patek philippe annual calendar chronograph

Patek Philippe’s
One-Eyed Wonder
Patek Philippe’s first-ever automatic chronograph watch
is an annual calendar with an unconventional, eye-catching
chronograph subdial.
BY JOE THOMPSON
ost mechanical chronographs
have what the watch gang refers
to as “three eyes,” i.e. three subdials – one for the hour counter, another for
the minute counter, and a third for the independent seconds hand.
Sometimes you come across two-eyed
chronographs that forgo the 12-hour counter.
Picky, prestigious Patek Philippe, in fact, is partial to these. Its latest version appeared last
year in Ref. 5959P, the world’s thinnest splitseconds chronograph.
M
What you never see, though, is a one-eyed
chronograph. Until now.
At Baselworld in April, Patek Philippe will
present another new chronograph caliber. It
debuts in the new Annual Calendar Chronograph, Ref. 5960P, which combines a chronograph with Patek Philippe’s patented annual
calendar mechanism. The new watch is brimming with Patek Philippe firsts:
■ Its movement, developed and manufactured entirely in-house, is the first automatic
chronograph caliber in Patek’s 167-year history.
The smaller blue hand on the chronograph subdial counts the hours and the larger red hand the
minutes. The small round aperture is a day/night indicator.
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WatchTime April 2006
■ What’s more, the movement contains the
firm’s first-ever flyback mechanism, whereby
when you push the return to zero button, the
chrono seconds hand automatically begins
timing again.
■ Thanks to a Patek innovation, it is the first
chronograph whose central chronograph seconds hand can also serve as the standard seconds hand.
■ It is the first Patek Philippe watch to feature the chronograph functions in one subdial
(hence the one eye). The 12-hour and 60minute chronograph counters are arranged in
a single, large, two-ringed subdial that dominates the lower half of the watch. (Since the
central seconds hand does double duty timing
both chronograph seconds and standard seconds, there is no need for an independent seconds subdial.)
■ Not to be overlooked is the fact that this is
the first Patek Philippe-created chronograph in
two decades that does not use a Nouvelle Lemania ébauche.
Patek is introducing the watch in a classic
round platinum case. It will be available in limited quantities in the United States shortly,
priced around $55,000. Eventually a goldcased version will follow, says Patek Philippe
president Philippe Stern.
Patek Philippe, for obvious reasons, is
particularly proud of the piece. It’s the latest
in a series of what it calls “practical complications,” defined as “a complicated wristwatch
with functions that are truly useful in everyday life.” In January the company invited
150 members of the international watch
press for a pre-Baselworld preview of Ref.
5960P at its manufacturing facility and headquarters in Plan-les-Ouates, on the outskirts of
Geneva.
Patek Philippe’s platinum
Annual Calendar Chronograph will sell for around
$55,000.
PATEK PHILIPPE ANNUAL CALENDAR CHRONOGRAPH
The automatic chronograph movement features a unidirectional 21k gold central rotor.
Vive la difference
As the first automatic chronograph Patek Philippe has ever made, and the first chronograph
made completely in-house since the 1980s,
the watch has plenty of Patek cachet. The
watch took five years to develop, Philippe
Stern says. Patek’s goal, he says, was to make
an automatic chronograph watch that is
durable, different and easy-to-operate (see
Stern interview sidebar).
The new chrono caliber is designed to complement the basic manual-wind chronograph
caliber that Patek has used for the past 60
years. The caliber was designed in 1945, Stern
says. Since the 1980s, Patek has produced this
basic chronograph caliber in its workshops
(Caliber CH27-70) using an ébauche manufactured exclusively for Patek Philippe by Nouvelle
Lemania. Patek has used this caliber for all of its
chronographs and will continue to use it. “We
will still keep the old traditional chronograph,”
Stern says. “That piece is still beautiful. It will
always be good for collectors.”
The automatic caliber, however, is designed
to be more durable than the 1945 version. “It
could be used more as a sports watch, which is
not the case for the very traditional chrono-
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WatchTime April 2006
graph,” Stern says. Its sturdier, more
modern construction will allow Patek to produce higher quantities
than it could of the traditional
chronograph, whose production was quite limited.
The caliber beats at a frequency of 28,800 vibrations
per hour (4 hertz). It is
stamped with the Geneva Seal,
as are all Patek Philippe mechanical movements. A unidirectional 21k-gold central rotor, visible through an exhibition caseback,
delivers the winding power.
An automatic chronograph movement,
while new for Patek Philippe, is commonplace
in the Swiss watch industry. The challenge for
the Patek Philippe team was to develop one
that is not only outstanding but that stands
out. The solution came with the development
of a disk clutch in the chronograph mechanism; it led to both a technical and a design innovation.
The new chronograph mechanism is based
on the column-wheel principle for controlling
the start/stop commands. This caliber, however, differs from classic Patek Philippe columnwheel chronographs thanks to what Patek calls
“a remarkable innovation.” Patek described
the innovation as follows: “The clamps do not
control the engagement of a lever-mounted
clutch wheel with the chronograph train but
instead act on a disk clutch that transmits
(chronograph running) or interrupts (chronograph stopped) the power between the fourth
wheel and the chronograph hand. This is a
highly reliable solution that eliminates the occurrence of backlash-induced hand jitter or
bouncing because it does not involve the sudden meshing of teeth when the chronograph is
started.
“It also replaces the conventional threewheel chronograph train that for reasons of
wear made it inadvisable to keep the chronograph running permanently. In this movement,
the chronograph hand can be used without
hesitation as a continuously running seconds
hand; because this has no negative impact on
the rate accuracy of the watch, the subsidiary
An exploded view Patek Philippe’s first
automatic column-wheel chronograph
movement reveals many of its 456 parts.
An exploded view of the annual calendar
mechanism.
PATEK PHILIPPE ANNUAL CALENDAR CHRONOGRAPH
The upper half of the dial contains the day,
date and month indicators of the annual calendar, which only needs adjusting once a year.
DATA
seconds dial customarily found in many
chronographs is no longer needed.”
What’s more, the flyback function enables
the wearer to instantaneously shift the seconds
hand from standard timing to chronograph
timing. One push of the button at 4 o’clock
quickly returns the seconds hand to zero where
it automatically begins chronograph timing.
The technological advance that eliminated
the need for a subsidiary seconds dial freed Patek designers to play around with the hour and
minute counters and opened the door to Patek’s first one-eyed chrono.
A two-ring circus
“The subdial is something really new,” says
Thierry Stern, vice president of Patek Philippe,
who was involved in the design of the watch
(and is Philippe Stern’s son). “We’ve never
done anything like it before.” The unconventional silver-gray subdial is the most distinctive
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WatchTime April 2006
PATEK PHILIPPE ANNUAL CALENDAR
CHRONOGRAPH
Manufacturer: Patek Philippe S.A.,
Plan-les-Ouates, Geneva, Switzerland
Reference number: 5960P
Functions: Hours, minutes, seconds, chronograph with 12-hour and 60-minute totalizers;
annual calendar with day, date, and month
indicators; power-reserve indicator; day-night
indicator
Movement: Patek Philippe self-winding mechanical movement, Caliber CH 28-520 IRM QA
24H; diameter = 33 mm (base movement 30
mm, date ring 33 mm), height = 7.68 mm
(movement 5.20 mm, calendar module 2.48
mm); frequency = 28,800 vph (4 Hz); Breguet
balance spring; 456 parts (movement 302,
calendar module 154); 40 jewels (35 movement,
5 calendar module); central winding rotor in 21k
gold, unidirectional winding, oil-free ball bearing
with zirconium balls; four-arm Gyromax balance
with four inertia blocks; power reserve = 55 hours;
column wheel chronograph; Geneva Seal hallmark
Case: 950 platinum; sapphire-crystal glass with
anti-reflection coating; diamond at 6 o’clock;
water-resistant to 25 meters; day-of-week corrector push piece at 9 o’clock, date corrector
push piece between 9 and 10 o’clock, month
corrector push piece at 10 o’clock
Dial: Two-tone charcoal and silvery gray; 8 hour
markers in 18k white gold; 11 Super-Luminova
luminous dots; leaf-shaped hour and minute
hands in 18k-white gold with Super-Luminova
luminous coating; baton-style sweep center
chronograph/ seconds hand in sand-blasted,
rhodiumed steel with counterweight; power-reserve indicator with baton-style 18k white-gold
hand, sand-blasted and rhodiumed; silvery gray,
azuré subsidiary dial at 6 o’clock: 12-hour indication on inner ring via baton-style hand in bluelacquered brass, 60-minute indication on two
concentric scales on outer ring via baton-style
hand in red-lacquered brass; day-night display
(white for day, blue for night) in subdial; day-ofweek display aperture between 10 and 11 o’clock, date display aperture at 12 o’clock in polished white-gold frame, month display aperture
between 1 and 2 o’clock
Strap: Hand-stitched brown alligator with
platinum fold-over clasp
Dimensions: Diameter = 40.5 mm (including
crown 43.25 mm), height = 13.55 mm,
width between lugs = 21 mm
Price: Around $55,000
feature of the Annual Calendar Chronograph’s
face. Its two-color, two-hand construction is
designed to enable the wearer to read the
chronograph indicators at a glance.
The smaller blue hand counts the hours
from 1 to 12 noted on the inner scale of the
subdial. The larger red hand counts the minutes on the subdial’s outer scale, making one
revolution every 30 minutes. (You can tell
which revolution it is in – 0 to 30 minutes or 31
to 60 minutes - from the position of the hour
hand relative to the diamond-shaped half-hour
markers on the hour scale.) The subdial also
features a day/night indicator, a small round
aperture above the 6-hour mark that progressively changes color from day (white) to night
(dark blue).
Patek connoisseurs will notice another subtle Patek Philippe “first” in this watch. Normally in Patek Philippe annual and perpetual calendar watches, the calendar corrector push
pieces for adjusting the calendar displays are
recessed in the right side of the case. In this
watch, the recessed correctors for the day, date
and month are on the left side of the case due
to chronograph push buttons at 2 and 4 o’clock on the right. “I was very surprised when I
saw those three pushers,” admits Thierry
Stern. “I’m not used to seeing that. It’s something we’ve never done before.”
The patented Patek Philippe Annual Calendar automatically accounts for months with 30
and 31 days. If the watch is always running,
the calendar only needs to be adjusted manually once a year on March 1. The calendar indications are in apertures arranged in an arc
across the top of the dial. Most prominent is
the date at 12 o’clock, which is made more
prominent by a polished white-gold frame.
Below the date window is the power reserve indicator, whose hand winds down from
a + symbol on the right (fully wound with 55
hours of power) to a – symbol on the left as the
movement loses power. The hand is made of
18k white gold, as are the eight hour markers
on the dial.
One small, nearly hidden detail that should
not be overlooked: the diamond in the case between the bottom lugs, which Patek Philippe
puts on every platinum watch.
PATEK PHILIPPE ANNUAL CALENDAR CHRONOGRAPH
PHILIPPE STERN: “NOBODY ELSE HAS ANYTHING LIKE THIS.”
“It’s a new development.
You can let the chronograph seconds hand sweep
around continuously and
there is no wear and tear.”
Patek Philippe unveiled the 5960P Annual
Calendar Chronograph at a soirée for the international watch press at its manufacturing
facility and headquarters in Plan-les-Ouates
in late January. At the event, company president Philippe Stern met privately with a
group of American watch journalists for a
question-and-answer session. What follows
are excerpts from his remarks.
Q: What was the thinking behind
launching Patek’s first-ever automatic
chronograph caliber?
Stern: From the beginning we said we’d like
to make it a little bit different because many
people make an automatic chronograph today. We wanted to make it a bit more simple and easy to read, so we went to work on
a new way of making it. It took some time.
Like everything we do, we are never too
fast. It took us five years to develop. Today,
as in the past, we want to be sure that what
is coming out of Patek Philippe will have a
lasting value. We cannot afford to make
something very nice but not too reliable.
That’s why it takes time.
I believe it is a very interesting piece because it is very simple, very high quality. It’s
made like a traditional chronograph, with a
column wheel. Until now, the basic design
that we had for the chronograph was made
in 1945. It is traditional, beautiful. I don’t
think we could ever do better.
But in the meantime, since 1945, we have
been able to improve a little bit. Today, with
modern production technology, we thought
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WatchTime April 2006
we could do something even more reliable,
a bit stronger and sturdier, something that
could be used more as a sport watch, which
is not the case with the very traditional
chronograph. So, we gave this watch a new
look – younger, more sporty.
Of course, we start with a platinum case,
which makes the price much higher today
because the cost of platinum is very high. In
the first year we are never able to produce a
large quantity, so it’s almost to reduce demand that we made it in platinum. Later on
we will make it in gold, whether white gold
or pink gold has to be decided.
type of clutch, so there is no problem. You
can let the chronograph seconds hand
sweep around continually and there is no
wear and tear. It’s a new idea, a better development than what we did before.
It is also our first flyback, which is interesting. So if you want to time something,
you just press and it goes back to zero and
starts right away.
Q: Is it different from the 1945 chronograph in terms of how you produce it?
Stern: We built this movement in order
to make a larger production. Today with
the new technology, the parts are much better made than 20 or 30 years ago. In the old
caliber, all parts had to be adjusted one by
one because the tooling was not as good as
today’s tooling. We try now to be much
more uniform in the production. Since the
concept was to have a larger production,
we can make more with this new movement. In the old type, you are limited in the
amount you can produce. We don’t disclose
the figures, but it’s not many pieces per
year.
Q: How will this affect production of
your Lemania-based chronograph?
Stern: We will still keep the old traditional
chronograph. That piece is still beautiful. It
will always be good for collectors.
Q: How many pieces of the new
reference will you make this year?
Stern: Even if we knew exactly, we would
not tell. It’s not a very large number. We are
not talking about a thousand pieces. We
won’t have enough, this is sure. For collectors, this is a very interesting piece and not
so expensive for certain people. The value is
there. Nobody else has anything like this. I
am convinced demand will be very high. We
hope to increase production slowly but
surely.
Q: For you, what is the most important
thing about this watch?
Stern: On the technical side, certainly the
simplicity and elegance. We wanted to
make something very easy to read. It is not
easy to make something simple.
And we put new technology inside. In a
traditional chronograph, you should not really let your sweep seconds hand turn continuously because if you do, you will have
wear and tear. In the Lemania type of movement, when the sweep hand is always turning, the movement will deteriorate. It will
not last 20 or 30 years. So in order to avoid
this, we found a new system. We have a
Q: It seems that in recent years Patek
Philippe has opted for bolder styling in
your new pieces. Is that so?
Stern: That’s the biggest difficulty for us: to
have a Patek Philippe look and still be practical and try to be more contemporary. It
doesn’t all work together. We can only
evolve slowly. This piece is new, it’s different, but it has a Patek Philippe look. And I
think that’s what we have to try to do. Certainly we are not in fashion design; we are
much more conservative. But still, you have
to live with your times. Our customers are
younger. We also have to make product for
them.
■
PATEK PHILIPPE SPIROMAX BALANCE SPRING
Patek Philippe’s
new Spiromax
balance spring
A better balance spring
from Patek Philippe
Using a revolutionary new material and a new geometrical
approach, Patek Philippe says it “is ushering in a new era” in
balance spring technology.
year ago, Patek Philippe unveiled the
first Swiss lever escapement with a silicon escape wheel, a breakthrough
that eliminates the need for oil. Now Patek is
back with another horological improvement
involving silicon. In January it introduced a new
balance spring called Spiromax, made of a silicon-based material. “It constitutes,” Patek
Philippe says, “an epochal step forward in the
constant quest for isochronism in mechanical
wristwatches.” Spiromax will improve the rate
accuracy and stability of its mechanical watches, Patek says, and enhance their longevity and
long-term value.
A
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WatchTime April 2006
Patek Philippe plans to continue to test the
Spiromax spring before introducing it as the
standard for all its regularly produced movements. It will, though, present the innovation
in a limited-edition watch at Baselworld 2006
at the end of March.
Isochronism (from Greek works meaning
“equal” and “time”) is the key to accuracy in a
mechanical watch: the greater the regularity of
the vibration of the balance spring, the more
accurate the rate of the movement. Many
things interfere with a spring’s isochronism.
They include the asymmetry of the expansion
and contraction phases of the balance spring,
gravity and centrifugal forces, changes in elasticity, magnetic fields, and mechanical and
thermal material changes at the two spring attachment points.
Spiromax is designed to reduce or eliminate
these factors. It was developed by Patek Philippe’s research department in association with
a research institute and other partners in the
watch industry. Its distinctive features are the
design of its terminal curve and the unique design of the attachment points at both ends of
the spring. The “Patek Philippe terminal
curve,” for which a patent is pending, presents
a new design inside the spring’s plane of oscillation. It is thicker at the outer end of the
spring, which creates a concentric development upon the spring. Patek says this causes
the expansion and contraction to be symmetric
relative to its center over the entire plane of oscillation. Consequently, the Spiromax spring
can be made three times thinner than a spring
with a Philips or Breguet overcoil, the better to
construct ultra-thin movements.
Spiromax has two other important design
features. In the center it has an integral selfcentering balance staff collet. At the outer end
is an integral stud attachment that precisely
defines the active length of the spring. Both
the balance staff collet and the stud attachment end of the spring were developed inhouse; Patek Philippe has applied for patents
for both. The advantage of the Spiromax design is that the active length does not need to
be painstakingly adjusted for each individual
movement.
Spiromax offers a number of benefits, Patek
says. Contrary to conventional springs, there is
no thermal or mechanical deformation at the
attachment points. There is less internal friction and greater elasticity than with Invar alloys. The spring vibrates with ideal concentricity even without an overcoil. It is designed to
be isochronous regardless of the temperature,
the orientation of the movement, or the presence of magnetic fields.
Joe Thompson ■