watches

[deanofs]

do you own an aviation watch, if yes, which one ? Are they to be recommended or are they the same as ga folks wearing pilot bars etc on their shirts ?? Oh... and Happy Easter fellow ppruners:=

[Bright-Ling]

This has been done sooooo many times old boy!

Just go back a couple of weeks on this forum alone.

Oh and for the record, there are three aviation watches I would recommend:

Breitling, Breitling and Breitling

B-L

(Sat here in my white dressing gown complete with epaullettes and 3 gold bars!)

[TheKentishFledgling]

http://www.pprune.org/forums/showthread.php?threadid=85708

It's been covered in Jet Blast within the last week.

Personally, I fancy a Chase Durer.

tKF

[Keef]

If you've got £1500 to spare on a label, then Breitling's for you. I've got a Breitling. When I fly, I don't use it. They've tried to make it work right so many times that I gave up on it. It looks great, though. It keeps time within a second or so a month, but the stopwatch stops and starts (and has a fit every so often), which makes timing an instrument approach "interesting".

I got a "Super Luminova" German pilot's watch, new, no box cos they're not "green", off Ebay for £75 and it's excellent.

[AC-DC]

I have the Breitling Emergency, hardly been used, will sell for £1950.

[BEagle]

Breitling Aerospace. The biz. Preferably a classic model without the italicised numerals. Reliable, accurate, good looking.......










...and makes chicks moist. Ooops - did I say that. Sorry!

[AerBabe]

I would have bought a Breitling, but the ladies' models are quartz only... :(
Ended up with something just as nice, but with an automatic movement. :ok:

[Grob Driver]

Breitling B1… I wouldn’t be without it! Looks great, keeps excellent time, and has some pretty nifty stuff for flying too!

[Bright-Ling]

Had a Colt, an Aerospace (always go for the titanium model and strap!) and now a Blackbird (essentially a Chrnomat GT)

They are excellent. Simple!

(BEagle - only moist eh? You are slackin' old boy!)

[Wunper]

I have an Omega Speedmaster "moon watch" which is pure swiss class, V accurate for a mechanical movement and it's very pretty but only tells the time and has a single stopwatch function (but to be fair the design is about 40 years old.

I recently bought a titaniaum Citizen Eco- Drive Skyhawk, it has more menus than a chinese takeaway is very clear and is about 1/3 the price of a new Omega. It also has a very good time zone function and whizwheel slide rule bezel.

Wunper

[max roll rate]

I have a Breitling B2, blue faced a thing of beauty makes me smile when ever i look at it :D :D

[Genghis the Engineer]

I wear a Seiko military.

Looks okay, runs forever, keeps excellent time. No idea who thought that we only want 30 minute stopwatches. Also everybody replaces the straps, which are incredibly uncomfortable.

Frankly, if it packed up, I'd not spend more than £50 on a replacement. Basically I want hands, reliability and a stopwatch and you don't need to spend hundreds of pounds for that.

G

[Monocock]

I bought a watch 9 years ago.

A Breitling and I wouldnt change it for anything.

[vintage ATCO]

Sunk a whole month's pay in Jan 1968 in a Breitling old Old Navitimer, £49 15s. Still wear it.

VA

[murphy1901]

Got a Breitling Aerospace (the one Beagle refers to, without the italicised numerals) for my 40th.

A great watch, with a titanium bracelet.. who's only oddity was to go slightly berserk when the battery was running low... at one point the LCD portion of the watched claimed it was 13:92pm :hmm:

[BEagle]

On the subject of Breitling batteries, DON'T be tempted to have one changed by anyone other than a Breitling dealer approved to do the work. Several people I know had batteries changed in Bahrain; Breitling tell me that their warranties will be invalid as a result.....

2-tone titianium/titanium nitride Aerospace with titanium face and 2-tone braclet, no italicised numerals and no 'repetition minutes' or '16 valve turbo intercooler full time four wheel drive' script on the face - the best looking Aerospace they ever made!

[Megaton]

Between the Aerospace and the B-1, the B-1 wins hands-down (sic). Although it is heavier, it has a better range of genuinely useful functions. I do wish they'd orientate the sliding bezel clockwise instead of anti- and get rid of the navigation computer; otherwise it's brilliant.

[matspart3]

never seen the fascination with posh watches myself...I bought an Avia Tec (£4.99 from Argos) in 1996, still going strong

It has two special features, it has a stopwatch and tells the time:O

[Flap40]

How does a prostitute spot a pilot?

Easy!

Big Watch, Small D**k, No Money;)

[Kingy]

Watches, watches, watches... like 'em, got loads (around 50 at the last count).

Depends what you are going for - let's face it Breitlings are a little 'passe' aren't they? How about an Omega Speedmaster Pro - any watch used to time critical burn on the Apollo 13's re-entery is good enough for me!:D

Kingy (dug in ready to receive abuse:} )

[AerBabe]

Tags are nice too... :D

AB (Forgot to look at Kingy's watch collection cos she was too busy playing with his cub!)

[Viggen]

I wear the Seiko military, very clear and easy to use in flight.

Nobody has mentioned the Sinn pilot's chronographs - see http://www.chronomaster.co.uk/Sinn%20Current%20Stock.htm these are lovely timepieces.

Also rather fancy a Tag Carrera ...

[tmmorris]

I have an Avia from Argos too (!) which I use at night, as it has a light (something most of the £1000's of pounds watches seem to have forgotten about!) and I can leave it permanently set to UTC. Not very accurate, though - gains about 5secs a month.

I mostly wear a Citizen Eco-Drive Skyhawk, since I like (a) the rechargeable solar cell battery, and (b) the slide-rule around the edge for time/distance calculations: set your speed against the 60 mark and you can do quite calculations in flight.

Tim

[Final 3 Greens]

I've got an old Breitling Navitimer Cosmonaute which has a manual movement and a 24HR face - looks similar to an Old Navitimer.

It's beautifully accurate and the simpler manual movement (no date function) is rugged as h*ll.

I use it when travelling across a lot of timezones, as you can keep it on zulu and stay oriented.

But I'd never use it for flying, where a Seiko quartz chronograph does the job equally well and would cost a lot less to replace if it got bust or lost.

PS: Kingy, the Cosmonaute was developed for the Mercury programme when men were men :D

[T_richard]

Flap40

The same is said of ocean sailors.....''nice big watch you've got there, sorry to hear about your dick":(

[IronHen]

Breitlings WILL let you down. My Aerospace 100m failed after only 5 years - let in water whilst swimming in nightstop hotel pool. Our local Breiling agent said they generally fail around the crown seal after 3 years! Where does it say that in the brochure?

From now on I'll be the guy wearing a nice cheap waterproof and (just as) accurate Casio in the pool!

Oh yes, by the way, I'll have to fork out over £300 to get a new mechanism if I want to continue to be a jerk and wear my Breitling again!

[Grob Driver]

IronHen,

I think you’re wrong to say that Breitlings WILL let you down… MAY let you down, or CAN let you down, but not WILL! I’ve had my aerospace for 7 years now and have never had a thing go wing with it… As for my B1… Touch wood, so far it’s been just as reliable at the Aerospace!

I’d recommend one any day!
:ok:

[MLS-12D]

I have a Speedmaster Pro, which my wife bought me as a present after I completed the PPL (I am so spoiled). It works well, and the stopwatch is easy to use and read.:ok: I do wear it while flying spamcans and the like, but not sailplanes or any other aircraft where I am likely to bash it into something; the old Timex Ironman comes into play then.;)

[TangoZulu]

Breitling Aerospace - two tone titanium strap etc

Bought as a wedding present for me not long after completing the PPL - don't use it in the air as I find any watch a bit too fiddly - a simple stopwatch or the timer on the ADF is perfectly adequate and generally much easier IMHO.

It's a very nice watch which I always wanted and am quite ahppy to wear.

TZ

[Davidt]

Got a Breitling Chronomat got it cos
a) Its dead pretty
b) Shop told me it will appreciate as there is a ready collectors market


Its sod all use as a navigational instrument the numbers round the dial are too small for a normal human to see. I use a digital stop watch, the kind that games teachers use cost £3.99!

[tmmorris]

Has anyone tried the vibrating alarm watches (as sold by Sporty's in the US)? They are suggesting they could be useful for timing approaches, &c.

Tim

[oli carley]

try the suunto vector, not designed for flying but a useful little thing (well, fairly big actually). Altimeter, barometer, compass etc, etc.