It's alive....

Just got my Aristo back from my friendly neighbourhood watch guy. Simple repair according to him. The mainspring inside the watch barrel broke. So, in goes a new one and all is OK. A simple inspection and service was also done to make sure everything is OK. 

In an earlier post, I mentioned that the movement in the watch is an ETA 2801. Well, I was wrong. The movement is an ETA 2804-2. The difference? Date complication. The ETA 2804 has a date complication. Does not make sense to me as the watch does not have a date window. Oh, well.....

My Aristo, dead

Sadly my Aristo watch has 'died'. Basically you can wind and wind and it does not stop winding. Oh, it is a manual wind watch powered by an ETA 2801 movement. I figure the 'clutch mechanism' is 'broken'. You can hear it slip when you wind the watch. Was planning to send it to my friendly neighbourhood watch guy, but his shop was closed today. Tomorrow then.... 

The Aristo with the 'hour angle' dial.

The movement, ETA 2801.

 Closer view. 

Will update this as to the actual problem once it is fixed. 

Lume shot

It has been some time since I last did a lume shot. Here is the lume shot of the Aristo Navigator XL, reference 3H59H with the hour angle dial. However it is not a true hour angle watch. I like the lume on the watch although there are some loss at the 20 minute mark. 

Aristo 3H59H Watch

So what watch did I get? Well I got the Aristo 3H59H watch. This watch is part of a 6 watch collection under Aristo B-Uhren in XL-format. The collection consist of 3 watches in each reference, A or H. The reference A is the automatic version, powered by the ETA 2824-2 movement, while the reference H is powered by the ETA 2801-2 hand wind movement. 

A bit about Aristo. Aristo was founded in 1907 by Julius Epple in Pforzheim, Germany. The family held the company for 3 generations until 1998 when it was sold Hansjorg Vollmer. The company is now known as Aristo Vollmer GMBH.

The watches in the collection are as follows:

Reference 3H57 A or H, Beobachter

Reference 3H58 A or H, Pilot

Reference 3H59 A or H, Navigator

The watches, left to right, 3H57, 3H58 and 3H59.

All the watches share the same basic specifications:

Functions: hours, minutes and seconds

Case: stainless steel, 43 mm diameter, 11 mm thick, 22 mm lug width

Crystal: sapphire

Water resistant: 5 ATM

Price: Reference A: USD 700, Reference H: USD 630

I got the watch at a very good price, NIB (new in box). I like the watch. While it may have the hour angle indication type dial, it is not a true hour angle indication watch. The hour hand completes a rotation in 12 hours as compared to a real hour angle indication watch which does it in 24 hours.

The watch.

The 'hour angle' indication dial. The inner dial is marked in degrees instead of the normal hour markers.

The most distinguishable feature, the really huge crown. It measures 9 mm in diameter and 5.5 mm thick.

The sweep second hand is actually light yellow in colour. The hour and minute hands are luminous as are all the markers.

The movement. Although the brochure states that the reference H is powered by the ETA 2801-2, this watch is fitted with an ETA 2804-2.

The movement is unsigned.

The pilot design strap.

The watch again.