The Breitling Watch Source Forums

I’ve been thinking about the 1953 Navitimers that have been shown and this question of dating them through the shock protection system. I thought I’d pull together some of the observations and see where it led.

In 1950 Breitling state on their advertising that all their movements use Incabloc.

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll? ... K:MEWAX:IT

Here’s a 1951 Breitling Premier 765 (799688) with a Venus 178 and Incabloc.

Here are three AVI’s with the Venus 178 dating from 1953 Also with Incabloc.

The first 820441.

http://www.antiquewatch-carese.com/coll ... 892-209580

The second 827695

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/BREITLING-Uhr-Co- ... 3a51591163

The third 827833

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/BREITLING-Uhr-Co- ... 3ef7209adc

It seems that Breitling and Venus continued to use the Incabloc system through to the end of the 1950’s.

Here’s a 1957 Navitimer (871788) still using Incabloc.

http://www.antiquewatch-carese.com/coll ... 390-992202

Here’s a 1958 Navitimer (909931) also using Incabloc.

http://www.finertimes.com/asp/watches/q ... 29&Page=68

However it seems that towards the end of the Fifties for a couple of years Breitling changed the shock protection system they used.

Here’s a 1959 Navitimer (919832) which uses this different system.

http://www.moonwatchtimepieces.com/Site ... tch_id=489

Here’s a 1960 AVI (922560) which also uses this different shock protection system.
The shock protection in these late 50’s Venus 178 are consistent with the shock protection of the 1953 marked Navitimer cases.

Several have been shown here already, here's the one that sold on ebay recently, serial number 824940.

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll? ... K:MEWAX:IT

By the early Sixties Breitling seems to have switched back to using the Incabloc system in their Venus 178’s.

However they continue to use this other shock protection system in a few other movements, like this Venus 188 Superocean.

http://www.chrono24.com/en/search/index ... results=82


This different system could well be the Breitling in-house Shock protection that Breitlingmuseum has shown.

To conclude it seems to me that the 1953 Navitimers we’ve seen all use a movement with a shock protection system that Breitling only used for a few years from about 1959 through to early sixties, the earlier Venus 178s all use the Incabloc system.

There are several already discussed conclusions that can be drawn from this all of which are plausable, but let me add one more.

The 1953 cases are correctly marked, but were prototype cases that Breitling took delivery of in 1953 as they were designing the Navitimer, ultimately they were never used in the final production run. Sometime in the late Fifties a stash of these were found and Breitling, always thrifty, decided to put movements in them and sell them.

This brings us back to the first production run of the Navitimer being in 1954 with a Valjoux movement.

If anyone has any Breitlings of the period it would be great to check if these observations are consistent with more watches from the era. I think that there is a great amount of knowledge coming out of this site at the moment and that many of the observations we are making just haven't been possible before this hive mind was established. I find this exciting and hope that we can share information about our passion in a friendly and supportive way.

Good stuff, Yaffle, and I have always been of the mind that this "old cases" assembled out of sequence was one of two distinct possibilities, along with a straight early production scenario:



One of Michael/breitlingmuseum's last posts here does provide strong evidence that Breilting had its own, in-house "Breitling Shock" protection system. This this is almost certainly the type found in my 824k Navi.


(Photo from breitlingmuseum)


When and why they began and stopped using "Breitling Shock" is yet another mystery and I would like to see more verifiable examples that confirm that this feature is strictly confined to the late 1950s.
As for the true sequence of early 806 production, my mind remains open...
Best,
T.

The Breitling family produced watches, but they did never produce movements, so I find it very unlikly that they should have produced their own "Breitling Shock" protection system.

I will go as far as to say that I am certain that the did not (but that is only my opinion)

Kurt B

Thanks Tomvox, a lot of this was prompted by your quest to find an answer to the riddle of your Navi. Initially we all believed it didn't have a shock protection system, now I don't think that's in question.



Now we know what to look for maybe people can post examples as they find them or if they have them in their collection. To date I've not seen a Venus 178 during the fifties, until this strange interlude of perhaps even less than a year, which does not have Incabloc.

I haven't looked at the other Venus movements used by Breitling (150/175), it would be interesting to see what they have?

However this is the only sequence of events which makes sense. If the movement you have was from 1953, why do the other 178's of the period used by Breitling have incabloc?



Yes, but that's half the fun?

Here's a 53 stamped Navi that sold a couple of years ago:

That's a very interesting question Kurt. Here's the conundrum with it, Breitling designed and copyrighted movements, or certainly facets of movements. The second button for a chrongraph in the 30's and the Caliber 11 in the Sixties. Why would they copyright something that they don't ultimately manufacture.

I am not entirely clear what you're saying, is it the case that even though they developed the Caliber 11 they never physically manufactured it?

Well, with the understanding that you do not think much of the person who was the source, this document/advertisement nonetheless definitively points to the existence of "Breitling Shock" which does not resemble Incabloc but looks exactly like what is in my watch and apparently all the other anomalous 824,k SN 806s:









May I suggest that it would not be necessary for Breilting to produce the device, but merely to license the product from an independent producer and then market it as "uniquely Breitling Shock?" Just looking through my Bestfit 111A supplement, there are a ton of shock absorber manufacturers other than Incabloc (Novochoc, Durobloc, Protax, Neutro Shock, etc), although none that I can see that looks like this "B"-shaped one. Maybe Breitling had a short-lived deal with one of them after some sort of issue with Incabloc to custom produce B-shaped Breitling Shock components?
Best,
T.

My German is not very good (read awful), but doesn't the bottom of that ad say something like 'Made for Breitling' suggesting that it was produced by one of the known shock absorber manufacturers?

I must admit that I know absolutely nothing about the second button for a chrongraph in the 30's and caliber 11 in the 60’s, maybe I’m moving into too deep water, so I surrender and better back out.

All my interest in vintage Breitling is based on 806 / 809, it’s not an excuse but merely an information.

I’ll stick to 806 / 809, and avoid responding to something I know nothing about.


/ Kurt B

As far as I know, Cal. 11 was a big design collaboration between Bretiling, Heuer, Hamilton-Buren and Dubois-Depras, with the actual movement being produced by the latter two companies (Buren the microrotor and Dubois-Depras the chronograph module). So, not unlike Omega commissioning Lemania to produce the cal. 861 to replace the 321, the movement manufacturer(s) produced the movement to the specs of their client but they would still manufacture the actual caliber, and in the case of the Cal. 11 Breitling & Heuer were responsible primarily for the case and dial designs.

More on the Cal. 11 in general:

http://www.fortunecity.com/olympia/wagn ... ber_12.htm

And MUCH more here in painstaking detail by the great Jeff Stein:

http://www.onthedash.com/docs/Project99.html

Best,
T.

Just on brief perusal of the Bestfit guide, one can find parts for Venus cal. 150/175s with shock absorption systems named Shock Resist, Monorex 53 and Kif Trior in addition to Incabloc. So at least prior to the 1950s, we can see that Breilting was not exactly monogamous in their shock protection parts suppliers.



Can't say as I'm ready to go that far but it is a plausible hypothesis, alongside the possible straight chronological sequence.
Best,
T.

Tom's Caliber 11 explanation matches my understanding, and the 30s chrono story is similar as I understand it - Breitling design with someone else commissioned to assemble - which isn't unusual.

In terms of shock absorption, I wonder how many of these are truly different - the cynic in me thinks that all of these systems are similar, with just the shape of the 'spring' varying (after all, how complex can it be) and I wonder whether some of these are just different brand names for things produced in the same factory!

Roff and Kurt,

as tomvox said it definitely means " Inhouse shock-protection for Breitling movements only",

"Fabrikeigen" means they themselves fabricated it.

Best regards to the Canadian Ice-Hockey team !

Cheers, Julius

Thanks Tomvox, I know the Heuer site well but haven't read this great article since it was published.

"In serial production, Heuer and Breitling would receive the base movements from Buren, complete the assembly of chronograph modules received from Dubois-Depraz, combine this "sandwich" into a completed movement, and then assemble the completed chronograph. Indeed, each of the partners in the Chronomatic group faced challenges in the race to develop and launch the world's first automatic chronograph."

So Breitling while not physically manufacturing the ebauch does assemble it from it's different parts. I guess Boeing doesn't manufacture the Rolls Royce engine, but it's still a Boeing plane? For me design is key, I don't know about JLC or IWC, whether their in-house movements are also designed by them but then contracted out?

I thought the timeline of production was also interesting.

"The Chronomatic group had produced 100 prototypes of its automatic chronographs by the Fall of 1968, with Heuer and Breitling each allotted 40 of these pieces, and Hamilton-Buren receiving 10. (Dubois-Depraz used the remaining 10 prototypes for testing and development.) In retrospect, the Chronomatic group's production of these prototypes, involving numerous companies that produced the new styles of cases, dials, hands and other components, was most likely to have been the event that tipped off the Zenith team that the Chronomatic was preparing for the launch of their chronographs."

Then in March 1969 they anounce the Caliber 11 in a trade magazine.

"The next event on the timeline of automatic chronographs was the Basel Fair, held in April 1969. At this event, the members of the Chronomatic group were able to show their dozens of pre-production samples of Chronomatic watches powered by the Caliber 11 movement, with multiple models from Heuer, Breitling and Hamilton, in a variety of cases and colors. By contrast, Zenith had only two or three samples of their automatic chronographs."

"Shortly after the close of the Basel Fair in April 1969, Heuer, Breitling and Hamilton-Buren delivered their 100 Chronomatic samples (pre-production prototypes) to their most important distributors, and advertising of their new automatic chronographs went into high gear. By the summer of 1969, these firms achieved full serial production of their Chronomatics, with these watches being broadly available to members of the public, in the world's major retail markets. "

So they had prototype cases the year before the launch. Makes you think about the Navitimer, especially since the Caliber 15's a few years later are put out with old cases.

Wouldn't it be fantastic to talk to Jack Heuer about Breitling, I bet he could fill in some blanks.