COSC-certified chronometers are not required! In most flying, accuracy to within ‘a few seconds’ is more than good enough. If a watch works within generally accepted accuracy standards, it’s going to be accurate enough for civilian aviation, and probably for many military uses. We reckon a fully featured ‘dream’ pilot’s chronograph would have the following features and characteristics – the characteristics of a basic ‘pilot’s watch’ with chronograph and other functions added: Accuracy – to a point Just as unidirectional bezels and Helium release valves have insinuated themselves into dive watch culture, certain features have a similar role in pilot watches – and in particular, pilot chronographs.Īlthough knowing how to use a chronograph watch to its fullest potential isn’t essential for many owners, understanding the functions and their applications can only add to the pleasure of ownership. And that’s where we're going to focus now, as we look at the chronograph watch functions often associated with pilot watches. Over more than a century, the ingenuity of watchmakers has led to a wide range of chronograph watch functions for sports, medicine, military applications and, since the invention of the aeroplane, for aviation. A chronograph is not necessarily a chronometer, although some chronometers are chronographs.īack to The Watch Book for another definition: ‘A chronometer is a precise timepiece which has proven the accuracy of its rate during a 15-day test at one of the official watch-testing authorities, e.g., the COSC (Contrôle Officiel Suisse des Chronomètres) in Switzerland.’ Got it? Good, let’s get back to pilot chronographs.Įver since Louis Mainet experimented with his ‘Compteur de Tierces’ in 1816, or Nicholas Rieuss developed his (literally)’time writer’, man has been perfecting devices used to measure small amounts of time. Now, let’s quickly clarify another common misunderstanding: the confusion between chronographs and chronometers. The ordinary time display remains unaffected.’ Chronograph vs. ‘A chronograph – or more correctly “chronoscope” – is a watch with an hour-hand, a minute-hand, and a special additional mechanism which, at a push of a button, alternately starts a (usually) centrally positioned elapsed-seconds hand, stops it, and returns it to its zero position. Brunner and Christian Pfeiffer-Belli, Chronograph is defined as follows: In the Glossary of The Watch Book by Gisbert L. The chronograph (literally ‘time writer’) is one of the most complex, sophisticated (or ‘difficult’ as the horologists say) watch complications that man has devised. Of course, many of the characteristics also apply to chronographs that weren’t specifically designed for the aviation fraternity. And hopefully, the answer to the question, ‘What does a chronograph watch do (particularly if it’s an aviation chronograph). So here, to complement our two-part article on pilot chronographs, is a detailed look at chronograph functions as they apply to pilot watches. It’s true! After ‘What is a pilot watch?’ and ‘What is a chronograph watch?, questions about the various pilot chronograph functions are amongst the most regular that we’re asked at WatchGecko. What does a chronograph do – and specifically pilot chronographs? Read the answer to the question ‘What is a Pilot Watch?’
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |