I grew up the son of a watch collector who liked the mechanical aspect of watches much more than the jewelry aspect. He and then we collected American pocket watches. It took me a long time to get my mind bent around even owning a wrist watch.

Anyway my tastes in both wrist and pocket watches probably tend toward tool watches....the elegant, high end part of tool watches. Tool watches need to work....all of the time. They need to be robust and relatively easy to maintain. The prototypical tool wrist watch is probably the Rolex Sub. However, in my business it has been useful to have a tool which you could beat up like a sub but which would also time events. My first wrist chrono was a1969 Omega Speedmaster moon watch. I loved it but I missed having a date and even thought I come from pocket watches and am used to winding a watch I thought it would be nice to have an automatic watch. Over the course of buying watches to wear and to sell I have owned automatic date chronos from IWC, Omega, Tag Heuer, Modern Zenith ELP, Vintage Zenith ELP, Eterna, etc and various off brands.

I would say that the best tool watch date/auto/chrono I have owned may have been the Tag Heuer Grand Carerra with the funny rotating dials. The only aspect of my watch itch that it did not scratch my watch itch is that it did not have any vintage feel...it was not soul satisfying. I really like my new Heuer Autavia GMT Cal 12. It is a soul satisfying watch and is still a great tool but I can't justify wearing it every day because it is too easy to damage and too hard to replace. It is also missing a constant second hand which drive me nuts.

As I sit here in Minneapolis/St Paul airport typing this message...on my way to Europe for a couple of weeks I am wearing my Movado/Zenith Astronic. It has most of I want in a watch from accuracy to functions (full date and chrono). However it cost me a bunch to get it into top working order and I had to find a scarce part to make it right. As a guy who likes to wear a soul satisfying watch I trust it enough to were it on a two week trip...I guess it is my favorite tool wrist watch/chrono of all the vintage watches I own....but it is still an old delicate watch....not really the greatest tool.

I guess I will have to buy one of the new CoAxial Speedys and wear it for a while. Or, maybe it will turn out that a good old VJ 7750 based watch will be the best for me. Right now...I guess I am on a quest. I hope it never ends.

JohnCote