IWC

SJX
[Purist]
8540

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Pilot's Watch Hand-wound

The first Pilot’s Watch of 1936 starts things off. As the first special watch for the still young, gruelling form of transport it already had almost all the important features on board: for example a black dial with strong, luminescent hands and numerals that was the model for the development of the classical cockpit design, and later sometimes also a movement with antimagnetic parts of the escapement. And the first of a long series of professional pilot’s watches also had a rotating ring with a luminous triangle which helped with roughly calculating the flight time and thus fuel consumption.

The modern interpretation of this mother of all IWC pilot’s watches has the dial of the original, increased in size to that of the 44 mm case, a small seconds hand and a bidirectional adjustable rotating ring with the luminous triangle fitted from the inside. Instead of the 83-calibre, which was used in 1936, the Pilot’s Watch Hand-Wound is equipped with a special watchmaking gem – the 98300-calibre: a hand-wound pocket watch movement, a balance frequency of 2.5 Hz, large screw balance and Breguet balance spring.

The 98-calibre family, the design of which dates from the 1930s, is one of the IWC watch movements that has been series-produced over the longest time. Where it is used in the vintage watches, based on the technical style of the first Jones calibres of 1868 it has the nickel-plated and decorative three quarter plate made from nickel silver and the elongated index for easier precision adjustment of the active length of the balance spring, which was characteristic of all Jones calibres. The founder has thus left his mark here, something that will naturally catch the eye. For it is not only the actual “window” to the dial that is made of sapphire glass but also the transparent back cover. In addition, the sapphire glass over the fial is coated.

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