Hamilton Mechanical Officer

Let's start the year off BIG. 44mm to be exact, but it seems even bigger thanks to the dial that stretches to the edges of the case, big numbers and oversized crown. It's my Hamilton Mechanical Officer H69619533, part of the Khaki Field collection. This one is not self-winding, and uses the ETA (née Unitas) 6497 with an approximately 40-hour power reserve. A unique twist is instead of a full display back, this has only a small porthole over the balance which adds to the industrial look of the caseback. The dial is dominated by the oversized 12 and 6 and small seconds at 9. The little dash of red on the seconds dial does keep the dial from looking a bit drab. The strap is heavy with two rows of holes for the double buckle, a functional touch on such a wide strap. Most of these I've seen have been sold with a large "Bund"-style pad behind the watch, but when I found this one on sale (and most I've seen for sale lately) they omit the pad. Looks like it's probably just a change in the model since it's shown sans pad on Hamilton's site as well. On such a large watch it seems like overkill anyway, I prefer Bund straps on smaller watches that need some bulking up. Shortly after I bought this I also found the matching bracelet on eBay, so after a bit of hemming and hawing, I picked it up (seen here on the Officer Auto Chrono.)

My watch buying has slowed down considerably in the last couple of years, but I still have a number of new ones that I will feature here. As I'm sure many of you have noticed, prices for even lower-end Swiss timepieces (not cheap per se, but the more reasonable offerings from Hamilton, Victorinox and various others) have in many cases doubled in the past few years. I still keep an eye out for good deals when I can, but I find it hard to spend $500-600 on a watch that three years ago could be bought easily for $250. The thought crosses my mind occasionally to thin out my collection, especially since I could sell most of my watches for more than I paid for them, but if I wanted to replace them with something equivalent it will cost more as well. For now I think I'll hold onto them.

I hope everybody had enjoyable holidays and I look forward to bringing more watches to the blog on a regular (if not daily) basis. Happy New Year!

Hamilton "Men In Black II" Digital

Today I'm wearing my Hamilton Men in Black II watch. Like my recent Hamilton Chronograph this one is brand new and I'm only wearing it for the photos, although I'm not looking to sell this one anytime soon. While it was a limited edition released in 2002 along with the movie, I didn't buy mine until 2006. I bought it for a few reasons. First, as I have mentioned before, I've always been a fan of Hamilton watches. And this watch is very similar to Hamilton's second digital watch, the Pulsar P2 (the P1 was the world's first digital watch, but didn't work as well nor look as good as the P2.) Second, I'm a fan of movies, and I like both "Men in Black" movies. While I probably like the first one more than the second, I don't believe Hamilton had special watches available for the original even though the Ventura models were featured in the film. And finally, I bought this because four years after its release, those that were left languishing on dealer's shelves were being sold for a fraction of what they cost originally, so it was too good of a deal to pass up. I'm very glad I did buy one, because until I held it in my hands I didn't realize how solid it was. The case and band quality are as good as any Hamilton watch, and looking at it from the back you'd never guess that it houses only a simple digital module. This watch is certainly all about the style and reproducing the futuristic look of the vintage Pulsar. It pulls this off with ease and really shows what a timeless design this is. While I have had a couple occasions where I would have liked to wear this, I think I prefer to keep it new with the band unsized on the off chance it has some collector value someday.

Hamilton Lloyd Automatic

Today I'm wearing my Hamilton Lloyd automatic. This is another of my seldom-worn dress watches, mainly because I get dressed up only rarely. It actually works as a casual watch as well since it has a funky look to it and is a decent size. Because it's square and has relatively long lugs, it wears bigger than the 36mm width would imply. The dial and crystal are really stunning. The engraved pattern of repeating vertical lines on the dial make it change color (depending on the light and viewing angle) from black to silver and various levels of gray in between. The applied silver-tone numerals are very attractive, as are the heavily domed sapphire crystal and heavy stainless case. I've heard some people describe this watch as having "screws" on the bezel, but the details on the corners are actually just machined indentations, perhaps to mimic the look of screws or diamonds/gemstones. I find the whole package very attractive and I will make an effort to wear it more often (either on non-workdays or once I run out of watches for this blog, of course.) I believe this watch is no longer in production, as Hamilton currently only lists the quartz Lloyd chronograph on their site. The Lloyd automatic is still available from many retailers, so if you like it and see one available you might want to buy it while you have the chance.

Hamilton Viewmatic

Today I'm wearing one of my older "modern" Hamiltons, a Viewmatic most likely from the late 1990s. I'm not sure of the specific name nor model number of this watch, but it looks very similar to a Linwood. The Viewmatic name comes from the "view" (or exhibition) caseback and the fact that it's automatic. One of the reasons I picked this one up (other than it being relatively cheap, a Hamilton, and me being in need of a dress watch) was that it came on a very nice maroon crocodile strap with a gold-tone Hamilton deployant. Of course, that was before I realized that any time I'm dressed up enough to wear this watch I'm typically wearing black, gray or blue, I don't even own a pair of brown or maroon dress shoes. So the very nice crocodile strap stays in storage with my other extra straps, and I wear this one (very infrequently I might add) on a rather plain black leather strap. The basic black actually works well on this watch as it matches the black hands, which I actually find a bit heavy most of the time and would probably prefer gold-tone hands. The black strap tends to make the hands look a bit less out of place. It is Swiss made and houses an ETA cal. 2824-2 in its 37mm case. It's an attractive watch but doesn't draw attention to itself. An excellent alternative to quartz dress watches for low-key dressy occasions, but I'm sure for many it would also make an excellent everyday watch.

Hamilton Khaki Action Chronograph

Today my watch is a Hamilton Khaki Action chronograph, Hamilton model number H63412133. It uses an accurate and reliable Swiss quartz movement, probably an ETA although I didn't make a note of it when I replaced the power cell last year. I don't believe this model is in production currently. It's not listed on the Hamilton website although a couple other Khaki Action models are. This one is very similar to my Khaki Action automatic. Both watches have the same case design and size (40mm) as well as flip-up crown guard and textured bracelet center links. The dial on this chronograph is very attractive and purposeful. The date window at 4 o'clock is a nice touch, as are the red details and gray minute and tenths subdials. The center links on this bracelet are Delrin which give it a unique look and feel but should still hold up very well. This watch I bought brand new a few years back but even then I had too many watches so I never got around to sizing the bracelet or wearing it (except for the pictures you see here.) As you can see the plastic on the caseback and bracelet has never been removed, and the plastic on the crystal was only removed for the photographs. The bracelet hasn't had any links removed, but the micro-adjust holes on the clasp have a wide range of adjustment. Even without removing links I adjusted it to fit my 7.5" wrist. I'm guessing it would fit up to an 8-8.5" wrist. It's a really good looking watch, and the chronograph works perfectly with all hands resetting quickly to zero (which is always fun to watch.) It's currently for sale on the Watchuseek forum and I hope it finds its way to somebody who will wear it, use it, and keep it for a long time.

Hamilton Dodson Automatic

Today I'm wearing my Hamilton Dodson automatic (model number H27415733.) It's dressier than the watches I normally wear, and I feel a little weird wearing it in the daytime during the Summer, but I'm getting down to a handful of watches and had to pick something. It's actually pretty big for a dress watch at 36mm wide and 41mm long, and the height of the case with the oversized, rounded "steps" gives it real wrist presence. The dial is also very attractive, certainly not too busy, with "exploding" numerals and an inset small seconds dial. It's also very nice to see a date wheel with a black background, as a white background would be out of place here. The movement is a very reliable and smooth ETA 2895-2 which is used in numerous watches including Breitling, TAG Heuer, Glycine and other Hamilton models.

Vintage Hamilton Thin-O-Matic Automatic

Today I'm wearing a vintage Hamilton Thin-O-Matic on a Speidel expandable bracelet which seems to be about as old as the watch (1960s.) This one was purchased by my dad and I don't believe he had it serviced. It's similar to my other Thin-O-Matic that was my grandfather's, but this one doesn't have a solid gold case and some of the details are different. If you look at the position of the hands you can see they don't line up correctly. This is easily fixed by removing the hands and resetting them, but while considering that I realized the case has no removable back, everything goes in from the front. Then I found this link that shows the tool and procedure for removing a crystal like this. I suppose if I want to have it fixed I'll probably take it to my watchmaker since I don't have the right tool and have little use for it, so I probably won't buy one. This watch is good looking and seems to keep good time, but if I keep it in my collection I will probably have it serviced and cleaned as well as fit a leather strap. I'd also be curious what movement is inside (whether it's a micro-rotor or regular automatic) and what year this one is from; I'm sure my watchmaker could tell me.