IWC

HSTE
[Omega Moderator]
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IWC Ingenieur 866 "Military" - almost a prototype (?). Anyway a nice example of a .....

...aviators' inspired watch!

Many of us here are familiar with the IWC Ingenieur ref. 866, the second generation of IWC Ingenieurs. They are quite rare as the production run for 866 counted probably only some 2000 pieces in the time period between 1967 and 1976. Among those Ingenieur 866, there are a few very (very!) rare birds, called the 866 "Military". I will quote here from Crott Auktionen in Frankfurt which had one on auction back in November 2011:

"IWC Ingenieur Aviator's Watch - As far as we know, only very few of the IWC Ingenieur watches were designed as aviators' watches. The German Air Force for example used the watch for test purposes but only ever ordered a very small quantity of it".

A similar military ref. 866 can be seen in the IWC Museum in Schaffhausen. Also, one of these is shown in the IWC book from King and Tölke from 1986 on page 183. Certain sources speak of somewhere between 6 to 12 of these models having been produced.

Enclosed you see one of my 866 military. The interesting thing is that the two examples that I have were - according to the IWC extract of archives - both delivered to J. Luiz de Carvalho, the IWC representative in Angola. The model below on November 10, 1971, the other one that I have on April 24, 1970. Note that none of my two examples has any military markings on the case back (which is consistent to literature).

Very nice watch in my opinion.

Cheers, HSTE