Reply With QuoteI get your point. However….I’ve owned a couple and would say the date window is so small as to be pointless and the hands are too skinny and too short.
Solid argument to say that on a properly diveable NATO like this, a Citizen Mears is all the watch anyone could ever need. Accurate, robust, solar powered, lightweight (titanium), 300m WR, small enough to wear with a suit, big enough to wear with anything else. Watch perfection?
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I get your point. However….I’ve owned a couple and would say the date window is so small as to be pointless and the hands are too skinny and too short.
I hear you but don't agree. Nobody needs to see the date at a glance. If you have to peer that's okay. And as for hands, I can read this night or day without glasses (a rare thing, at least in the dark, these days).
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Fair points well made. They’re cracking watches.
Originally Posted by FrontierGibberish
It's a very good contender - legible, light, tough and super-convenient.
For me it should also have a day-date display and a bidirectional bezel for timing.
I've got a number of watches that get close to my ideal, but none get that near ticking all the boxes - probably closest is my Damasko DC57:
If I could pick a full fantasy feature set, it would be:
Carbon fibre case, lugless, with a bidirectional CF bexel; 40mm diameter, <10mm thick, 20mm lug spacing.
Full lume white dial with black arabic numerals; inset Tritium tubes at each index point; no branding or other guff.
Black obelisque-shaped handset with inset Tritium tubes.
Solar charged quartz centre minutes chronograph with radio signal time adjustment.
200m WR.
Titanium crown, Ti crown protectors, Ti caseback.
Sapphire crystal with AR inside only.
It's very ugly and I'm old enough to not need great big numbers on the dial.
"A man of little significance"
The Mears is close to greatness. If they could lose the date and chill the dial out a bit then it could be a massive hit IMO. Love the monobloc case.
This has become a firm favourite,gets worn the most,loose the date window and it would be perfect.
It’s a nice watch but for me, a one watch contender has to be versatile and that’s a tool watch through and through.
The vast majority of my watches lean towards diving and sailing with a couple aimed at walking and hiking, but as a regular "day wear" this Lineage has become my grab and go, accurate, uncomplicated, easy to read, multifunctional and due to titanium - light weight, so much so that I'm looking for a white dial version.
"Once is happenstance. Twice is coincidence. The third time it's enemy action."
'Populism, the last refuge of a Tory scoundrel'.
The thread title basically encapsulates my watch philosophy...currently it´s a Cream dial Smiths Transglobal on a Nato...though I´ve come to the conclusion lume would really be useful, the nippers going through a restless nights phase along with additional aesthetic reasoning, thus I have my eye on the Baltic Hermetique... Realistically probably about the most compact watch I can carry off and not look like I´ve borrowed a kids watch, super slim so less likely I´ll bump it into things, amazing lume, plentiful WR and a certain je nai sais quoi...It shall be a reward if I put in a decent time on a 10km race end of the month.
Then I´m done for quite some time.
These are my two one watches …
Still can’t decide which of the two is the one …
Have had a few of those Ray Mears Citizens in the past and always flipped them in favour of a
Seiko 7c43 7010 on a solid link bracelet
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would have to be a G-Shock for me, if i wear a watch when i work and do stuff around the home / garden / car it would get totally mangled in no time.
I've tried about four Promaster Toughs and always flipped them.
However, the one I regret flipping was this:
It was 38mm, reasonably-sized dial numbers and a long knurled crown. I have no idea what reference it was but I think it was JDM. I picked it up from another forum.
Compared to this there was no contest for me:
or
One of which is in classifieds.
Both Ti and both radio-controlled.
Absolutely this. I haven't needed numbers on a watch since early primary school and that was a long time ago. I generally hate Arabic dials with a vengeance and this particular one is worse than most.
If you took all the others away I could live quite happily with only this, I already wear it more than any other:
What gibberish:-)
It is one ugly looking watch!
Got to be a SD4K surely?
Possibly this.....
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From a personal view it would probably be this one
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The idea of wearing this with a suit is one I find quite disturbing, but each to their own I suppose!Solid argument to say that on a properly diveable NATO like this, a Citizen Mears is all the watch anyone could ever need. Accurate, robust, solar powered, lightweight (titanium), 300m WR, small enough to wear with a suit, big enough to wear with anything else. Watch perfection?
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It depends on the suit.
Most people don’t care
They have one suit, one pair of half decent of shoes and one watch.
I consider the ability to get in to a situation in life where I don’t have to own a suit or smartish shoes a life goal. :-)
As per the OP I do think that could be a solution if you didn’t like watches
Last edited by Sinnlover; 17th March 2024 at 21:17.
Probably my one.
But this new arrival pushing very close.
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I've had a few latest version ray mears and while they are excellent general tool watches the oversize numerals did put me off eventually..the pmd56 was a nicer watch and might have to put a wtb back out there..damn these threads !
Before I joined this place (insert "when life was so simple" reverie) I owned one of those titanium Citizen diver's watches as my do everything timepiece. As it was my only timepiece.
I look back sometimes and see it in photos on my wrist. Carefree days. They (and the Seiko watches of the same era like the Landmaster) really were the high point of function, design, materials and reasonable cost.
Then of course it all went bananas...
Ha ha, yes, that near-mythical state of carefree retirement and one watch ownership. Just seems however close I get, it remains always a little further beyond me. A man's reach should exceed his grasp, I suppose. It keeps us going.
If I were ever to reach that place, I could make a case for this one to be the forget-it-I-am-done watch:
I have "better" and "more prestigious" things to wear but this one is from that same golden age and hasn't really been bettered. High frequency quartz oscillator offering 20 seconds a year accuracy (near enough...), perpetual calendar, proper Seiko depth tested, 20mm lugs for boredom-driven strap changes, and an 8 year battery life.
Also it does this every four years, which is clearly something worth waiting up for...
I can't really think of anything not to like.
TT
That's the spirit
That is so cool...Also it does this every four years, which is clearly something worth waiting up for...
I can't really think of anything not to like.
TT
I’ve been in that place for the last 18 years and can confirm it’s a very nice place to be
Best Regards - Peter
I'd hate to be with you when you're on your own.
I can second that Peter, though still playing catch up to you, 14 years.I’ve been in that place for the last 18 years and can confirm it’s a very nice place to be
It’s a long story, but I had the opportunity to ‘retire’ early and took it without hesitation. Lynn was aghast as I’d been a workaholic for as long as she could remember. Took a holiday after the event to ‘talk about it’ where, after just 2 days, she said she’d never known me so relaxed - never looked back once.I can second that Peter, though still playing catch up to you, 14 years.
Best Regards - Peter
I'd hate to be with you when you're on your own.
This is the only IWC watch I've ever liked ! Not enough to actually buy one though, but then I'm not a chronograph guy ... but if I was ... :-)
For me a Sub - simple
At the ripe old age of 43 I have a way to go but it is the plan!I’ve been in that place for the last 18 years and can confirm it’s a very nice place to be
Last edited by Sinnlover; 18th March 2024 at 14:48.
For me it would have to be something from G-shock.
They can be worn anywhere without worry of theft, decent WR, numerous functions, accurate and reliable.
I must admit that this is the watch that gets worn most of the time, with 40mm a perfect size, high grade titanium, true GMT and the one piece case make it hard to beat.
Got a new watch, divers watch it is, had to drown the bastard to get it!
Yup,I threw the towel in at 61,never regretted it for a moment.
It would have to be Rolex for me. Either Sub, Daytona, or Datejust.
Can't see the point in having 1 watch for life and it not be from my favourite brand and I'm not rufftytufty enough to merit "the one" being a beater.
EZM1.
Tough enough to be wearable in any situation, yet with a traditional case design that has elegance.
Small enough to wear with ease.
Great lume (mine is an Ar model with excellent lume, the trit ones are not the same)
Chrono and countdown bezel for all types of timing.
Covers every base.
No love for the Explorer V?
It was 53 for me. Cliche I know, but I now can't imagine how I ever had time to work!
There is an old suit somewhere at the back of the wardrobe, but I no longer own any smart shoes to go with it (if it even fits). Still can't get down to one watch though!
No, they're my least liked models tbh. Im not really a fan of arabics.
Before I came on to the forums back in 2008/2009, I had a Seiko SNA411 Flightmaster. I bought it new and wore it every single day through thick and thin. No problems, amazing accuracy, rock hard, looked well in a shirt or on the beach.
I've thought many times about selling the whole lot of my pieces, extricating myself from any online influence, and returning to one watch. But I never have.
Picture from the web...
CWC Royal Navy diver Mk.II.
Swiss made to British military design, solid as a rock, super easy to read in all conditions, sapphire crystal with AR, very positive 120-click bezel, 300m WR, slim case for a diver, thermocompensated ETA Precidrive movement which is running at under 2 seconds a month fast, quick and easy strap changes without tools.
Ticks a lot of boxes (no pun intended).
Packed it in at 54 btw, but I see I've already been beaten here as regards earliest hanging up of the boots.
I have to agree, many of these ‘one watch for everything always’ suggestions wouldn’t look great when you’re dressing up. I’d want a ‘one watch’ to be good for a party, fancy restaurant, relaxing, dressing up, dressing down, travel, meetings, the odd swim… I don’t care if it can’t dive as I’m unlikely to in real life, snorkelling would cover it. So I can’t escape the conclusion that the Oyster Perpetual 36 or perhaps Explorer is the answer, since both the Datejust and Omega AT38 are afflicted with polished centre links (though my old AT quartz, with brushed bracelet, jumping hour hand and 150m water resistance is a contender and a great travel watch). Some older DJs would also work. It may seem a vanilla choice but that’s the nature of the question, it has to work everywhere, and that includes drinking cocktails followed by car chase.
This for me would be a contender for a 'one only' watch, but too many others get in the way so I could honestly not pick one watch.
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See where I'm coming from.....
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