The IWC Spitfire Automatic - A Historic Tribute to Aviation
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- Опубликовано: 30 авг 2019
- A discussion and review surrounding the IWC Spitfire Automatic. The article looks at the History of the "Dirty Dozen" the Development of British IWC Pilot watches and the development of the modern Spitfire and the Design approach taken.
#iwcspitfire #iwcbigpilot #fliegerwatch
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Date windows are useful. If every watch went for symmetry over function that would be very, very bad imo. Not everyone buys 8 watches etc, if you want one nice daily wearer for life probably the best complication you could go with is just a simple date complication.
I love the way you make mock ups of how you might like to see the watch. It’s very much a personal choice thing in terms of aesthetics. I don’t always like the changes you make but it’s refreshing to see something different. I think your mock up with the non patina hands was nice here tbh.
Thank you! I fully agree if the watch is your daily then a date would be very practical. I'm of the minority who prefers a watch without a date. And all of these redesigns are up to personal taste (if I had more time with these projects, I'd put more hours into many more mock-ups of course - just to hone in on the details better) But thank you for the comment and feedback, man. I love getting comments like these
Date windows could still be placed at 6 or 12...
IDGuy I’m coming round to no date watches. I have two of the classics in the Moonwatch (hesalite) and the current 39mm Explorer which I prefer to the 36. However if I had to go for one watch only I’d have to go with a date complication I think.
The mock ups show a degree of effort and talent for photoshop that most of the others just don’t put in or have the ability to. It makes the vids more interesting for sure! Thanks
The lume placement makes sense because that’s where the lume actually is on the watch and where it’s always been historically
Excellent video as usual! Makes you look at watches with expert eye and I love that ... thank you
Great video, love the clear concise history of the iwc pilots watch!
Great video! Love the history background. Thumbs up!
Great video. In my opinion this is the best IWC ever. The case size, strap and the pilot watch aesthetics makes it the perfect watch
Keep on doing good content
It has a lot going for it (and the size is a huge plus) Thank you for the comment, man! I'm glad you enjoyed the discussion!
Good video I've had my spitfire since 2021 and I'm still amazed how good it. IWC done are really good job.
A big fan of this watch. Enjoyed the review as well.
Another great video ! Always informative .
Always Appreciated, man. Thank you for tuning in. I'm glad you enjoyed it!
Simply one of the most important pilot watches out there. IWC spitfire is absolutely a must have for collectors. It’s design and layout of dial is perfect.
Nitpicking obviously, but an entitely red second hand looks kinda weird on the strictly black and white background. A red second hand tip ”cern milgauss-style” however would probably look awesome.
I would have been cool if I included a white seconds hand instead of red, maybe that contrast would have looked hella cool?
I think the most bang for your buck out there from "high-end" manufacturers is the Omega De Ville, if you like the non sport watch styling. For just over 2k you get a beautiful watch with a co-axial escapement.
I've been eyeing Omega De Ville's lately. Absolutely gorgeous variety of pieces! Thank you for the comment as always, David
Great episode. I am lucky enough to have an Omega 2292 from 1939 which was issued to Pilots of the Royal Fleet Air Arm. I love the history of these watches and the tales they could tell
I may have seen a post of your's at omegaforums if you're the same guy.
David Marskell Hi David. I am not a member of that forum but may look to join. Thanks.
Love that pilot. It really is a classic! Thank you for the comments as always, Mark (and for tuning in) Have a great weekend!
Gorgeous watch. Agree, I really dislike the date complication on any watch & the red second hand does improve it. Excellent video, Cheers 👍 👍
Fantastic video ID Guy! I really like this new Spitfire and I completely agree with you on it’s positives as well as it’s negatives. Like you said it’s main drawbacks are the faux patina and it’s price. To bad, IWC had a real opportunity here, but fell just short. Keep up the great work. 👍
Well, we could sort out discounts with them too ;) But it is a pity that it slipped up in a few places. Thank you as always for the comment, sir. It means so much that you can always tune in!
Another intelligent and impartial review. I assume the "partial lume" choice is because the original only hade lume on the main indices and hands, not the numerals. Steill, I agree with your comment RE visual harmony. Omega's placement of a date window at 6 in their latest piece has worked very well in blending this element.
YES companies mixing faux patina lume and ’new’ lume is a big pet peeve, great mockups.
The clash is very distracting (but I sort of get where they were going [Trying to emulate the MK11 format]) Thanks for the comment as always, Anton!
Another great video, just back from a UK visit. I am a fan of the Broad Arrow MoD watches...currently researching Smiths versions. Cheers 👍⌚🇬🇧🇺🇸✈
Smiths has such an array of pieces...it's actually amazing to see! You can even find the Hilary watch if you look hard enough. Thanks for the comments as always, David!
@@ID-Guy Keen on the W10..."Made in England". ⌚🇬🇧
The IWC Mk11 is truly a grail of military watch collectors. The infamous ‘dirty dozen’ has some lovely watches included in it with Omega, IWC, Lemania, Eterna, Record, Vertex, Buren, Timor, Grana, JLC, Longines and Cyma all playing their part in British Military horological history. It’s such a shame that we don’t have such great mechanical timepieces in the military these days instead of the practical quartz models that are more commonly seen.
The Spitfire really does a great job in its fliegeresque design. As you stated it wouldn’t look out of place in an aircrafts cockpit amongst the instrument dials.
The fauxtina isn’t something that bothers me a great deal. In fact it emphasises that the watch is a homage to military watches as opposed to being a true military issue. I love the look of it.
Yet another great video my friend. Keep them coming. ✊
I’d love to hear your thoughts on the Stowa 40 Flieger and the Verus.
Cheers, great show as always!
Great review and opinion as always! And the price isn’t a lot... its insane. I wish them luck
So much for Swiss neutrality. Agree with your comments on second hand colour and patina. My Hamilton Khaki has red tip to second hand, and 80 hour power reserve, Swiss 2824 movement, super tough and legible. Great review and appreciate your constructive critique👍☘
Agreed on your opinion. Nice video mate.
Good stuff!
Good points, well said.
Great review! I could never pull the trigger on the Mark due to the price, size and eta base movement. This one though is another story...expensive for what it is? Perhaps, but not really as much so as the Explorer. Your comments on the 39mm Explorer are spot on, I wanted to love it but the proportions especially the dial were just somehow off. I am very happy with the Spitfire so far.
Phist!
You do amazing reviews that put the others to shame my friend!!
M Tbone Well said.....
You continue to flatter me as always, man. I love doing it. I'd love to continue to do this with sponsorships and all the rest one day and the more I work on this, the more I find that it may have legs in the future ;)
@@ID-Guy Gotta get you on the live shows brother! Clyve and Archie have said they are up to it. Make it happen please!
Remarkably on point with your critique. Interestingly enough, I have a Hamilton Khaki in my collection. My first reaction to this piece was how much better it would look with a leather strap. Instead of a solid red seconds hand, however, I think it would look quite interesting with an arrow tipped seconds hand dipped in red, e.g., like on the Khaki.
Turning now to the date window, most of my pieces have date windows, and I find it a useful complication. My watches are under the sleeve most of the time. And when I sign a document or make an appointment, having a date window which I can ritualistically check is indispensable. But, after spending time listening to your date window integration prose, I feel I have a better feel for a well designed date window and one which is perhaps less so. At a Khaki’s price point a white date and black dial is excusable. Yet I feel that a window at 6 or a color coordinated date wheel at 3 would have been a more acceptable solution at this price.
For me the elephant in the room is the red Spitfire logo above 6 o’clock. As an homage piece which dips into the reservoir of IWC’s legacy I’m left with the feeling that the inclusion of the Spitfire logo is superfluous. Field and aviation watches were always bereft of unnecessary adornment, and I suspect that a WWII fighter pilot rarely looked at his wrist to remind himself of what he was flying.
What I’m getting at is that unique among watches pilot watches should be iconographic in design such that the piece expresses by its very design the function it fulfills. In automotive design I would analogize the Citroen DS, a car that needed no adornment to identify that it represented something unique. The design collapsed this dichotomy between form and function because its uniqueness (what T.S Eliot or Harold Bloom or Roland Barthes would call strangeness) represented the car and the era in which it was created. Who really thinks it needed a brand label to identify it?
A modern example in watch design would be the Grand Seiko Snowflake which by its very uniqueness expresses something intrinsic about the piece and the brand that gave it birth.
My one watch collection right here
The fauxtina is a nod to IWC´s past. Just look at the old IWC pilot watches to find that 12, 3, 6, and 9 markers have always been offwhite. I own this piece and I am in love with it as my daily beater. Cheers from Sexico City!
Great video...if you have to pick between Mark XX or Spitfire, which one you'll go for ?
Excellent mock-up of a full patina version - as a Tudor Pelagos LHD owner, the yellowed colour of the indices makes the watch complete for me. I want to get the blue version as well but I cannot get past the Colgate white indices in comparison.
A version of the dial with the patina look and no date would be absolutely killer in my opinion. I think you should, if you do not already, post your adjustments on Instagram as a side-by-side comparison. Not the first one I have seen from you and they are always interesting. The red seconds hand was interesting but I think it does sacrifice some legibility in comparison.
Thank you James! I should post these mock-ups up in the future. And I agree about the red seconds hand (maybe it would have benefitted the watch better white a white hand instead) Thanks for the comment, brother!
I agree a red second would balance the dial...i also agree the MRSP is quite a shock!!
And I should have added a white seconds hand too just to see the effect ;) Thank you for the comments as always, Vaughan! I hope your VC is treating you well!
I love your discussion of design. Like you, I really don't like the patina on the hands...I also wonder if the minute hand is a bit long. - what do you think? Thank you for another fantastic review :)
Beautifuly stated
Craig, thank you as always, brother. I'm glad you enjoyed it! Have a superb weekend
Nice
A Spitfire watch with dial inspired in RLM FL23883 Type A. RAF WW2 era watches don't have the triangle with 2 dots around at 12:00 o'clock and their seconds scale was railway type.
I LOVE PLAIN!
Great video about a nice watch.
I honestly don't care much about an inhouse movement besides the increased power reserve ... and I bet an RAF pilot who would have used an MK XI could not have cared less about it.
One thing I would like to note here: As far as I am aware the german Flieger watches also known as B-Uhr (Beobachtungs-Uhr) were not issued to the pilots but to the navigators on bombers.
The watch was used as part of the navigation equipment to compare and adjust the plotted route to the target.
I think the faux patina on the Spit' is done well because it's made to show the aged radium or tritium.
If you look at an old MK XI usually not all markers were luminescent but only the ones on 3, 6, 9 and 12. All other markers were only printed on and therefore would have stayed white.
IMHO another great re-creation of an issued watch showing faux patina is the "Laco Erbstück" series, especially the B-Type. Only the straight numbers show the faux patina because only the straight numbers were luminescent on the original that they still had in their archive.
Back to the IWC Spit'. I would not pay close to 5K (CHF) for a three-hander on a nato strap that in the end is just a homage. It's a nice watch. It's just not for me. Not at that price point.
I assume at this price that the movement is COSC certified but I haven't seen that mentioned in any of the reviews.
The movement is a shared IP amongst Richemont brands developed and made by Val Fleurier (which Richemont owns). I also believe that its deign is much like an ETA movement as well.
George Yang interesting! Thank you George
The dial design is perfect. It could do with shorter lugs though.
Drilled lugs would go well with it, I agree with the red second hand.
Nice watch; nice review. What I can’t get my head around however, is how a watch with German flieger-style hands, shares anything with an Royal Air Force aeroplane? Maybe I’m being picky 😁
Personally, I prefer the Mark XV Spitfire Iw3253005. The font isn't as good, but the lack of a date window is a massive plus for me.
Gorgeous looking piece! And I love the numerals throughout! Thank you for sharing, man
Spitfire. Emotive. The plane itself at the rear. Against your skin. Defensive. Ready to strike. Long gone yet very much an icon. Overall the design elements are slightly unusual but certainly add character and interest. So many clone watches out there. Finished to perfection but boringly robotic. Sometimes the disharmony can only add to the aesthetic. I’m considering this piece but I’m more drawn to the Mk XVIII in PP livery. The date is off. It’s not in-house. But beauty is in the eye of the beholder. A watch has to give you the fizz. It makes you smile or it doesn’t. Heart over head every time. That which satisfies the intellect but doesn’t whistle at the dog doen’t get the bone.
Do you think trading my seiko sje093 for this is a good idea? Fair?
Beautiful watches. But, the price would be my concern as well.
Two points I've been missing:
1. The Mark XI is clearly Bauhaus inspired (compare it to a Max Bill Junghans and this becomes very obvious).
2. The currently best IWC Flieger is Hawkinge MKII: I have a Hawkinge and I did the comparison...
IWC lost it's way when VDO sold it.
You do pay a lot for simplicity here (even more so with the time only Explorer) but while I like the idea of bicolour treatments I agree it looks mismatched here. Go all in and move the date to 6 if you want one, half the price, then give me a shout 😉 Nice analysis as usual.
nothing worst then date on 6
Agreed, man. Thank you for the comment! It would be awesome if they gave us a price reduction for the package
likeris subruknem Each to their own hey buddy.
@@faisalingalong I think price is great, grand seiko kost even more and montblanc.
Perfection comes at a price , I assume.
Good job you didn't show the working internals, people might just think it's a decorated ETA 2892-A2. Ho hum!
I like iwc and their history. So no slight on the company. More if a general comment , why the faux patina when using materials that fight against it. When you listen to vintage watch collectors they love patina. A question then. Are companies going away from patina happening to their products with these new materials? Or is it that there hasn’t been enough time passed to see pieces age?
I feel that the effect they were trying to go with here was to match the Mark XI in the way that it had lume at the quarters and at the twelve. That's not so much of an issue, but the hands... And to answer your question: the patina effect is there for show. The new luminous materials won't ever degrade or change to a different colour (so it's now very much for aesthetics more than anything else) Thank you for the comment as always, Tito!
2:35
How do you dare to criticize the Explorer???, Let's go outside!!! ;). Best from Spain!!!
Hahahaha! No, in all seriousness, I love the watch. I just don't find the proportions of the 39mm to be as good as the 36mm variants. Like right now, I'm wearing a Smiths Everest on a Jubilee (it's a near perfect homage to the 1016, and my god, it is unbelievable) The size, the balance...the FONT! Big love from the UK, man. Thanks for the comment ;)
A shame IWC is using Selitta movements in some of their models now. Breitling does, too. If you don’t believe me, just look it up. Desperate times call for desperate measures, I guess.
As the pontiph has mentioned a few times too...sadly the industry is in a bad state. Still, we can appreciate them in different ways. Thanks for the comment, Charles!
There are positives about them using Selitta.
These are perfect pilot watches if price is not a major concern for you
It’s hard to comment without referencing value.
I know...I always try to look past it...like how an artist views a painting ;) Thanks for the comments as always, man
A pilot of a FW190 or BF109 would wear one looking like that while in a dogfight with a spitfire.
I like vintage IWC. The modern ones are too big, too heavy, too expensive. Most models lose 75% of their value if you buy new. If you want one, buy used and don't pay much in case you need to sell it. I like the older IWC, not very heavy, simple yet nice and not too big or too thick.
Size is an issue with IWC, no doubt. I have been eyeing the 5002 and for long time (but feel like I'll be disappointed with the size if I ever tried it on) Thanks for the comment, Scott!
You can get this for about 4K and I think it’s worth when you consider everything. Not like Tudor or omega have better at the price point. I’d argue you get more history here.
It's a beautiful looking watch but I feel the £5000 price point is too high for a simple looking piece
IWC makes amazing watches. If you want an aviation watch, buy an IWC.
The 5002 is a dream of mine...absolutely love them. Thank you for the comment!
I thought the same on the false patina. Using it only on some of the indices makes for an odd look. There is much to like about this piece though.
A true pilot watch should be a Type B.
Just as a friendly pointer, not all the German pilots were Nazis. I think it fairer to say, German pilots.
y Messerschmitt bf 109
Rolex Air King - for me please. I would entertain buying a watch made by a company that supplied the Nazi Regime in WW2.
They seem very expensive
Tudor Ranger might be better bang for buck ?
Ooooh! You just hit on what I'm chatting about next week! The North Flag is going to be up next (and yes, it and the Ranger are a much better value prop without question)
I will get a Hamilton instead of this 4K piece. Thanks
PLAIN? True watch Enthusiasts Love Plain? I'll bet you are very difficult to live with!
To me IWC is maybe the most overrated watch brand, nothing truly special.
sebseb seb I kinda want to like this watch, and IWC as a brand, but I can’t justify the price they’re asking.
@@fifthpint4571 how much is it? I also don't buy the whole inhouse movement, I don't trust IWC as a movement manufacturer, more like an ETA modifier.
I enjoy some of their flieger's (like the 5002) but I understand what you mean. It is a marmite brand nowadays . Thank you for the comment, Seb
@@ID-Guy the best way so far I seen to characterize IWC
Thought the same thing until I saw them in person.
Too expensive.
Sorry but to me the Explorer is the best watch ever