quote:

Originally posted by teenage-robot:


@ leitznoctilux: whoa! impressive pictures! is that watch yours? i like the military style maps (indochina i guess) as a background!

you seem to be (maybe) an "expert" on this watch - can you tell anything about the fixed bar-version of the raaf-model mentioned in atp?

it seems to be rather rare.

btw. the orinal vintage mark XI are far nicer than the mark XV - the date window destroys much of the clean look.

The RAF version had fixed bars, whilst the RAAF ones used normal spring bars. However the earliest RAAF watches came from RAF stocks and so had fixed bars. I have no idea how many were in this group.

All JLC Mk XIs are rare, only 2,700 in total were made & they are one of my favourite watches. There is a purity of design that results from it being an instrument designed for a specific purpose.

Adding the date window ruins that purity & (in my eyes) kills the watch.

The background is an MI9 E&E map of Burma. MI9 were the department of British Military Intelligence whose role was to assist Military Personnel in Escape & Evasion when in enemy territory. These maps, printed on silk, were provided to all aircrew so that if they found themselves behind enemy lines thay could navigate their way back. The maps were printed on silk because it could be folded really small without causing damage to the print and also because it held up well to the humid atmosphere.

LN

Walking round inna tux with a Suunto comp with its hose hooked up to nothing would look even worse...

(I know, you can get the wireless ones, but they're still ugly on their own.)

Actually, even though I've disagreed with Leitz in the past over watches (and cameras, but that's for another time...), a dive watch is handy for keeping a record of your bottom, and because, as LN said, it's based on entirely different technology than your dive comp.

Just in case for, oh, let's say, you happen to be within range of the EMP field from a small nuclear blast. Hypothetic, like.

lithos runs over to his bed, reaches under it, and pulls the dull-black hull of a carbon-fibre briefcase out from under the slats. Runs his fingers over the embossed Cyrillic, strewn out over the mute-grey of the titanium latches, the mouths to their locks a wry, twisted polygon. Rubs a thumb over the trefoil, shaped like three exclamation marks sharing the same dot, and each spaced exactly one-hundred and twenty degrees away from the other...

Anyway, yeah. What LN said. And, because I think I've earned it. I've never really bothered to attempt anything like getting a dive licence. So it's a symbol, sort of. And I never used to wear a watch.

I feel in love with a nice Tissot. For five hundred AU, it's still outta my price range. But it's lovely. I like the look of dive watches with the big, square-edged rotating bezel (by the way, Doxa bezel rotate both ways), and the strap attachments jutting from the case at hard right angles. That's what this Tissot looked like. Nice. I'm not a big fan of thin bezels, really.

But I'll wait. Any watch less than $500 tends to make up a significant part of $500, that its cost would be put to better use as savings for that Tissot...

Oh, and for all you watch Otaku, check out www.timezone.com.

My family has a tendency to get Tissot watches due to the similarity in pronunciation with our surname. In fact, when I called the bank this morning I was asked if I was Mr Tissot.

quote:

Originally posted by LeitzNoctilux:

The RAF version had fixed bars, whilst the RAAF ones used normal spring bars. However the earliest RAAF watches came from RAF stocks and so had fixed bars. I have no idea how many were in this group.

All JLC Mk XIs are rare, only 2,700 in total were made & they are one of my favourite watches.

so the atp watch has to be one of these early jlc handed over to the raaf from the raf because the watch has fixed bars in the book? do the markings mentioned in the book match these early raf-raaf-handover-watches:

"G6B1346

RA *AF
1fl153
The 6B denoting a particular grade of movement, degree of accuracy, he knows, though the 346 is a mystery. The broad arrow, central, the Queen's mark, her property. 53 the year of issue, but 172? Could the boy somehow pry knowledge from these numbers, if the question could be put to him? Somewhere out there, Fontaine knows, every last"


because i guess mr. gibson maybe made some "creative" fault - like the buzz-rickson jacket he discribed as being black though buzz rickson never produced one in black (not until gibson-devotees kept asking and begging buzz rickson for a black ma-1"

the burmese maps are a perfect match (thanks for providing the details)

are into military watches in general or only into jlc markXI ?

Wonder if Goong-Goong got issued one of those Mk. X1's....

Probably not, as he was a radio operator, not a navigator, but even so I think I'll be making a phone call to Mother tomorrow.

Addendum: Seems that the watch was issued after WWII, so he wouldn't have gotten one, anyway. Still, I'll check a few disposal stores out toward Enoggera and Amberley...

We're fairly ignorant of such things horological down here, so I may find one for cheap...

And here I am with a ten-dollar Timex on my wrist (hangs head in shame.) Tells the time just fine, though.

quote:

Originally posted by John Maddox Roberts:
And here I am with a ten-dollar Timex on my wrist (hangs head in shame.) Tells the time just fine, though.

as long as you are happy with it - why bother? as long as you are not one uf us "watch-otakus" as we have been called in this thread...

btw - can anybody around here tell me more details about the futurematic by jlc?

earlier in this thread two pictures of the futurematic were posted. one watch was marked "jaeger-lecoultre futurematic" on the dial the other one only "lecoultre futurematic"

as i know jaeger and lecoultre joined their companies in 1925 and produced under "jaeger-lecoultre".

a friend of mine told me that for the american market they continued to use the brand name "lecoultre" - without jaeger´s name for a while.

the questions is: until when? and when were the futurematics produced?

and now for my private interest - how much do i have to pay for a futurematic if i want one?

a goldplated "lecoultre futurematic" started on ebay recently for 1500€ - is that a fair price?

I imagine LeitzNoctilux can answer that, and in answer to your question on whether he is into military watches in general or just the jlc mark XI, he is being modest by not mentioning the fact that he edits a magazine on watches (it might even have something to do with www.timezone.com but I have lost his business card so I can't recall). He is a goldmine of knowledge on watches, and many other desirable gadgets.

ok ok i should research a bit then ask around.

a fast netsearch for pictures of the futurematic revealed something:

all watches of the futurematic type that are labeled with "lecoultre" only (to be meant for the american market if my friend is right) are also labeled "futurematic" on the dial.

those watches labeled "jaeger-lecoultre" are marked as "automatic" on the dial.

... as long as i can trust the pictures available from google pictures...

and in atp also only the name lecoultre is mentioned - so the atp-watch has to be (when i am right) an american-market model.

quote:

Originally posted by Kradlum:

I imagine LeitzNoctilux can answer that, and in answer to your question on whether he is into military watches in general or just the jlc mark XI, he is being modest by not mentioning the fact that he edits a magazine on watches (it might even have something to do with www.timezone.com but I have lost his business card so I can't recall).

Thanks for reminding me of why I'm a privacy freak.

for those deeply interested in jaeger-lecoultre watches:

http://www.jaegerlecoultreforum.com/

a rather unorganized but resourceful forum.

and yes there i discovered that my last guess was right: the futurematics were american-market-models signed only with "lecoultre" on the dial

prices range from 800 USD to 1500USD depending on condition and wether they come with the correct appendices [box, papers etc.]

the only thing still puzzling me is this "fixed-bars-thing" concerning konrads jlc mkXI.

quote:

Originally posted by teenage-robot:

btw - can anybody around here tell me more details about the futurematic by jlc?

I recently posted watch references in ATP on a watch forum (first entry) ... at the bottom of the entry I give some more links about the Futurematic, etc. It's worth going through the whole thread ...

http://www.tz-uk.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=17628&highlight=gibson

john

hi abraxas,

nice and informative thread at tz-uk.com

thee thread on the jaegerlecoultreforum about the "literary futurematic" may add information to this.

and to copy myself "the only thing still puzzling me is this "fixed-bars-thing" concerning konrads jlc mkXI."

on the overinformative markeleven.com-page we learn that all the rraf-mk XI had spring bars whereas the mk XI of konrad has fixed bars.

only a few numners of mk XI handed over from the raf to the raaf had the fixed bars. but as the watch of konrad is a 1953 model it should have spring bars.

btw can you tell us mor about the mr. dowling namend in the tread on tz-uk.com? and you mentione an interview in your last post there - maybe you can provide a link leading to this interview with gibson?

thx in advance

quote:

Originally posted by teenage-robot:

and to copy myself "the only thing still puzzling me is this "fixed-bars-thing" concerning konrads jlc mkXI."

Olright. Fixed bars vs springbars or spring-pins. Here is a picture of a mingy old watch:



The black arrow is pointing at a springbar, or spring-pin. It's hollow, multi-piece, and removable; the ends have little flanges (see the white arrows), and one grips them with a forked tool and pushes them inwards, against the springs. Makes it relatively easy to put the watch on a metal bracelet or two-piece leather strap, for example. 99% of civilian watches are equipped with springbars of some sort.

Military-issue watches were not intended to be worn on designer straps. Moreover, they're useless if they fall off when they get snagged. Springbars can be improperly installed, or can fail outright- I've had it happen. Not what our frogman or bombing raid pathfinder needs five minutes out, eh?

So, issued watches were often provided with fixed bars. Fixed, as in immovable. Unlike spring pins, these are solid lengths of stainless steel rod, normally quite thick, pressed, sweated, silver-soldered, or upset permanently into place, and not likely to come out.

The only downside for the casual civilian user of such a watch is that one-piece cloth straps become de rigeuer, unless one sews, glues, or clamps a two-piece strap onto the fixed bars. Because fixed bars don't come off- they're fixed in place.

The watch below has fixed bars (picture shamelessly stolen for the purposes of education):



See how fat they are? These are probably silver-soldered in place.

hey mean old man,

thanks for the pics so maybe the other forum members get an idea what i am talking about all the time.

to be precise: the watch of konrad in atp is the already discribed jaeger-lecoultre mk XI dated to 1953 and with raaf service markings. as discribed in atp this watch hase fixed bars (which is the reason why the watchstrap had to be sewn around these fixed bars).

well when you check out the marvelous www.markeleven.com-page you will find a table noting many of these watches raf and raaf-service.

the thing is all the watches that went to the raaf (like the model discribed in atp) had spring bars. as leitznoctilux revealed a little earlier in this thread there was a very limited quantity of theses watches that were originally produced for the raf having fixed bars and these were handed over to the raaf. but these were earlier models 1949 or so and definitely not 1953.

so we see there is appently no 1953 raaf-model having fixed bars.

so maybe this is a simple fault of mr. gibson or at least seems to be.
and this feult only matters to oberexcessive watch-otakus like me ;-) and the books do not get any better or worse - they stay brilliant.

the effects of such creative "faults" are illustrated in the buzz rickson ma1-jacket, which is now being produced as the pattern recognition model an hell i spend a thought about buying it ;-)

Stop getting your panties in a twist, teenage robot. Do you think this information was known to all and sundry? Yeah, it's the first thing anyone tells you if you go to Australia, or visit the RAAF homepage. Maybe this information wasn't known when ATP was written? Who'd have guessed Aussie Pilots had a horror of One-piece nylon or leather straps...

quote:

Originally posted by martin:

Yeah, it's the first thing anyone tells you if you go to Australia...

"Oi! Welcome t' Straylier, myte! Oi'm misty! Our issued ayvyaytion watches ain't got fixed bahhs! 'Ave a Cooper's, myte! You'll 'ave 'ad yer wank..."

Yeah. Right.

quote:

Originally posted by Mean Old Man:

quote:

Originally posted by martin:

Yeah, it's the first thing anyone tells you if you go to Australia...

"Oi! Welcome t' Straylier, myte! Oi'm misty! Our issued ayvyaytion watches ain't got fixed bahhs! 'Ave a Cooper's, myte! You'll 'ave 'ad yer wank..."

Yeah. Right.

aussies... sigh

hell yeah. the things only only my private hyperinquisitive interest - but hey it´s solved .

quote:

Originally posted by teenage-robot:

.....................................

only a few numners of mk XI handed over from the raf to the raaf had the fixed bars. but as the watch of konrad is a 1953 model it should have spring bars.

btw can you tell us mor about the mr. dowling namend in the tread on tz-uk.com? and you mentione an interview in your last post there - maybe you can provide a link leading to this interview with gibson?

thx in advance

There is no way the fixed-bar JLC is a 1953. What it sound to me like is ... it's an earlier watch ... with a later back. Happens all the time.

A new article on JLC's Classic Ebauche:
http://ninanet.net/watches/others12/Mediums/mjlc125.html

Since then I posted another thread about watch references in ATP (I deliberately left some out).
http://www.tz-uk.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=17628&postda...ighlight=atp&start=0

... which will give you an intro to a new watch called Cabestan ... based on the Curta calculator (which was introduced to Mr Gibson by Mr Dowling).

john

This message has been edited. Last edited by: tiger68,