pair of glasses this saturday I discovered that you can click the image on Chuck’s blog to see a bigger photo. The Monaco is clearly there.

Click here for his blog!

During the years I have tried a few watchwinders, but never got too enthusiastic. I don’t have the money for a watchwinder that costs as much as a new Omega Seamaster Professional and most of the time the less expensive ones look great, but lack functionality or are too noisy. Or just don’t wind my watches at all. And we aren’t exactly talking about very cheap models here either. Ofcourse, if I hadthe money I would be buying the Orbita Monaco winder in teakwood with hand-stitched Italian leather for 3000 USD, but like I wrote before, that’s not the current situation I am in

However, Ernie Romers of WatchUseek asked me to review a watchwinder. I agreed and not much later I got this odd looking winder delivered by our local Postman Pat. The casing is made out of hard plastic and looks a bit like the MTE winders. On top of the winder is a transparant cover you can remove to place a watch on a pillow. The winder does the job clockwise or counter clockwise, both directions have a seperate switch. It is suitable for only one watch and the noise it produces is very acceptable, I have mine in my livingroom on a bookshelf and even I don’t get annoyed with it.

Why telling you all this? Well, Ernie Romers is going to sell these little machines for such a nice price it gets even interesting to buy one for winding your lowpriced Seiko 5 automatic wristwatch. I am writing and adding the last pieces of information to my review (which also will give a pricequote) and if it is finished I will keep you guys posted so you can all place your order at WatchUSeek!

Mr. Richon, author of Omega Saga and keeper of the Omega Museum in Bienne and Jean-Michel of Speedmaster-Mission.net, Navitimer.net, Lemania5100.net and together with myself co-moderator of the Omega Forum at WatchUseek made a hell of a list!!

The entire history of Speedmaster (pre-)Professional models, Automatics, Broad-Arrow, Limited Editions etc etc is listed in this table.

Click here for ‘The Speedmaster models history’ by Marco Richon and Jean-Michel’

Aurelio S., one of the die-hard Panerai fans on the Paneristi and TimeZone Panerai Forum lost his Panerai PAM00127, also known as the ‘1950′. He visitted a watch GTG (Get ToGether) in New York and not much later he discovered that his watch was gone from his collection.

Another regular from both forums (by the name of Yogi) initiated a fundraising for a new PAM00127 and it seems that within a short period of time, over hundred people donated an amount of money for a new watch for Aurelio S.

You can see the message about the status of the fundraising here.

Besides the fact that Aurelio S. is a populair fellow amongst Paneristis, it is nice to see that the Panerai community is so close they even start a fundraising to replace a stolen watch. Although I wonder if this was done as well for someone else with less ’status’ at Paneristi.com or the Panerai forum at TimeZone.

WatchRap.com regular Ming Thein designed his own watch! What would your own designed watch look like? Since I am that creative, I guess my watch would look like a vintage Daytona (without screw-down pushbuttons, so a 6239 or something) or an all integrated design watch like the AP Royal Oak, PP Nautilus or V&C Overseas.

Anyway, here is Ming’s watch (it’s the MING Cal. M16RS Carillon Sonnerie Repetition Minutes, according to himself):

You can follow the whole thread here.

My 2nd watch (my 1st watch was the Speedmaster Pro with saphire front and back crystal) for 2005 is coming in very soon! Gerard showed me this Abacus MSN Direct watch in his store and although MSN Direct isn’t available in Europe (for now), it had some nice other features. Although my focus is on mechanical wristwatches, a nice digital watch can be usefull sometimes. I already have a Casio digital wristwatch I got when I was 9 or 10 (so that would be in 1986), it still works. I can remember I really liked those G-Shocks back then, but I couldn’t afford one and my wrists were way too small to handle one. So about 1.5 years ago I bought this 20th anniversary re-make of the first Casio G-Shock (1983), only the caseback shows it is a new watch (it has the 20th anniversary inscription). So in the end, I still got what I wanted when I was a kid.

Ofcourse, these digital things are just for fun and shouldn’t cost me too much (although I can understand why people buy an Omega X-33 or Breitling Aerospace, very neat watches). This Abacus watch is priced right, especially for a watch which I am probably never going to wear. Maybe only in the beginning or in the gym… maybe…

Anyway, I just found a review of one of these watches here. If you are in the US (and thus can use MSN Direct), you can get these watches for fair prices at eBay.

This poor guy who calls himself ‘rsg1′ really suffers on the Public Forum at TimeZone after he asked something about his deployment buckle. Ofcourse, we all know it is deployant buckle.

To see the embarrassing thread (not for the original poster in the first place), click here.

Maybe it is wise to speak about a folding clasp next time