The first thing you find hitting authorized timepiece dealers is sticker shock. Nice watches tend to be a rich man's game. The Bell & Ross didn't look to be any great shakes, but their 03-92 I only wanted in stainless steel turned out to be just under $3,000. As far as luxury brands go it's a gonga, but no way was that anywhere within reality. Hell, it wasn't even in my city as the nearest dealer was over 200 miles away.
So unreality was what I needed to pursue: a replica. Not so I could fake any sort of false prestige in saying I had a Bell & Ross, but in that I had fallen in love with the aspects of its highly polished beveled edges, the satin finished casing, its anti-reflective unscratchable sapphire crystal, luminous hands & numbers, and the single-minded purity of its smooth Swiss movement.
The research? Three months of Wikipedia, long threads from replica watch forums, digging into manufacturers' technical white papers, referencing catalogue thick glossy watch mags, alot of back and forth correspondence with a couple replica dealers, squinting at online pics of sequential teardowns, and reading many posts by a really spot-on mechanically objective user, LysanderXIII (props to L13!). And those three months also allowed me to save up for my purchases.
From all this due diligence I have learned what factors make for a quality watch, that replicas are sometimes comparable, and why watch geeks really are justified in their geeking out.
The heart of any automatic watch is its movement, the spring driven mechanical construct that determines its accuracy. Depending on who makes the movement, what grade of movement they're selling, and if that individual movement is certified, adds up to how accurate that watch is.
Believe it or not, Swatch, creators of the must-have 1980s battery-powered quartz plastic fashion watch, own the dominant supplier of watch movements to the world, the Swiss ETA (eh-tah [not to be confused with the Basque separatists]).
On the high end, most automatic watch movements are models or variants of ETA's 2824 or 2892 movements. The 2824 was originally designed in the 1950s, while the 2892 came about in the 1970s, when there was a need for a thinner mechanical movement during the advent of thinner Quartz watches. ETA makes movements in four grades: Standard, Elaborated, Top, and Chronometer. As of this writing the Standard 2824 goes for ~$130, the Elaborated 2892 (there's no Standard grade) around ~$220. The differences between the four grades are usually the quality of parts used to make up the movement (i.e. spring materials, shock absorption system, type of ruby jeweling, etc) with Chronometer being determined by official third-party testing.
The Contrôle Officiel Suisse des Chronomètres, (the Official Swiss Chronometer Testing Institute), or COSC, grades watches as chronometers if they meet a standard of -4/+6 seconds per day. But these tests are performed on the movement alone, meaning that it's not even tested in the case, which isn't respective of the real world. That and only 3% of Swiss watches sold are even COSC tested and their movements engraved with a unique COSC serial number to prove it.
Yet even more exacting than this are watches that have been Observatory graded. In places like Kew and Glashütte (glas-soot) during the 1800s there were competitions where watchmakers would show up with their finest offerings and accuracy would be tested, usually for nautical use, at an actual observatory. These tests were more realistic in that not only were the movements tested in different positions at rest at different temperatures, but were left in their cases, and even tested while being moved around to simulate actual body and travel motion. Only recently have the Germans resurrected the Observatory grade of testing, which seems a far more honest way to gauge accuracy because at the end of the day the consumer buys a watch as a whole and not just a naked movement. This makes for the lesser-known fact that German watches from Glashütte are the most accurate, but since the Swiss have established themselves as the cornerstone of fine timepieces this difference goes mostly unnoticed.
All this de rigueur and quality control determines some of the price differences, while market, brand perception, and limited supply determines the other. And the exceeding demand and high-end four-to-six figure luxury price hike creates another market: the replica market.
At one point ETA sent Swiss technicians into then-UK Hong Kong to train Chinese watch repair staff how to work on their movements. Little did they suspect that not only would they learn, but master the skills enough to clone their movements. While in most instances the clones aren't as finished with the Geneva striping or pearlage (the fancy circular beveling) or higher grade parts, sometimes they actually are, and for all appearances are pretty indistinguishable. Shopping online renders hordes of replica Rolex, Cartier, Panerai, Omega, Phillipe Patek, and others. Sometime there's even models that the original luxury brand never made, which gives the buyer some especially creative options and "limited editions".
The B&R 03-92 I coveted uses an Elaborated 2892 (ergo the 92 in the model number), but looking around I could only find replicas with a Standard 2836-2 inside (a later version of the 2824). The 2892 has a maximum variation of +/-20 seconds per day, with the 2836-2 having +/-30 seconds per day. Given that I was still getting a real Swiss ETA movement with only a possible 10 seconds maximum difference, made in the same 316L steel, and with a "croc" band at 1/10th the total cost of the actual B&R I was more than sold on the replica, which showed up inside of two weeks and turned out to be 25-hours-a-day of kick-ass retrostalgia.
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| [Yes, that's my wrist.] |
While it's illegal to make and sell replica watches, it's not illegal to buy and own them. And like the Bolsheviks exporting faux Faberge products to establish themselves, the Chinese government doesn't actively pursue manufacturers of replica Western goods, which means the global grey market for replicas isn't going anywhere.
Caveat emptor: The replica market by nature is one of questionable ethics. There are many horror stories of people getting something not even close to resembling what they saw online, watches with functions that don’t work, dealers that don’t respond once you’ve sent a gob of money far beyond reach, customs confiscations, and general customer service nightmares aplenty. Find a dealer with good feedback on watch forums, and pictures of actual product received by actual customers. Most dealers are all selling the same replica watch from the watchmaking district of Guangzhou, so comparison shop, and make note of differences in descriptions, pictures, and especially the movement, of which the best case scenario is having a picture of the actual movement in the watch case. Take the time to ask specific and detailed questions until you get satisfactory responses before you commit to purchase. While with replicas you’re saving a considerable amount of money, be sure you don’t lose what you’re spending.
On the legitimate side before the replica market, the Chinese actually began their own watch making tradition in 1955 (and way before that, Chinese royalty had a love affair with Swiss Bovet watches, even using them as a medium of exchange). But the communists ordered four men to make a watch from scratch, and soon the Wu Xing (Five Stars) from Tianjin Watch Factory was born. By 1961 they were making chronographs for their Air Force, and much later morphed into Sea-Gull, the officially licensed and distributed Chinese watch brand, using their own ST-series of movements.
For my dress watch upgrade I found the Power Reserve Parnis, a Chinese homage to the German-made A. Lange & Söhne, who once provided watches to Zeppelin airship crews. (See how that totally came back around to the SteamGoth thing?) Homage watches aren't replicas; they're clearly their own brand, but made in the style of another watch, usually a high-end one. This particular Parnis is a great choice as it uses Sea-Gull's well-executed ST-25 movement, which is essentially an ETA 2892-based design, and the watch has an exhibition back that shows off the decorated rotor and movement, so I can see and appreciate the workmanship involved. Plus it has a date complication, which the Langematik it's based on doesn't have. Surprisingly, it cost less than a third of what I picked up my B&R for, and even seems to be slightly more accurate so far, which speaks volumes for the Chinese in a business where seconds do count.
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| [Uncommonly vertical subdials. Swankomatik!] |
Given the longstanding ETA models above, watch movements haven't really changed much from their basic design. Design infringement aside, some of the passive argument for replicas is that if the Asian makers can duplicate $3K-$10K+ high-end timepieces for only $100-$1,500, then it finally forces the horologists to up their game to the point of where actual advances and improvements will be made. The last decade or so saw the advent of the gyro and flying tourbillon, and while the regular tourbillon's been around for 100 years, making a carriage spin around on itself and even gyroscope in reverse like a haunted garden armillary to ensure greater accuracy is pretty dazzling.
And new materials such as beryllium or silicone for hairsprings, 3/4 or microrotors that put less wear and weight on the pinons while working even more effectively and give different looks to the rear of the works now force the replica makers to chase the new technologies. The Spring Drive, crafted by Japanese watchmaker Seiko, uses an electronic break to moderate the mainspring's release, giving exceptional accuracy. Mechanical traditionalists might call that "cheating" but the electronics involved are mechanically powered and thus are still automatically regulated.
Bottom line is that a cheap battery powered quartz digital you can pick up for $20 is more accurate than any Swiss mechanical no matter how much you shell out for it. Even the Swiss will admit this because they use digitals to measure their mechanicals. So why all the fuss over something that works less proficiently and is more expensive to produce? Because the analog hands on the clock are the analog to our hands, the same hands that design, define, and drive the miracle that is the wristwatch. The imperfection and variance of a mechanical movement has a beauty that's almost organic by comparison, and contains an art that reflects the striving to make a solid clockwork measure & capture the ephemerality of time, a quality that is ultimately more conscious perception than mathematical absolute.
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| [Exploded view of the ETA 2836-2. Beautiful genius/madness.] |
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12/2013 Addenda: While the Bell & Ross with its ETA movement hasn't given me a lick of bother, mechanically the Parnis has needed to be sent back to Guangzhou three times in the two years I've owned it for losing hours, stalling, and misgauging the power reserve. The forums may tell you that the ST-25 Sea-Gull's a "premium movement", yet my experience seems less than optimal. While Parnis' very willing customer service repairs all their product for free, sending it overseas for $12 shipping at a month's absence speaks otherwise -- though this still totally beats a U.S. $20 bench charge plus parts & labor. Will update if the troubles continue.
12/2019 Addenda: The Bell & Ross unexpectedly stopped, so I emailed PureTime to authorize a repair, but 18-years on after my purchase I was told they no longer service my particular replica as they now use different works for their current replicas, and they advised me to purchase one of their current ones. Their current B&R selections were about half the price, and pricing a local repair was only a bit more. Noticing that most of their current B&R replica models didn't have ETAs, I opted for the repair to keep the better Swiss works. Point here is that in the very, very longterm, unlike luxury firms, replica makers may not continue to support their product, so far future repairs may happen out-of-pocket as opposed to warranty. Mathwise, I'm still wayyyy ahead on the buy, so while that disappointing lack of product support & repair cost was unexpected, if such a repair occurs at so long an interval, a good replica is still worth it.
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While a mostly happy bookstore fixture for over two decades, Guillermo Maytorena IV is currently willing to entertain your serious proposals for employment as a literary/cinema critic, goth journalist, castellan, airship pilot/crewperson, investigative mythologist, or assisting in a craft brewery. Should you be connected to any of the above or equally interesting endeavours, do contact him via LinkedIn or G+.
