Reply With QuoteExcellent review of these brilliant watches - I thoroughly enjoyed that read
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
I received my watches today, and had a mild panic attack in the process. I received a "delivered" notification, but there was no package at my front door! I have a camera and that didn't pick up anything, and I didn't see any UPS truck pass by. Furthermore I had a meeting at the same time, so I couldn't call UPS to find out what happened.
After my meeting I took a walk in my neighbourhood, and found my package sitting on my neighbour's porch. Phew! Hopefully my neighbours didn't see me and think that I had stolen mail.
So I am very very happy with these 2 watches. They really are perfect in execution. I wouldn't have minded them being 38mm, but 36mm makes them feel very cozy on the wrist. I once owned a Dornblueth 99.1 which looks very similar to the PRS-29AM but in 42mm size - it had a gorgeous rose gold movement peering out of the display back. I ended up selling the 99.1 because, I suppose, I got bored with it and never wore it much.
There is something to be said about being the right size. 36mm is sublime for a "field watch". It makes the watch feel like it's not there - it is a part of you like your fingers. The Dornblueth felt like I was strapping on a diving gauge - very obtrusive and ostentatious. For the last 20 years, we have seen a steady rise in the size of watches, which I believe was led by IWC, Audemars Piguet and Panerai. Now we have watches that are 47mm, 52mm, 56mm. Just simply TOO BIG. People are wanting watches to make ostentatious style statements. They are no longer like a wedding band, they are like a 4 carat solitaire diamond ring surrounded with 20 carats of emeralds. There is a place for watches like this, but not for a watch that you never take off.
What I like about the PRS-29 is that it has everything you need for a watch that you never have to take off. I have a history in the watch world, dating back to 1997 when I was a prolific writer at TimeZone.com and was published in some magazines. I've had over 30 high end watches go through my hands, and was an expert at buying and selling to avoid losses. Around 2006 I dropped off the map because I had different life priorities and a waning interest in watches. Part of the reason of that loss of interest was the ridiculous rise in costs of servicing. Servicing my Panerai costs $600! That caused me to rethink watches and my priorities. IMO, a watch should serve me, not the other way round. It should be easy to service and durable. My high-end collection was stripped down to bare-bones: a Submariner and a Speedmaster, the 2 most essential watches in a mechanical watch aficionado's collection. Of course I had other watches as well, like a nice collection of Seiko autos, and some great Citizen Eco drives, and the essential Solar Tough Casio G-shock.
Modern watch companies agree with me: it's about the servicing dummy. Every major watch company is moving toward watches that require less and less servicing. Great advancements have been made toward developing silicon escapements and diamond pallet stones, requiring zero lubrication in the escapement and very little wear and tear. However, most of these watches are also automatic, and a great source of metal dust is the auto winding mechanism which is constantly moving around in "field" conditions. I don't like that. This is where a manual wind is essential for this kind of watch that you never take off: there is no rotor or anything to develop a metallic sludge in your watch when you're in the field. It's true that the balance and escapement are still developing this same sludge, but it actually develops less sludge than the automatic subsystem because of the weight difference: the heavy rotor in field conditions develops wear and tear proportionate to the level of activity.
It doesn't stop there. The antimagnetic cage is essential to a field watch, and I'm constantly disappointed in watches that could have a soft iron cage, but don't. Magnetism is the #1 problem found by watchmakers: it's a reality of life that should be mitigated, especially in a field watch. No compromise! I am less interested in frivolous stuff like a date, because we don't live in the 60s. We all have cellphones now. 2 timezones, stopwatches, the date - all of them are really obsolete now with a simple cell phone. Although desirable and fun, these features aren't necessary - antimagnetism IS.
For a watch that you could wear everywhere and any time, you need antimagnetism and a decent water resistance. While most watches now have decent water resistance, most watches don't have antimagnetism beyond the mediocre 4800A/m, so you have to take them off when you're handling speakers, or stick your hand in your wife's purse, or handling Macbooks and so on.
Onto the design of the crystal, dial and hands: I love the box sapphire, the hands, the dial: these are all beautiful and well proportioned. I'm not a purist martyr who insists on an acrylic crystal for some OCD nostalgic reason. My OCD is loathing the idea of having a deep scar across a crystal to mar my view of the dial and hands. I tell people that the way to tell a high-end teddy bear is to look at how the nose is constructed: it's attention to detail that determines the best from the rest. This applies to the dial and hands. Often cheap watches will focus on a blingy case, but look closer at the dial and hands through a loupe and you'd wish you hadn't. The dial and hands of the PRS-29 are just so delightfully perfect - easily belonging to a high-end watch; the colours and textures are just perfect, which can't be appreciated in pictures. It reminds me of fine vintage porcelain of the kind you'd see in an antique store - definitely something you wouldn't want ruined by scratches on the crystal.
The length of the hands are also perfect; that's something that is often a blemish on many watches: wrong sized hands. No; on the PRS-29 the hand length is perfect. They are generously long, and touch the markers like they should. Watches whose seconds/minute hand don't touch markers look cheap to me, like the hands are an afterthought, or a cheap plastic nose glued on a teddy bear, or they were taken from the parts bin. For a watch to be perfect, it has to be perfect in every regard - it has to be the result of the singular vision of a designer, not the collaborative result of bean counters and engineers. The difference between great and crap in anything is attention to detail.
I want to mention also that I am a sucker for "good" nostalgia. It is important to me that the PRS-29A is a true-to-form reissue of the W-10. I don't think I'd be as interested in this watch if it wasn't Smiths branded. The PRS-29AM is less interesting in that regard, since it's based on an Omega, not an actual Smiths, which is why the PRS-29A is the more interesting of the 2. In a world of fake news and fake everything, authenticity is a valuable commodity, which makes the PRS-29A something quite rare. Nevertheless, the PRS-29AM is such a pretty watch, and it complements the PRS-29A nicely.
Would I change anything? Yes. To follow what I said earlier about wear and tear, it's better to have a slow beat movement. Slow beat movements, like 5bps or 6bps are famous for lasting a very long time without needing service. a 5/6 bps handwind movement, I would argue would be the perfect movement for the PRS-29. Why does anyone need higher? Watches had higher bps for accuracy, which isn't really needed today. For me, as long as a watch is not slow, I am okay with up to +20s/day, which is dead easy to achieve with a slow beat movement. We don't need watches to tell the time, that's really not what they're for any more. They are for the enjoyment of time.
Finally, the price. Price matters. It is important to wear a watch, that is not necessarily cheap, but feels like you got a steal. Sure I could have gotten many mechanical watches for much cheaper, but they aren't as perfect. The price could have been much higher too, but then it would have felt like I paid for something that was less real, and more to do with marketing or some other intangible thing. I haven't felt that way in a while. I have purchased a microbrand watch that was very good value, but it wasn't perfect, and I have much more expensive watches that are "perfect" but because they are so much more expensive, I am less likely to wear them everywhere. Being a watch that you would wear everywhere and at any time is important, I think, in a watch that you love.
Last edited by grizzlymambo; 12th June 2020 at 20:57.
Excellent review of these brilliant watches - I thoroughly enjoyed that read
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Great review - remember to post some photo's of them 🙂
Great feedback on 2 great watches, enjoy my friend.
I want to add some notes on why I felt it was "urgent" to buy these 2 watches now, and not over time. It's because they have the 2801-2 movement in them and NOT a Sellita.
Sellita and ETA movements are not identical, and there are some differences:
https://omegaforums.net/threads/sinn...1/#post-763206
Now I'm not sure what type of balance wheel or hairspring is used in higher grades of Sellita movements, but the higher grades of Sellita use an Incabloc shock absorber, which is the same one used in the PRS-29 2801-2s.
The PRS-29 2801 balance wheel is a "standard" brass type, not a Glucydur balance as evidenced by the straight spokes, as opposed to the curved spokes of a Glucydur balance. The difference in material has to do with the Glucydur's increased antimagnetism and it's resistance to temperature changes. I'm not concerned about magnetism because of the antimagnetic cage, and the temperature changes I think are unimportant.
The hairsprings between the 2801 and Sellita is likely to have virtually identical performance.
What it then boils down to, IMO, is exclusitivity. There came a time when any watch with an ETA movement was frowned upon, since it was available to anybody. Now that judgment has moved to Sellita. ETA are now considered exclusive: and they literally are - exclusive to Swatch Group brands.
I compare it with the IWC Mark XII's used of the JLC 889/2 movement. Considered a darling to collectors. But why? Functionally, by design and materials it is actually inferior to a high grade 2892. It uses an old fashioned Kif shock absorber, and the hairspring is likely a Nivarox I, which is not the anachron hairspring used in the highest grade 2824/2892. The JLC 889/2 is not more desirable for functional reasons, but for exclusivity. It is ONLY used in the highest-end brands, and it is NO LONGER available for current model IWCs.
The PRS-29 is a reissue of a historic watch. It uses a historic movement: an ETA 2801: once available in the early naughties, and no longer available, just like the W-10 is no longer available. No longer available = exclusive, by definition - exclusive to the few who were able to get a watch with this movement - an excellent movement that is loved by watchmakers, and considered as high-end as other high-end movements.
See: https://www.watchdoctor.biz/eta-2824/
.. for a watchmaker's assessment of ETA movements vs equivalent high-end movements like the JLC 889/2.
Actually I would go so far as to say that the PRS-29A with ETA2801-2 is actually more valuable than the IWC Mark XII, because the Mark XII, and in fact all IWC Marks after the XI are not based on anything. They are historically non-relevant. The XI was issued by MoD, and so was the W-10. The PRS-29A is a faithful reissue of the W-10 and has a NATO #, the XII is not a faithful recreation of the XI and is completely civilian. The 2801 is just as attainable now as the IWC 884, since you can't get either now. And of course the 2801 is the original movement used in the reissue.
To my preferences, a good watch is a combination not only of practical features, but of emotional qualities. I mentioned the practical features in the first post and the fact that the ancestor (and the fact that it actually has an ancestor), the W-10 is an important relation; but the fact that it uses an ETA movement, to me is also an emotional quality that I enjoy - it is the original design (not a copy, like the Sellita), and it is the first movement used in the reissue. It compensates for the fact that I didn't jump on the IWC Mark XII when they were still being sold at the AD.
Last edited by grizzlymambo; 15th June 2020 at 22:24.
Interesting stuff - thanks for sharing 👍Originally Posted by grizzlymambo
Now I understand my my WTBs for 29 am and pm have gone unanswered...!!! :0(
Never thought about magnetism that much but you spend my eyes. Funny that it is neglected by so many. Maybe a sign that manufacturers think of watches as jewelry, not as tools?
Never thought about the wear and tear of a automatic movement neither, that opens my eyes even further. In other words: thanks for this review, you should ge back to writing!
Last edited by Cas86; 21st June 2020 at 17:00.
Posting Permissions
