anno cinquanta 6. October 2010

What does a small watchmaker do about the photos it posts on its website? Either the website doesn’t open immediately, or computer-generated graphics are used. Sure, the latter would allow us to present air-brushed perfection. But aside from all the lateral thinking contained in the mechanics, the whole ochs und junior ethos is based around the charm of the raw, of the real, of the visible. Our anno cinquanta gallery contains photos of actual prototypes as worn on the wrist. The silver model you see on the website is in daily use.

The movements of the two gold models were transferred to two test watches after the photos were taken.

The photos you see in today’s blog are of the ‘final’ anno cinquanta with its annual calendar. We have learnt how to successfully machine the hardened heat-patinated dial. The result is fine indices without any browning.

We use a disk of white gold 0.5 mm in thickness, which we heat in the oven to 950 Celsius – it darkens without bending.

We’re delighted to show here traces of Peter’s machining work on the two-part silver and gold cases…

The new well-supported rotor bearing and the intermediate wheel (partly hidden in the photo) of the two spring barrels are custom made and run beautifully and smoothly. In contrast to the small ball bearing of the prototypes, which was overloaded by the mass of the white gold rotors, our new solution oozes effortlessness. Paul’s movement is a superb piece of mechanical engineering in its own right; it also drives Ludwig Oechslin’s annual calendar… We’ll soon have more pictures for the anno cinquanta gallery…