We???ve thus far been pleased with the small selection of Davosa pieces we received here at the Watch Cave. Unfortunately, and, in a way, fortunately, the Davosa 160.394.56 aka the Mecanique, was the weakest piece of the bunch, which says a lot about Davosa as a whole.
In a recent publication, it was said of a particular brand of watches known for its aviation and extreme sport timepieces “if you can die doing it, this company makes a watch for it.” That statement, and company, is a topic of conversation for another story. But to riff on that line a bit, if you can kill someone doing it, then Chase-Durer makes a watch for it. The fine folks at Chase-Durer will probably cringe at such a crass statement, but looking at their inventory, one thing cannot be denied: these are serious pieces of equipment for people involved in serious missions. Jet fighter aces, Special Forces demolition experts, and bomber pilots are just some of the serious professionals who wear Chase-Durer timepieces.
A hot little number from Nubeo.
Two fundamental elements of the timepiece create the essence of the black jellyfish. These elements are the bezel and the strap. In them, we have merged two materials of conflicting natures as if they were one.
The body of the bezel is made of stainless steel that in a second process is covered with rubber. In the upper part of the bezel are inlaid the twelve numbers of the hours. These numbers are large and their top part respects the spherical shape of the bezel, being slightly lower in order to protect them from bumps and scratches. For the elaboration of this piece it was necessary to develop a new technology in the process of rubber injection that up to now had not been possible in the manufacturing of bezels of this type.
Hello, All.
We’ll we’re back online after a MASSIVE server failure. We’ve lost quite a bit of our content, but we’re aiming to be up and running after the holiday.
This is a serious piece of timekeeping machinery. Yeah, it’s quartz, but the Rambo factor of the watch earns the term “serious” in my book.
When a man and a watchmaker love each other very much, they get together and make beautiful watches. That’s exactly what happened in the Netherlands. Willem Kamerman and Till Lottermann wanted to create a system for creating and selling excellent, high-end dress watches on-line. Thus, Blancier was born.
We???ve all heard it. The endless refrain from friends and family who want a watch. No, they don???t want one of those old fashioned watches. They want a good quartz one. Show them a Citizen or Seiko flight computer and they???re all like, ???No, that???s too big and too many buttons.??? So you sit down with them, assess their needs, and pick out a nice Diesel or Fossil or DKNY and just let them enjoy themselves.
The DKNY 5073 is the first in a series of pieces we???ve recently received from Fossil. Fossil is manufacturing most of DKNY???s watch selection.
This world-time watch consists of just two hands and a dream. Running the Zexus ZAD44 quartz movement, this watch can automatically set itself to any one of 30 time zones. That, my friends, is about it.
The finish and quality of this piece are average. The case is made of brushed stainless steel and is almost half an inch thick, which seems to be overkill. The face is 40 mm with a black face with small hour and minute numerals. There is a mineral crystal and the DKNY logo is situated prominently above the time zone read-out.
The lugs are unique in that they begin halfway up the case and curve down and are connected to an attractive black leather band and signed buckle. The back of the watch is polished stainless steel and this piece is apparently waterproof to 50 meters, although the leather band won???t like a bath, we suspect. The back of this piece was off center, as if it had been hastily put together. We hope this is not the case with the final pieces.
Setting the watch is easy: pull out the crown to set the time, press and hold to set the timezone. Once you???re done setting the time zone, simply press the second button at 2 o???clock to change the hands. There is no date window and the current time zone appears in a negative LCD readout, which means that the letters and numbers in the read out are actually NOT lit while the blocks surrounding the letters are lit. Imagine a cut-out in a black piece of paper and you get the idea. This allows the readout to blend into the face quite nicely and the 5 second back light glows through the letters.
In terms of style, this is a nice piece for that special someone who travels quite a bit. Perhaps a cousin who just got a job as a consultant, flying from Kansas to Florida to Cali? Perhaps for dear old Brother who visits Las Vegas every month for his blackjack fix?
Overall, the 5073 is an acceptable watch. It is, however, a bit simple for the size and movement and if your idea of a big trip is hitting the Wal-Mart on the other side of town, perhaps its one feature won???t do you much good.
Quality: 3/5
Style: 4/5
Overall: 3/5
-John Biggs
The Nooka Zoo is like the Nooka Zot???s sensible older brother. Sure, this watch likes to rebel, but it stays within the bounds of reason and propriety and offers a perfect role-model for other small-run, classic watches to strive towards emulating.
The biggest piece of vaporware since Windows Longhorn has finally hit the street: the Fossil Wrist PDA. Yes, it’s here, dropping mad science on all you geeks out there.
Rarely does something come along that forces you to rethink old ways of doing things. Think about it… what piece of design or engineering, in the past, say, ten years, has really caused you to reconsider the ruling paradigm?
