Reply With QuoteGreat write up and a cracking watch. That movement looks beautiful. I’ve a couple of JLCs but they are entry level and the movement finishing, though reasonable at the price, looks nothing like as well executed as that. Lovely.
I've had this for a few months and it's everything I hoped it would be. I first tried one at Heathrow several years ago, boarding another interminable flight to another interminable meeting. I couldn't afford it and told myself it didn't look right anyway. I never thought I would own one. Some recent good fortune and a generous-spirited wife led me to end up buying this one from its original owner. I have always been fascinated by the Duomètre movement and this particular watch has a few interesting details which made it the one for me.
The Unique Travel Time is a manual wind world time watch, that will display any time difference on the second dial, whether whole hours, half hour, quarter hour or even down to one minute. It was launched in 2012 as a limited edition of 100 to coincide with the opening of the Place Vendôme flagship boutique. This is one of those first 100 which is why it is in white gold rather than the more usual rose gold of most subsequent versions. The white gold is of a particular palladium alloy that remains white and does not requite rhodium plating. The hands are also white gold but I believe have a heavy rhodium plating so that they are darker and easily visible against the lovely eggshell dial in all lights (unlike some of the steel JLC hands). The rose gold ones have more traditional blued steel hands.
The essence of the Duomètre is the two independent mainspring barrels, one powering the time keeping and one powering the complication, in this case the second time zone indication. The only evidence of this on the dial are the two power reserve indicators, bottom right and left of the dial. These move independently as you wind the crown: anti-clockwise for the main time, clockwise for the second time zone. This makes winding both at the same time very easy, the action being no different from a traditional manual wind watch. Once the watch is wound, there a setting procedure which sounds complex but quickly becomes second nature. First use the pushers to set the world time zone on the 'globe' to your home time zone, GMT in my case. Then pull the crown fully out to the third position and set the right hand dial to local time. The watch doesn't hack; instead the running seconds hand automatically jumps to the 12 o'clock position when the local time is being set.
Next push the crown in to the second position, and use it to set the left hand dial to match the local time. This time, the seconds hand will keep running, and the minute hand on the second dial will move in 1 minute increments, while still staying aligned with the progress through the minute indicated by the seconds hand. My description is a bit confusing but it means that you can set the local time to the second and then know that the local and second time zones will automatically have their minute hands aligned exactly on the indices, without having to think about it. The hour is indicated by the digital counter at the top of the second dial, counting 1 - 12. For this limited edition only, the 7 and 9 markers are red, reflecting the address of the Place Vendôme boutique.
Once you have the second time zone set to match local time, you can start to change the time zone. The pushers will move the time zone back or forward one hour at a time. The globe, and the time zone numbers around it, will move accordingly. If you want to add in an increment of less than an hour, e.g. 15 minutes, you pull the crown out to the second position and adjust the minutes accordingly. The running seconds will continue and the minute hand in the second time zone will stay aligned as before. Thanks to the Duomètre configuration none of this fiddling has any effect on the time keeping of the main time zone.
Day and night in the second time zone is shown by the dark and light ring around the globe, which is translucent and moves over the time zone numbers as time passes to show whether they are in day or night.
As I said it sounds complex but for me it works absolutely brilliantly, being easy and quick to set and read yet capable of any time zone variation conceivable. If we go back to having local city time zones in the UK as we did before stagecoaches and trains, then I've got it covered.
Powering all this is the Calibre 383 movement, with 54 jewels and 498 components yet only 7.25mm in height. I had the chance to spend time with a JLC watchmaker at the London boutique examining this movement through a microscope and I just think it is beautiful. The bridges are made of german silver which has started to show that lovely slight golden ageing which I hope I've captured in the photo. I wish I knew more about how the movement works, especially how a single escapement regulates two power trains so they stay in lock step but are somehow independent of each other. Also shown on the back of the case are cities with their corresponding time zones, and the limited edition number.
The case is a work of art in itself. My poor pictures don't do it justice, but I haven't got tired of the detail of the frosting and dual-pitch knurling on the crown and the brushing and the polishing of the different facets. The lugs are welded to the case which is apparently a difficult thing to do. All I know is that definition and contrast between the polished lug facets and the brushed case is very nice. Overall the case is less than 14mm thick, and 42mm diameter. With the short downward curved lugs it is a substantial watch but for me absolutely wearable on my 6.75" wrists.
Any disappointments? Not really. It came with the original strap and white gold buckle which is lovely but I would have liked the deployant. They are available but at £2600 I might wait for a bit more good fortune. Also the box is very lovely but showing its age, in that the soft alcantara style interior is crumbling into a fine dust that coats the watch and the strap. You'll have seen it in the photos; with my long sight I can only see all the little bits once they are magnified on a large screen.
I know there are or have been one or two Duomètre owners on the forum and I'd love to see pictures of some more and read what you think about them. The last service was about two years ago as well so I will have that to look forward to in a few years time...
Thanks for reading.
Last edited by alfat33; 7th August 2021 at 17:54.
Great write up and a cracking watch. That movement looks beautiful. I’ve a couple of JLCs but they are entry level and the movement finishing, though reasonable at the price, looks nothing like as well executed as that. Lovely.
That's lovely and thanks for taking the time to review it.
I think your photos would come a lot closer than mine Tony, but thanks anyway :).Originally Posted by learningtofly
What a beautiful timepiece. Horology at its quintessential best I think. Very refreshing to see such a complication executed with such finesse. What is the diameter of this one and do you have a shot of it on wrist? Thank you so much for sharing this stunner. Best. Martyn.
“ Ford... you're turning into a penguin. Stop it.” HHGTTG
Wow, engineering artwork. Thanks for sharing
42mm case diameter. I’ll try some wrist shots tomorrow.
Thanks for all the kind comments. Under a loupe the movement really is marvellous. The Côtes de Gèneve stripes that radiate from the centre of the balance jewel are apparently applied to the different bridges by hand before assembly, at which point they line up perfectly...
Absolutely superb. I really like the intelligence evident in every aspect of the information presented, from the date location to the excellent cottier sub-dial.
I always admire something a bit different and fun, this is a super pick up, well done!
Great write up thanks, couple of questions if I may-
Do the 2 power reserves deplete at a similar rate and was there a Southern Hemisphere version made? Not that I need one, just curious!
I keep coming back to this photo - what a work of horological art it is.
Simon, do you think you'd have preferred it had JLC matched the colour of the hour wheel to the dial, or do you need the additional contrast for purposes of visibility?
Now that is gorgeous. JLC have done a terrific job with the overall design. Must be a real thrill to wear. Good write up too. Thanks for posting.
Thanks. Both power reserves are rated at 50 hours and they do deplete at pretty much the same rate, although if you let them run down they don’t stop at exactly the same time. JLC advise you not to deliberately run one without winding the other but I don’t know what the consequences of doing that would be.
Good question about the Southern Hemisphere. I’ve never seen one but I guess all you’d need to do is change the graphic in the globe. It would be a cool thing to see. Funnily enough this one was originally sold in the Southern Hemisphere and I guess it would function in exactly the same way. It would be nice to see your own country on the globe though.
A good review and a beautiful watch ,this is true horology and much more interesting than most of the usual hype watches
Sent from my moto g(8) power using TZ-UK mobile app
Sorry - "date wheel" came from muscle memory and I was referring to the hour wheel, of course. I was idly wondering if a decent alternative might have been to match the dial colour but use a subtly-coloured font, but I guess we'll never know unless you'd be willing to mod yours a bit so we can have a look
A different font colour could work although this first edition already had two different colours, with red for the 7 and 9, so it might have got a bit tricky.Sorry - "date wheel" came from muscle memory and I was referring to the hour wheel, of course. I was adly wondering if a decent alternative might have been to match the dial colour but use a subtly-coloured font, but I guess we'll never know unless you'd be willing to mod yours a bit so we can have a look
If this rain doesn’t stop today I might whip out the movement and see if I can try out some hour wheel options :).
Love the hour wheel, rest not so much. Am sure is a fantastic watch quality wise but the overall design doesn’t work for me.
Beautiful piece. Congratulations.
Cheers Raj. I guessed it wouldn’t be to your taste, judging by the styles you tend to show. It is 42mm though, that must count for something compared to my usual 34mm-38mm.
Lol!! That is a mahoosive diss:-)Cheers Raj. I guessed it wouldn’t be to your taste, judging by the styles you tend to show. It is 42mm though, that must count for something compared to my usual 34mm-38mm
I can appreciate these kind of watches but huge subdails, too many hands and two massive pushers on left- it doesn’t all come together for me. May be in metal is different. Anyway, I am sure it is of superb quality and if you like it, my views are not that important.
Last edited by RAJEN; 9th August 2021 at 12:45.
Haha, I think you have fabulous taste in watches Raj, especially combined with your strap choice. It's nice to hear different views, it is a watch forum after all. You are right though that I've already made up my mind about it. I don't think you would like this one in the flesh any more than in the photos, although the pushers might not seem so massive.
Tony, just for you (and maybe Raj, and for me really) here is the red 7 on the hour wheel that I mentioned earlier. The hour wheel may be white but I noticed it still has a slight texture rather than being flat gloss. I couldn't get the blued minute hand to come out the correct colour though in this shot.Sorry - "date wheel" came from muscle memory and I was referring to the hour wheel, of course. I was idly wondering if a decent alternative might have been to match the dial colour but use a subtly-coloured font, but I guess we'll never know unless you'd be willing to mod yours a bit so we can have a look
Martyn, sorry it took me a couple of days to come up with this wrist shot. I hope it shows what you wanted to see. As you can see my wrists aren't that big but, while the watch is large and not subtle, to me it doesn't look oversized. It fits under a shirt cuff. The strap could do with being about 5mm shorter though just because I am on the second to last hole.
Last edited by alfat33; 9th August 2021 at 17:38.
Great review , love the watch. Would love to see one in the flesh . I wish the minute and hour hands were the blue JLC ones in the reverso classic . But beyond that a stunning watch.
wow - simply stunning.
I wish I had more occasion to wear dress pieces.
Thanks, glad you like it. I know what you mean about the blued steel hands. JLC (and others) do them very well. Fortunately there are two on this watch, the second time zone minute hand and power indicator. Sorry the colour balance isn’t right, but the blue is pretty much spot on.
wow that's a rare beauty.. many congratulations
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