At the time of its introduction in 1964 the 6218-8971 Seikomatic Weekdater was the top of the range flagship of the Seiko automatic lineup. The 1964 Weekdater was the immediate, automatic equivalent of the 1964 Grand Seiko hand-wind, before the appearance of the first automatic GS in 1967. The 6218 movement’s an automatic, 35 jewel, 18,000bph, hacking calibre based on the 62xx platform that powered everything from Seikos World Time and their first dive watch, through to the Grand Seikos of the era. Both the 57GS/43999, 6218 and 62GS have 35 or 39 jewel movements and are all examples where jewels were added to stop what has been translated from the Japanese as the ‘shake fall problem’ with the datewheel. The 1965 example featured below came in for a movement service and is in lovely original condition.
Dress
Oris pointer
Oris have been making wristwatches in Hölstein Switzerland since 1904. They’ve been responsible for some iconic designs throughout that time, of note is the big crown pilots watch introduced in 1938 and of course the feature watch of this post (introduced in the same year), the pointer, which as the name suggests uses a hand to point to the date which is written around the periphery of the watches dial. This ladies example recently came in for a new crystal and a service and it typifies Oris’s pointer series of watches with its guilloche type ring beneath the numerals, it’s cathedral hands and crescent style date pointer hand.
Seiko Chronometer
This 1972 Seiko 5626-5020 Chronometer came in for refurbishment at the end of last year.
It’s screams 1970’s from every pore with its TV style dial, chunky case and faceted crystal. It’s powered by the 25 jewel, 28,800bph, calibre 5626a automatic movement. It also has the benefit of manual winding and hacking, the lower grade Seiko movements of the day tended not to have these features. These movements were a step up from the 21,600bph 5606a which normally found their way into Seikos Lord Matic range of watches. The 5625/6a was destined for the King Seiko range which also includes their line of “Superior” Chronometers which were produced at the Suwa plant, and “Special” Chronometers which came from the Daini plant. This particular model isn’t branded a King Seiko, but it is in all but name and has the legend “Chronometer Officially Certified” below the Seiko logo. The 56xx Chronometer was built to a specification of -3/+8spd and was certified by the in-house Seiko chronometer standard testing, the equivalent of the BO (Basel Observatory) Chronometer standard. A nice touch is that these chronometers were serialised with individual numbers engraved on the movement. (more…)
Gold Omega dress watch, calibre 1030
This lovely 1970’s Omega dress watch came in for a service a short while ago. I was struck by the simple, very elegant styling, the whole watch hangs together beautifully from the baton hands and applied indicies to the dial that fills the slender 9k gold case with its baton type lugs. It just looks right!
Once inside, the calibre 1030 movement is every bit as lovely as the external components, you can tell the rhodium plated movement hasn’t been built down to a price, again it’s just right. (more…)
The Watch Bloke 