The Grey NATO – 140 – Under-Appreciated Watch Brands We Love
Published on Thu, 11 Mar 2021 06:00:38 -0500
Synopsis
Jason and James discussed a variety of lesser-known watch brands that they enjoy like Marathon, Damasco, Stoa, Archimede, Newmark, Aster & Banks, CWC, and Skirfa. They praised the quality, unique designs, and backstories of these microbrands while also touching on topics like brand loyalty versus appreciating individual products, the minor controversies between some brands, and the challenges in bracelet sizing. For the final notes, Jason recommended an intriguing mountaineering article about a secretive Cold War operation, while James highlighted an entertaining off-road car video.
Links
Transcript
| Speaker | |
|---|---|
| Jason Heaton | Hello and welcome to another episode of The Grey Nado, a loose discussion of travel, diving, driving, gear, and most certainly watches. This is episode 140, and we thank you for listening. Hey James, how's it going? |
| James Stacey | Oh, not too bad. Yourself? |
| Jason Heaton | Pretty good. Yeah, it's a rainy day here. It feels like spring, finally. |
| James Stacey | Oh man, it's bright, it's sunny, it's starting to warm up here. Yeah. I'm a little low on coffee, so I'm going to be sipping espressos while we do this. |
| Jason Heaton | But, uh, yeah, I'm excited for it to be warm again. Speaking of coffee, I, uh, I took a right turn yesterday morning and I was like, you know what, today I'm just going to drink green tea all day. And, uh, you know, I thought every once in a while, it's not a bad idea to kind of try to wean yourself. I don't know why, but I did. So, um, I did like three cups of green tea over the course of the day and I woke up with just a raging headache today. I can't, I can't do it. Um, no, So bad idea, bad experiment gone wrong. |
| James Stacey | So, yeah, I've been, um, you know, a while, it was a while ago. I don't think I've talked to him on the show, but several, several months ago last year, um, I picked up an espresso machine. I had some points that were expiring and that seemed like a fine way of going about it. And now I drink a fair amount of espresso as you do probably three, three to four espressos a day, something like that. Um, which is great. I like it a lot. It's really quick and you can make all sorts of different coffee with it. I'm very happy with it. And the other, what I've done now is when I transition to being done coffee, I have adopted like a nice afternoon coffee, two, three o'clock is that last one. It really gets me through the rest of the day. But then I've switched to this, it's a mint tea. It's called, I think it's super mint, which is why I like it. I like the name. That's fun. From a company called Stash, which I think is a huge tea company. But this is like, it really is kind of like sipping a piece of spearmint gum. And I absolutely love it. It's great. It's one of those things where like, if I could, if they made a little machine that just consistently filled, filled the cup, I put it down. It kind of put more of this stuff in it. I would just drink it all day. It's lovely. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah. |
| James Stacey | It doesn't have to be that hot. It's fine. Cold. |
| Jason Heaton | We, um, in our garden last summer, we planted some mint and mint as people who are into gardening will tell you is basically a weed. And if you don't contain it in like a pot or something, it'll go all over. So, We did that. We dug it up, we put it in a pot and we brought it in for the winter. And it just grows like crazy even inside during the winter near a window. And so I started making mint tea fresh from the cuttings. Um, I'd cut off a bunch of leaves, put them in a press pot and put boiling water over and let it steep for like five minutes and plunge it down. And man, it was the best mint, best mint tea. It was so good. That sounds great. Um, but now I've, you know, I've trimmed it well beyond, so there's no, no leaves left, but, uh, |
| James Stacey | Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah. Yeah. Mint tea's good stuff. |
| James Stacey | Yeah. Big fan for sure. |
| Jason Heaton | What else? You're having some computer woes. |
| James Stacey | I have to, I have to think before I start going down this road about how long it will take me to explain it. Um, but I, I have had a spot of bad luck. Uh, so on the previous episode, I spoke about how we, I had invested in a second monitor. Um, and then in that process, I was also learning about how to get the best monitor performance out of my laptop. Right. Because I want 4K, but I want 4K with all of Apple's scaling ability because I don't typically run the monitors all the way at 4K. I run them slightly lower because it makes text bigger. And when you've got two panels that you sit that close to, I like the text being kind of the right size. If I'm just going to be sitting and editing images, I'll drop the scaling to natural 4K, but this is closer to 3,100 pixels versus 3,800. Anyways, not super important. That's where I find it most comfortable for my eyes and the sharpness and the rest of it. There's a refresh rate. And on some of the cheaper adapters I've been using, you only get 30 hertz versus 60. And there's a pretty noticeable difference when you're scrolling windows. And the things that are moving that should move smoothly just don't look that smooth in 30 hertz. So there's some eye strain and some discomfort there. So I'd been hoping to move the whole thing to 4K at 60 hertz. uh, for both panels. Uh, and, and I run the laptop closed in what's typically called like clamshell mode. So it's just the two screens. I did a ridiculous amount of research into these hubs that basically give you one USB plug into your laptop and they do the rest. So they've got USB, they've got multiple screen outputs, they've got ethernet, they've got, uh, uh, you know, some of them even do power delivery. So you literally only have the one cable. Oh, sure. Which is great. I like all of that stuff. They're not cheap. You know, the, the ones that do two 4k panels start around 150 bucks. Um, that do it with the display link to be clear. Um, and then they, they can get quite a bit more expensive. If you want to go to a Thunderbolt three, you know, hub or dock as people sometimes call them, they're not really docs. They do the same thing as a laptop doc, but they're not formatted to actually dock your laptop. They're just kind of like a big USB hub. Anyways, I knew this was going to get boring. Uh, I bought one. It didn't work. It wouldn't, it wouldn't function and land in a, in clamshell mode. It, uh, so basically you had to have the laptop screen open, which is taking up resources that I would like to use to run things like Photoshop and Lightroom and the rest of it. I returned that I got another one in, it was basically the same. The problem appears to be me. Uh, so it has gone, it has gone back as well. Uh, and I'm, I'm actually just going to use the, you know, the laptop only has four ports. It's a modern 2019 MacBook Pro. And so I'm going to have to use two for the monitors. You can do like USB-C to DisplayPort cables. There's nothing between. It's just signal and the computer and the monitor do all the work. So I'm going to try those out. Those are in the mail. That's a relatively small problem. It's kind of a fun thing to research and to learn about. And it's a very opaque part of the internet world is what does work with various monitors and various specifications and various laptops and these computers, but not those ones, these brands, not those ones, these OS is not those ones. It's all very complicated. I don't think I'm going to try for more hubs. It's been frustrating. The, uh, the real bummer came a couple of days ago when my space bar fell off, which, uh, It's a real kick in the pants, Jason. It's a real kick in the pants. |
| Jason Heaton | You do use the space bar a lot. I mean, I can use the space bar a lot. |
| James Stacey | Uh, I, I've used this, I've the, the, the number of miles on this keyboard is very high. Yeah. Um, but I take very good care of my stuff and, uh, and this, the, the, you know, the, the space bar had been kind of a problem, especially kind of since COVID kicked off. where it just, the laptop's not even two years old. It's a little over a year old. And these laptops are kind of known for being a problem with the keyboard. It's better in the 2019s than the 2018s or the previous ones, but this one's failed. It's going to be a week, maybe more in repair is what I've been told. And obviously there's not a lot of flexibility to you know, get upset at the counter during COVID and that kind of thing to try and get to the front of some sort of a lineup or pay more or whatever. So I'm going, I have to get that replaced. And then that means I have to time it very carefully because I can't produce TGN without this laptop. So I either need to just blanket replace the laptop, which I don't really want to do over a space bar. That seems very wasteful and expensive. Or I have to kind of time it where we record this show. I edit it. I put it up for tomorrow. We try and do these on Wednesday. Now it makes them as timely as possible. |
| Unknown | Yeah. |
| James Stacey | And then on Thursday, when the show goes up, I'll take it to the Apple store and, and they can have it. And hopefully it's back within enough time to produce the next show. That's the goal. Anyways. Um, I have a, you know, I have a $400 home theater, Mac, uh, PC. Windows PC, a little Intel NUC that I'll use in the short term, but it, you know, it can barely open Photoshop and Windows is a weird foreign land for me. Uh, but yeah, so that, that's, uh, that's been my saga. You know, I'm, I'm trying, trying to get the desk kind of the point where I really, where I really like it. And the screen's doing everything I like in this stupid space bar fell off. |
| Jason Heaton | I hope, uh, I really hope it comes back before we record the next episode because otherwise I'll have to edit the episode. And we certainly don't want that. I think. |
| James Stacey | Yeah. I mean, it's one of those rare scenarios where we might end up with a delay. They told me seven business days, you know, and, and that, that would be fine. That would get us in. I mean, it's not fine. It's a huge pain, but it would be fine for the schedule of the show. |
| Unknown | Yeah. |
| James Stacey | Right. So that, that is what it is. |
| Jason Heaton | We'll have to do it. We'll have to do the next episode live on clubhouse. How about that? |
| James Stacey | Yeah. Or, or the next episode just won't be edited. Yeah. I'll record it on my phone and you record it and I'll smash them together on my phone and put the file out. |
| Unknown | Yeah. Right. Right. |
| James Stacey | I can never tell if people understand maybe how much the show is edited. It's a fair bit. Yeah. Um, you know, to, to remove my extensive use of mitigative speech and, uh, and then occasionally you, we, we entirely lose track of a point and I have to cut around. That's usually me as well. Uh, I have to cut around that. So We'll see how that works out. Hopefully nothing else just falls apart while I'm holding it. Um, that, that would be, that would be key. Uh, yeah, that, that, that's basically the, the, that's my tech. That's James's tech update. Uh, your session of boredom is somehow over. |
| Jason Heaton | I've got a tech. What do you got? Mine's a very low tech update. So I took the, um, I fired up the Land Rover, the old one. I saw this on, on Instagram. Yeah. Um, you know, the past, what have I owned this thing now for going on four years, the, the old one, it's a 76 series three. And, um, I've driven it year round for the past three years. And then once we got this new defender or new ish defender, 93 defender, it's not new at all. Um, that became a bit more of a daily driver parked on the street. So, uh, this was the first winter that I parked the old one under a, uh, cover car cover, uh, off the street, keep it away from the salt and you know, just no, no need to be running two of them. So we had a spell of warm weather, you know, a week ago that's continued and I took the cover off and climbed in and, and you know, I didn't do anything to it when I parked it. You know, in the past when I had the old alpha years ago, I would take the battery out, put it in the basement, over air, the tires top up all the fluids, et cetera. This time I just parked the Land Rover, kept the battery connected, um, you know, made sure to hit a full tank of gas and stuff, but, and it, it turned right over, fired right up. Um, I had forgotten. Hey, there you go. I'd forgotten that this, uh, you know, the, the defender's a diesel, so there's glow plugs and there's a procedure for starting that. But, uh, I had forgotten when I jumped in this one that, that it has a manual choke, um, that you need to close off when you start it cold. So, um, I jumped in, I was cranking and cranking and cranking and the starter motor was strong and it sounded like it wanted to catch and, and, uh, Then I realized that I had to pull the choke lever out and then it fired right up immediately. So, um, it's good to be back. It's a, it feels good. It's such a different driving experience than the defender. I mean, I'm still on the right side of the car. It's kind of the same seating position. Um, but it just, uh, it just feels different. It feels so good to be in that old one again. |
| James Stacey | So that's great. I'm glad. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah. Bravo for, for old. technology. Now there's no electronics in this thing, so nothing, no, you got to love the simplicity, nothing to draw off the battery or run it down over the winter. |
| James Stacey | Oh, that makes sense. Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | It's a, it's a manual fuel pump. So I just kind of reached under the hood and, and give it a few clicks. There's a little lever on it. You can manually prime the fuel pump. So I just kind of gave that a few clicks, jumped in and off I went. So yeah, it's been, it's felt good to get back in it. So |
| James Stacey | And it makes enough heat to keep you warm in, uh, in Minneapolis March. |
| Jason Heaton | Uh, well, fortunately we've had, I mean, we've had like really warm, like, uh, it was in the close to 70 yesterday, which is just insane. But yeah, it's okay. It does fine. I mean, like in the winter it was, it was pretty miserably cold when I used to drive in the winter, but, uh, it does. Okay. It doesn't really put out much heat, but, um, it's a bit like a greenhouse in there. It's a metal roof, no insulation. And if it's sitting in the sun for a while, um, you know, it's, it's, it's warm enough for, for the weather we're getting now. So yeah, it's been great. That's awesome. Glad to hear. Yeah. And, uh, other than that, the, um, you know, I've been giving these regular updates about depth charge, uh, my novel and I'm, I'm doing the final, final, final read through with Kishani. We're each going through a copy and catching final stuff and then I'm sending it off to, okay. To Paul, who's my designer over in London and he's, he's doing the typesetting this week at the end of this week and then, I'll have it proofed and then printed. So, um, I'm a little ahead of schedule and, uh, I feel really good about it. Um, feels still feels, you know, through my thousandth time of reading through it, it, it still reads like a decent story. So I'm, I'm pretty excited to get it out there. And I did put an excerpt out on my sub stack, uh, newsletter for the highlight of my week for paid subscribers. So that was, uh, that was good. I got some good response and, um, the chapter is excellent. Debate which chapter to put out. I wanted to put one out that had some suspense and interesting elements to it, but not give any of the plot away too much. |
| James Stacey | I'm glad you liked it. I think you picked well. I think it was great. I read it several times and it did exactly what it should do. I'm very excited to take delivery of the book when it's ready. That story is going to be super fun. Anyone who's listening, It's not like Jason, I didn't talk about this or anything like that, but if you're not subscribed to the sub stack and you want to check out that chapter, it's worth the cost of entry alone. I think it's going to be, uh, going to be super fun. And the sub stack's been great. I also went back and I was behind, um, your piece on Japan, which I think is a story I've read a couple of times. Oh yeah. Or, or I've heard you say it once I've read it once somewhere else, that sort of thing. Yeah. It was great to read it again. I mean, just a, you know, a good dive story about, you know, getting out there and, uh, you know, taking chances kind of, not chances in terms of the diving, but in terms of who you're diving with and the scenario and where and the language and, and, you know, maybe even a bug in your boot or something like that. I like that one a lot. So the subsects been great, man. You've been doing a great job. |
| Jason Heaton | Cool. Cool. Thanks. What else? Any new? |
| James Stacey | Yeah, we've got with our, so we spoke on the last episode, but the Raven Trekker 39. So that review is live. |
| Jason Heaton | It went up recently. Yeah. I think love the photos that yellow on blue. I mean, I wrote about it on Instagram and a story. I was like, you know, just seeing your photos of that sharp color combo makes me think like brands need to take more chances. Like you might get a blue dial watch, but like put a little yellow in there too. It looks so good together. |
| James Stacey | Yeah. No, I think, I think the watch came off beautifully. I think they did a great job with it. A nice attention to detail. I think a strong price point at about 700 bucks. Yeah. Uh, it'll be, I guess it's seven 50 at the end of March, if you don't want to preorder. And it's also for this, for people who it matters. I mean, it, this is limited. I don't like calling a lot of these, whether it be a Raven or a Hallios or, or some of these brands we're going to talk about in a moment, a limited edition, you know, they're limited based on how many of the brand, you know, believes they can produce and sell. |
| Unknown | Yeah. |
| James Stacey | Um, so the production is low. It's kind of different. It's low. I would call it more like low volume than limited edition. |
| Unknown | Mm. |
| James Stacey | Uh, but for low volume, there's only going to be a hundred of these blue ones total. Oh, wow. So not, not a hundred of the one that was in the review. I think there's like 20 of those or 17, or there's a different sort of division across the eight specs, but there's eight specifications that will total out a hundred models. And there's only going to be 300 total of the Trekker 49 in its variety of colors. |
| Jason Heaton | 39, 39. |
| James Stacey | Oh, thank you. 39. Sorry. Uh, my, my ability with, uh, numbers is never fails to impress. |
| Jason Heaton | 49 would be groundbreaking. |
| James Stacey | That would be, that'd be a big one. The Trekker 49, maybe not on the roadmap until, until the whole, there's an idea to start a new trend. The Trekker 49. Yeah. I mean, you see, you know, Steve, if Steve is listening, he's done, he's done some, some pretty large watches in the past. I don't know about 49. He'd have to correct me if, if he's already hit that, but yeah, the Trekker 39 solid watch. I was really impressed with it. It got a nice response too. I mean like I like covering these sorts of watches. Yeah. You know because I know Steve and I know the companies that he's worked for or run in the past and Raven and now his involvement with Finch. I really like the knife company. Yeah. And so it's just nice to be able to support what I still see as a small business. You know this is a guy supporting his family by selling some watches and I think the watches are really good and have merit and I think they're a more interesting way of spending say 700 bucks than you have from a lot of the big brands or brands with more noticeable names than something like Raven. But yeah, I was impressed with that. Other than that, I do have a bunch of straps to talk about, but I don't have a specific methodology for going through these. Just some two straps that I received in the mail for free, heads up. uh, that I think both are pretty good. The first one is from a company called wrist hardware and it's because they're military straps. So it's basically a NATO. Um, I'm really impressed with these. They sent, I mean, far too many, they sent a whole stack. Um, but, but a, uh, a really nice sort of, this is more of the, the smoother shinier it's in the vein of a seatbelt, but the hardware is really nice. Lots of different colors, lots of different versions. I know people are always on the lookout for another NATO, and we talk a lot about the UTA stuff, which of course is now at Hodinkee. But if you prefer something that's a little bit more on the smooth, the shiny, it's not so much my general taste. These are really nicely made. They're about 26 bucks. There's a litany. There are myriad options. And I think that's worth a look. So, you know, a shout out to Wrist Hardware. Thanks for sending the straps. I, of course, appreciate it. And I look forward to getting a few of them real sweaty this summer as I get back into a true NATO sort of lifestyle, hopefully, with the snow going away. These are solid straps. And like I said, if you prefer something maybe a little bit less rugged, a little bit more smooth and refined than an UTA or some of the stuff from crown and buckle that we've talked about before, I think this is a great option as well. They seem to be making a nice strap. I mean, all NATOs at this point have become generic, right? But these have a couple. They have kind of the nicer hardware. They have that, you know, that like edge finishing that they do on some of them. |
| Unknown | Oh, yeah. |
| James Stacey | It's not just melted. It almost has like a weave to it. |
| Unknown | Yes. |
| James Stacey | Yep. Yeah. It's just a little bit more upmarket. I think it's nice. It's not something that you always see. It's a twenty six bucks. So good. Good job on them. This second strap is a cool one. It's very an uncommon design that I've not come across before. It's made by a company called Dispatch, which both Jason and I know Jason. I think they've made straps with the Gear Patrol in the past because you gave me this really great orange Oh yeah. Geez. Years ago. Right. Orange camera strap, which I used for years. It was great because it was bright orange and you can literally just tell somebody you're meeting somebody at a car event. I remember I was trying to meet, um, I was trying to meet a friend at the, at the, the kind of, uh, pit adjacent area to, um, to Laguna Seca during, uh, Monterey Historics. |
| Unknown | Yeah. |
| James Stacey | And I said, like, yeah, I'm over by this such-and-such car, bright orange camera strap. And people find you, kind of works like a high-vis vest as well. You can put it over one shoulder and you've got this big, bright orange. So I like their stuff a lot. They've made a bunch of stuff. And a friend of mine at AcquireMag, Bernard, thanks very much for sending one of these straps, for thinking of me. It is called the Fidlock, F-I-D-L-O-C-K. it's sort of a military kind of streety sort of design, but it uses a two-piece nylon with an adjuster buckle, and then it has a magnetically kept channeled buckle. So it's this really... They don't recommend you use it with a watch that doesn't have great magnetic protection. So I've been wearing it on my Garmin Fenix, and it's just perfect. It's, um, there's enough, there's enough hardware to balance all the other hardware between the big kind of magnetic clip and this, um, slight sliding adjuster. And so once you get the kind of position of all those things, right, it sits really nicely balanced on your wrist. It doesn't weigh that much. It's a nice soft nylon. Um, they're about 36 bucks, uh, is, is what they go for. And I think for a certain, for certain type of fan who kind of likes a little bit more bulk to their strap, or appreciates the kind of look and feel of this. Right. I think you'd get a kick out of them. I, the buckle is surprisingly secure. I have yet to have, it took me a little while mentally to know that I was wearing something. It was kind of just connected by magnets. But then if you actually sit down and look at the, the kind of design of the buckle, it's, it's this very complicated connection of curves and little channels and, and, and reliefs that fit into each other. |
| Unknown | Yeah. |
| James Stacey | And it makes this really secure, one-handed, take it on, take it off sort of thing. And I'm impressed. It's not the kind of strap I would have paid any attention to. Because aesthetically, I think it's a little bit strange. You have to match it with the right watch. My guess is it'd be best in 22 millimeter with a larger watch. Oh, sure. Than it is in 20 with a smaller watch. Yeah. But I think these are a cool thing. And I think if you want a strap that doesn't feel like the rest of your straps, you want something that feels kind of new. Or if you're in a scenario where you have to take your watch on or off a lot, I dig it. And then they also make them with Apple Watch fittings. And for an Apple Watch, I think it makes a lot of sense. It's a really cool way to wear something like an Apple Watch or a Phoenix. You can take it on and take it off really easily. It's going to deal with sweat just fine. You can clean it. And I think it works. So that's my strap update. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah, that's really wild. I'm looking at it. there's, I have something that has a magnetic clasp like that, that I use regularly and I can't think of what it is. I almost think it's the chest strap on one of my day packs. I think so. I think it is that where it's, it's one of those straps that isn't load bearing necessarily. Cause I think it would pull apart the magnet would be quite strong enough, but I think, you know, for a watch it would be fine. And I like, it's a very satisfying, closure when you get it. Yeah. Yeah. |
| James Stacey | This one has this definitely hit the link. If you're interested, if you, if you're curious, hit the link, but this one has this sort of hook so that even if the, even if the magnet were to become, I don't know how it would happen. You'd have to, something would have to dig into this little edge and pull the magnet flap up. And then even if it did that, it's not yet ready to let go. |
| Unknown | Okay. |
| James Stacey | You have to like extend it further until it lifts itself off of this little hook. |
| Unknown | Okay. |
| James Stacey | I'm impressed by it. I like an interesting and different sort of strap. And I didn't want to let, I didn't, you know, both of these companies, but Wrist Hardware and Dispatch were kind enough, Dispatch via Acquire magazine, were kind enough to send these in. And I didn't want to just forget about it. You know, it's easy to get a NATO in and then not remember to chat about it, but both were pretty good. I think that Fidlock, if you want kind of an interesting, or if you have a watch where you've never really found the right strap for it, This might be the one to consider. Yeah. I think it's kind of neat. I don't, I wouldn't say it's as comfortable as like an Erica's but it's definitely right in there with like a standard NATO in terms of comfort. Once you get it kind of balanced out. Cool. Yeah. So that's probably, you know, plenty of of, of chit chat. Let's see where we are here. Yeah. I think that's probably, probably lots of chit chat. You want to get into a risk check and then our, our main topic. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah, sure. And, and risk check actually has a, some interesting news as part of it. Um, I am wearing, uh, the all new just launched last night, Synchron Military. So this is, um, Synchron Corporation or Synchron Watch Company, if you're not familiar, is the brand that was Started by more recently, Rick Mirai, who we interviewed on a TGN not long ago regarding his spectacular AquaStar launch. Synchron was a brand back in the, in the sixties that owned a number of different companies. They owned Eberhard, they owned Doxa and some others, Borel, I think. And then they went to Fonkton and Rick bought the name a number of years ago and has used it to kind of be his umbrella brand over tropic straps, isoframe straps, AquaDive, AquaStar, and now Synchron. And I think, you know, Rick was at Doxa for 20 years. He was the kind of the guy behind a lot of those, well, all of their great reissue dive watches since the late nineties. And there was one that he always wanted to make, which was this, the, what was called the Army back in the, in the seventies, a very small run, kind of a cult following grail piece for a lot of collectors. Um, and so he's made it under, under the Synchron name now that he's, he's, uh, away from Doxa and it's a, it's an amazing watch. So he sent me one. I've had it since I, gosh, I think November. Um, and it was just released last night. So he sent it to me to check out and, uh, um, it comes in two versions. There's 250 are going to be made in each color. So there's the, the DLC black case version and, um, just a raw steel case. It is a, you know, typical sort of tonneau shaped DOXA style case with the sawtooth bezel. But the dial hands and bezel are entirely different from what you'd see normally on a DOXA. It doesn't have the no deco limits scale. It's got a, a Sapphire insert with a countdown scale. So instead of counting up for time elapsed, it's a countdown scale and it's done in those kind of funky bakelite style luminous numerals that you'd find on the old Seamaster 300s and a few other watches back in the 60s. Really, really cool. But I think the most obvious departure and kind of interesting piece of this watch is the dial and hands. It has a really very 70s looking geometric, colorful, almost psychedelic kind of dial with really crazy black and white and tan markers And then the handset is really bold. Our hand is this blocky, almost square piece, and then the minute hand's a little bit more traditional, kind of what you'd expect on a Daxa. And then the second's hand has a big orange arrow on it. So, you know, this is a watch that stands out. It's very different from kind of more of the, you know, military-derived looking, ironically, military-derived, you know, sober, white-on-black dials that you saw kind of in the era before this one came out originally. Um, but it's a really cool watch. And so the regular price of this is 1290. There's an intro price of nine 90. So this is a, a sub thousand dollar watch. Um, 42 millimeter case, 45 millimeters lug to lug 12 and a half millimeters thick. So, um, you know, kind of standard size. If you know what you're getting, it wears a lot like a Doxa of course, or a Seiko turtle or something like this. Um, The movement is kind of a higher grade ETA 28, 24. So for those of you that are kind of anti Salida snobs, this is a, this is a movement that, that you'll be happy with. It's a, um, the, the nicer grade 28, 24, um, 300 meter water resistant comes on a tropic strap, or I think you can get an ISO frame with it. So, um, how's the loom? The loom is, is pretty amazing. Um, as you imagine, and I love a loomed bezel, um, Yeah. |
| James Stacey | I want, I want one just for that loom bezel. |
| Jason Heaton | That bezel looks incredible. It's just the, the numerals that are illuminated after dark. And I think their website, if you go to the SynchronUSA.com, I think they're, they have a couple of kind of loom shots that you can, you can check out, but it'd be a tough call like between the, um, the black version and the, and the naked steel version. It's, it's a tough call. The one I've been wearing is the, is the steel one, which I usually don't go for black watches, but I think on this one, I'm not sure how it would wear or if it would patina nicely, but I think it would look so great if you just, you know, wore the heck out of it and it just got all scarred up and kind of chipped and faded and everything else. |
| James Stacey | But, uh, yeah, I think, I think I may order a black one. I dig it. I think it's super cool. You know, there's, there's some controversy, right? Cause it's kind of a Doxa design and, uh, Doxa even, um, reference the controversy quite openly on their Instagram. |
| Unknown | Yeah. |
| James Stacey | you know, making, making a play for the authenticity of the original or of the army itself. Right. Right. But they did so with the kind of version of the army that has like sub hands, which is a weird move. Yeah. And I saw it popped up in the comments, even some kind of high profile commenters, if, if you're, if you know who I mean, but a really, I think a really, really good looking watch. And the, the thing that, that surprised me, I didn't know this was coming. you know, I, I don't like Rick is, I think Rick has kind of a circle of trust, uh, with, with a few people, uh, that, that get to hear about these things before they come out. So there's not like a press release with an embargo and the rest of it for, for this watch, it just kind of showed up. Um, I, I was really surprised by the price. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah. Nine 90. |
| James Stacey | I mean, you know, sub thousand cause I just thought it would be, I thought it would be up there with, you know, with the Aqua star, like why not do 1500 bucks? Yeah. Yeah. Um, and then the, the pre the non pre-order price makes a little bit more sense to me, but under a grand, It's a pretty cool watch for a great. And isn't that, it's a totally solid and get it service anywhere movement. Really? Otherwise really simple. Like how's the, how's the crown and the bezel? |
| Jason Heaton | Um, it's great. It feels good. Not scratchy. I'm not too wobbly. Um, bezel's great. |
| James Stacey | The bezel's really, you can't ask for much more than that. I mean, at a thousand bucks, if it's a decent movement, you like the way it looks and the, the, the bezel and the crown, those are your main touch points. How can, how can you complain? Right? Same, same vibe as that, uh, as that Raven. Yeah. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah. I mean, I think it's, the luxury watch space is so interesting now and our episode today, you know, this kind of dovetails nicely into it because we're talking about brands less traveled or, or smaller players that we really like. And I think, you know, Synchron fits into that. Doxa used to fit into it. I think they've gotten a little bigger now, so I'm not sure that, that we could consider them. We're not necessarily just talking micro brands, but just kind of lesser known or lesser talked about brands. But I think what we see now is we see a lot of, um, I don't know if you call them turf wars or, or kind of small battles being played out across different platforms. And, um, you know, this is one, you know, Doc's post today was a bit of a shot across the bow at Rick for releasing the watch when he did. And I think, um, I'm not sure if Doc's has one in the works or, you know, what their, their timing plan is, but it was kind of interesting timing on the morning after to kind of release that. And with the comment that they did, but I think it goes to a larger issue that I've noticed over my, you know, decade writing about watches is I'm always surprised at how, um, how much kind of backstabbing and sniping and everything there is across different brands, whether you see it among, you know, British brands or the Swiss brands, or I think the Japanese brands kind of stay above the fray a little bit and don't get involved in that. But to me, it's, this is all good stuff. I mean, this is, there's, there's nothing, nothing bad about all these watches. There's plenty of them to go around. I mean, we're talking about people who are buying these watches with very disposable income. So, um, you know, we don't need to, you know, duke it out too much, uh, over what really is a, uh, obsolete sort of luxury product. But, uh, I don't know, as an observer, it's, it's fun to watch. |
| James Stacey | Yeah. And it might be a topic for say a future episode or the, the last episode of TGN or something, but I mean, this, this industry is full of snipes for sure. Uh, it's, it's a pretty common thing. I don't think it's just one brand to another brand. I actually, you know, the design, the design of the military is very much tied to DOCSIS. So I get that they would be, they would kind of feel like someone drank their milkshake. I get that. Um, and, and maybe they'll, maybe they'll release a comp competition and we'll have a weird thing like in the sixties where people were releasing watches that were, you know, mentally from the same thought plan, they were just developed. They just ended up being developed from, by, you know, different entities. Um, so maybe that's, maybe that's the, the circle of life when it comes to, Sometimes watches look a lot like other watches and also came out at the same time, you know, look to 1969 for fun. Yeah. For that in the background, but man, that, yeah, the, the, the back and forth thing, especially, you know, it's, and it's not just brands, it's, it's journalists. It's, you know, it's, it's, it's everyone, everybody's in, everybody's in for what they believe to be a share of a, of a very limited pie. And I'm not necessarily, I'm not always sure that it's as limited as people think it is. You know, the internet's a big place and there's a lot of, there's a lot of time and effort put into consuming things on the internet. But yeah, I think this watch looks pretty solid. I'm absolutely interested to see what the next, I mean, irrespective of this watch in many ways, I'm really interested to see what the next year is for Doxa. You know, cause I thought they, they made some strides last year in terms of refining their, their lineup. And I just like to see where they take it. And I don't, I don't believe that the army was ever going to be like a core model that everybody kind of clamored for. Right. It is this sort of oddball thing on the side. So I don't think that this is going to disrupt their entire, you know, arc for 2021 or whatever, but I'm sure, I'm sure it's a bummer at some level, if they had one in the works or, or that sort of thing, which is, uh, which is sort of a different scenario and, and probably not that uncommon at some level, uh, you know, brands not being the first, to a spot where they want it to be. Yeah. But I, it'll be interesting to see where it goes. I I'm, I'm excited to, you know, even just to see one of these in the metal, let alone maybe snap one up. Uh, you know, they are pretty limited to 50 of each unit and currently under a grand. So that's, I mean, I think that's the kind of thing we got to chat about on the show, right? |
| Jason Heaton | By the time the controversy plays itself out, these watches will probably all be gone with such a limited number. And I think, you know, uh, regardless of the, know, which side you fall down on or, you know, if you even need to take sides, which I don't think you need to, um, you know, just independently or objectively, this is just a, it's a fantastic watch. It's a, yeah, it's just a fun watch. I mean, let's just look at the watch itself. I mean, it's, it's, it'd be a fun summer watch. I mean, it's perfect timing to throw it on like a light colored NATO or even on the Tropic that it comes with. And it's the, it's the jump off the dock watch for, for this summer. It's really cool. |
| James Stacey | The other perspective that I would like to share when people get so angry about things sometimes, and I'm not saying this about Synchron and Docs, I'm just talking about the way people attach to watch brand controversy. Watch brands are nothing. I mean, like a great watch is a great watch. And I think most brands make a great watch. I don't think there's one brand where I like everything they make. You know what I mean? It's probably a lot closer to almost every brand you can name. I like one or two things and ignore the rest of it. So the idea of really being the brand guy, unless it's your brand, if you own Doxer, you own Rolex, or you own whoever, whatever it is that you feel does make a perfect product line. Sure, if you work for the brand, if you own the brand, wear the t-shirt, have the polo, put the key chain on your thing, I get it. But if you're just like a consumer, I've never understood this steadfast adherence to a brand. Whether it's like the Ford Chevy thing, it's like, you know, Porsche or Tesla or whatever. Like people stand so hard for a brand. And like, I get, I understand like feeling, feeling connection to the specific product that you own. Like being a big, I love DOCSIS sub three hundreds. I have two of them. They're great. Um, I don't, I don't, I don't have like a strong opinion one way or another about the idea of DOCSIS as a brand. I think, you know, it has to be reflected in the product. |
| Unknown | Mm. |
| James Stacey | And brands are brands. I don't think that they're important to consumers beyond what they make. And I think a lot of times people should just focus on the product itself rather than saying that like, I adore Omega and thus I don't like Rolex. Whereas in my mind, I can think of three or four Omegas that I really like and I can think of three or four Rolexes that I really like and kind of leave it at that. |
| Unknown | Sure. Yeah. |
| James Stacey | Yeah. It's the adherence to the brand thing. You'd almost think it's a band, right? And in many ways, it's like the same thing with a band or a director of movies. I might like one or two of Scorsese's. I don't like all of them. I might like, um, most of the songs on a Frank Ocean album, but I, you know, there's two or three that I don't like. I don't want to listen to the Facebook song. It's not even a song. |
| Unknown | Yeah. |
| James Stacey | Right. And, and it's this weird thing where like at a certain point you have to try and focus on, I like to focus on the end result, whether it be the song, the specific movie, the watch, the car, rather than this, more grander presence of a brand. I think the branding part is very interesting when it's being reflected in a product, but it's not that interesting when it's just branding. |
| Unknown | Yeah. |
| James Stacey | Like think about how many watch brands just kind of attach their name to a sport or an athlete or, uh, uh, some other, you know, connection of kind of this detached love. It's I've always found it to be, I don't know, somewhat weird. And when people get really deep into this brand or that brand versus, this specific watch versus that specific watch. I, I find it strange. Yeah. It's such a general nebulous sort of thing to complain about. Right. Right. Um, anyways, I've rambled, uh, allow me to continue rambling, uh, as we can get to, uh, we can get to my watch. I'm wearing the, uh, the Oris Diver 65 for Hodinkee. Uh, it's been on, uh, on a bracelet for a little while. And I had sized the bracelet for a wrist smaller than mine and, uh, and have been unable to, unsized to resize the bracelet to a larger size. Just I bent a couple of the little pins doing that. So I finally gave up and just knocked it off the bracelet and I threw it on a NATO. I've been wearing it for the last few days. I think it's just such a fun watch. It's a killer thing. It's really, really pretty, but it's super subtle. So yeah, I've been enjoying that. I don't have anywhere near as much to say. Everyone listening probably knows that watch. If you don't, by all means, hit the link in the show notes. But it was a thinner, hand-wound, Diver 65 that Hodinke designed with Oris about two years ago. Still has a screw-down crown, flat gray bezel, or flat gray dial, a kind of ghosty gray bezel. It's a little bit thinner because it doesn't have the automatic winding. Yeah, it's a really fun, thin dive watch. I mean, how can you go wrong? |
| Jason Heaton | I'd love to see this as an idea for a future, you know, you've been doing these sort of photography, one-on-one watch photography, one-on-one, uh, articles on Hodinkee lately. I'd love to see a story on sizing bracelets. Cause when you mentioned the pin sizing, um, I don't even, I don't even attempt it. I don't even, you know, I've imagined that it's similar to, uh, removing links in a bicycle chain, which I've done. And I have the tool for that. I'm guessing you could get a similar tool to pop out the pins in a bracelet, but I'd love to see, a story with good photos or something, or maybe you should just do a YouTube video of it, or somebody should, because... Yeah, I mean, there's definitely some pretty good ones. |
| James Stacey | I know of two offhand videos. Yeah. I can drop them in the show notes. It's really tough because it's the... This is why I praise The Raven in my review, because they use single sided screws. |
| Unknown | Oh, yeah. |
| James Stacey | So not only is it a screw and not a pin, it's one side. It's more expensive and it's more complicated, but you're only holding one screwdriver. Yeah. You're not scratching your bracelet up, removing it. Yeah. Um, you can, and then I also really liked that I can return once I've got the sizing just right, I'll back the screws off and put a little bit of Loctite in there. |
| Unknown | Yeah. |
| James Stacey | Because I like just, just the Loctite that you can actually, you know, break the blue stuff that you can get. You can, you can back the screw out later on, but it's enough to keep it in there. |
| Unknown | Yeah. |
| James Stacey | Um, and, and yeah, no, I, I, I like, uh, a single side and then with the, with the Oris, it's, uh, you know, it's the, the, um, split pin style. Oh yeah. Which isn't, isn't as bad. It's one of the worst, uh, not to be unfair, the Oris bracelet is fine and once it's sized, it's great. But if you're just focusing on the art of sizing a bracelet, um, the absolute entry level in my opinion is Seiko and their, their pin and collar. Oh yeah. So that's where, uh, if you imagine, um, if you imagine the connection between a link being almost like a male and a female link where the one link is fitting up inside the two arms of the other, that would have a little cylinder, like a tube, a collar inside that link. And when you push the other, and that eats up the tolerance between the size of the pin bar and the internal channel of that center link. And it's, so then when you remove it and you turn the link sideways, this tiny little metal collar falls out and most people lose them, right? This is something you learn if you've ever sized in like a 7-7-9, you know, a monster, the monster bracelet you see. It's a pain. They're fine once they're in. They don't wiggle loose. That's fine. Then you have the dual sided screws. These are hard because you have a tiny head. You have to use, in my opinion, you have to use Loctite. You will lose a head eventually on those. But the microbrand scene has largely moved past that into these single-sided screws, which I really like. And then a lot of the Swiss stuff, especially at a certain price point, like the Aorus, still uses this split pin design where you use a little tool to push the pin. It only goes in the one direction being split. Push the pin out, put it back together, and then back the pin back in the other way. And I just found that the tolerances of the Aorus bracelet were great, but that meant that you know, one of the pins was kind of stuck and you grab it with a pair of pliers and kind of crank it over there. It bends. It's not going back in. So I'd have to pick up a couple of pins if I wanted to resize that. And that's okay. I just, I wasn't patient enough to use the exactly correct tools. Yeah. I got it done. I got it sized. It's all right. Um, I think if I had used higher quality tools, obviously the, the, the bits, the pins would have, would have survived, but they didn't. So, uh, I'll get, I'll get on that at some point in the future. Not a big issue. The watch is great on leather. It's fantastic on a NATO, so it's not exactly an issue that I care strongly about, but it is, you know, a thin dive watch is also nice on a thin bracelet and that bracelet's pretty nice on wrist, so. Cool. That would be my wrist check. Speaking of, so that would be my wrist check. What do you feel about some main topic now that we're, what are we, an hour into the show? |
| Jason Heaton | Well, we can We can call it the main topic, but I just feel like today's just sort of a bit of a, you know, bit of a floaty episode. We'll just, uh, we'll just, yeah. |
| James Stacey | Just before anyone gets upset, we're not going to get to every brand in this one. Yeah. We kind of see this as one that we'll do every couple of months. It's kind of a highlight of smaller brands that we, uh, we think maybe don't give it enough, enough mention or enough notice, but still feel pretty TGN. That sounds about right, Jason. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah, I would say so. So the idea came directly from a listener, Luke Taylor down in Australia, who, I was exchanging emails with, with Luke about something different. And, um, and he said, Hey, I've got an idea for a future topic for TGN brands, less traveled, um, you know, brands that are in our wheelhouse, but don't get talked about a lot. So it seemed like a great idea. We were looking for a topic for this week and here we are. So, um, and as James said, you know, uh, you know, there's no way we're going to, we're going to get to all of them. And so we'll just kind of throw a few out and maybe make it into a series at some point. So. |
| James Stacey | Yeah, I think we might be able to get to four or five with the time we have left today because we've got some pretty solid final notes. Yeah. So we can get to that. But why don't you kick it off? Pick one from the list and we can chat about it. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah. So I think a good place to start is Marathon. You know, here's a brand that we've both experienced over our history in watches. And lo and behold, they're a Canadian brand. So great. You know, bravo. Oh yeah. We don't talk about them much for some reason. And I think they're such a great brand. They're such a TGN kind of brand. They're sort of a bit of an underdog. I would say they're kind of the Canadian version of like a CWC or, or, you know, kind of with, with the military history. Um, you know, I think early on in my watch days, uh, I owned several of the so-called SAR, the search and rescue dive watches that they make. And, Cole's done a good job of writing up Marathon for Hodinkee, so you can search for a few articles of his over there, which I think are great. Over their long history, I'm not an expert on Marathon, but the SAR watch was one that was built for search and rescue divers, I believe with the Canadian Coast Guard, possibly maybe the American Coast Guard, but they were available for issue with a few different militaries. Once they got known by kind of the watch nerd community as happens, such as with CWC in, in great Britain, um, they started to pop up for sale and people really, really liked them just for their no nonsense kind of ruggedness. And I've always enjoyed them. Uh, Gashani has the 36 millimeter, what was called the TSAR, the, the tritium SAR. So it's the one without the, the painted on. Such a good watch. Luminova markers and hands. It actually has the little tritium. tubes for, for luminescence on the dial on hands. And, um, and I've had, gosh, I had a JSAR. So the jumbo SAR years ago. Um, and then currently I have the, the, I think it's the, like the drab olive colored navigator, which is in like a fiberglass reinforced or, you know, plastic case that has asymmetrical shape to it. Um, quartz movement. I like the navigator a lot. It's like a $300 watch. I got it on worn and wound at their site. And, um, It's, uh, yeah, it's fun. It's just a great little grab and go super light. Great. It'll be a great summer watch. I think. |
| James Stacey | Yeah, no, I agree. I think, uh, I think they make some good stuff. I've owned a TSAR, the standard spec one. I thought it was lovely. Great bezel. The bezel is great. It might be one of the best, uh, you know, tritium super fun. It's, it's fun because the bezel action, the movement, the rest of it is only, it's fine. It's exactly, it's kind of what you'd expect from a sub thousand dollar dive watch, but it's the design of the actual bezel makes it so easy to grip. I love it. It's like, um, It's like, if you've ever been in a car that has a short shift kit on the shifter, it's, it's the same, it's the same, it's the same gearbox, the clutch travel doesn't change, but the whole experience is a little bit more refined. |
| Unknown | Yeah. |
| James Stacey | Yeah. You know, it's one of those things as providing the car needed a short shift. I know that that's an argument within the modifying community. People making them shorter doesn't necessarily make it better. Um, but let's say the kit made it better and it's that change in the geometry of how you're kind of interfacing. with the same mechanics. That chunkier bezel design, there's so much grip, obviously has been designed to be used wet and with a glove. Yeah, I think they're a great brand and one that's always kind of on the radar. When people write me and I know that they want a watch that is just a watch and gets out of its own way, I often say like, hey, if this is in your price range, these guys make stuff that the military really enjoys. It should just serve you. really reliably for a long time. And if it has to get repaired, it doesn't have to leave the country. Right. Um, and if you go to the courts one, if it gets, you're not repairing it, they're just putting a new movement in. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah. I think we do a whole episode on, on just the best bezels in the business. And I think marathon, I mean, I've always loved, loved the bezel. And I think you're like, like you said, I mean, as we've talked about earlier, the, the idea of brands and kind of the competition and sniping among the industry, I think in marathons and those brands, it just exists completely separate from that. They just seem to, do good stuff and kind of keep quiet about it. And I think, you know, lately we've seen a bit of an uptick in interest and exposure. They've, they've appeared on Houdinki, Born and Wild. |
| James Stacey | Cole did a great write-up of the, the white 36 millimeter, which I think is probably one of their best watches. Yeah. |
| Unknown | Yeah. |
| James Stacey | So we'll put that in the show notes because Cole did a beautiful job. There's some incredible photography in that. He took it for some proper adventures. |
| Jason Heaton | They do some cool clocks too. I've noticed on their website, they've got like alarm clocks and wall clocks and I think they do some compasses and so I'm Yeah. Fun, fun brand. Really good one. And I think it's a good one to lead off with. |
| James Stacey | What, what do you have to start off? I'm going to pick two. I'm going to put them together only because if we, we've already talked about Raven and, but I would like them to be mentioned because I think that, that they're on a great trajectory for a brand. Yeah. But alongside the, I'll get, I can get two out of the way. We already talked about Raven at the top of the show, but I don't want to leave them out of this conversation because they're absolutely representative. |
| Unknown | Yeah. |
| James Stacey | The other one to throw in there would be Hallios. Hallios gets plenty of, um, of kind of notoriety within the enthusiast community and decent press coverage. Uh, but they haven't kind of lately, I don't know if that's more just that they've gotten a little bit quieter during COVID or whatnot. You know, I chat with Jason, you know, Lim at Hallios with some frequency and, uh, you know, they're still moving, moving their way through the fair wind and on route to the Universa, which is, which will be my next Hallios one I'm quite excited for. Um, But yeah, I wouldn't want to go through this conversation without getting, you know, brands like Raven and Halleos mentioned, but Raven also just, you know, just had my story on Hodinkee and Halleos, I think is relatively well known within a certain circle. So I would say that probably next up, the one that always hits me when people say like, well, what's an underrated watch brand, it's Damasco. Oh, yeah. Every time I see a Damasco, maybe the aesthetic is just slightly off of where I want it to be. But the build quality, the brand story, the usage case, all of that is locked in. They make a really compelling product. And they're also one of the few watches that has passed muster. I have a friend who's exceedingly picky about watches. I won't even say their name in case this embarrasses them. But this is a brand that passed their muster. This person is vastly more picky than I am. I'm very particular in my tastes, but I have this kind of fluidity of whatever I think is kind of cool at the moment. This person's not involved in that thinking. They really pick watches just for their own wrist. And the Damasco that they've owned passed musters. They're definitely not fooling around. And I think they deserve a mention on this list. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah. And, and it, it falls in a list of the short list of, of brands that I'm always surprised that I've never owned or tried, you know, I think I handled one once at a local get together about five years ago and I was impressed with it. And I always loved the photos and I think somebody had produced a nice video of a visit to Damasco, you know, chatted with the owner, the founder. Um, and I'm like, you know, these are really impressive watches. And I think they might suffer a bit because they've always been mentioned almost as an asterisk or as, as a tag on when you talk about Zen. Um, and I don't know if there was actually a connection and I'm sure some more knowledgeable listeners will correct us or correct me, but yeah, I don't know if there was any sort of a connection between the two brands at some point. Um, but they have similar, they are always mentioned together. Yeah. Always hardened steel, German, blah, blah, blah. Yeah. |
| James Stacey | So yeah, I think, uh, I think there's solid one. If you don't know Damasco again, show notes, uh, figure that out. Uh, I definitely think they're worth a look. They make, uh, they make an interesting and not, not insanely, it's an, it's an, an enthusiast price point. Yeah. Like marathon has a couple of things you could recommend almost anyone, whether like watches or not. |
| Unknown | Yeah. |
| James Stacey | Um, I don't think that's a Damasco, uh, trait. So, uh, yeah, that, uh, that would be, yeah, Damasco would be that. So that gives us, we're already at four brands. We're moving faster than we normally do. |
| Jason Heaton | Well, I think, you know, continuing in this sort of, Germanic thread that we're going along here. I think, you know, we've got two more that we can, we can knock off here. Both brands that make kind of a Flieger style watch. One would be Stoa and the other is Archimedean. Have you owned a Stoa? I have not. I would love. Yeah, me neither. I love, the one that I love of theirs is not the one that you might think that I would. It's the, I think they called it the Marine original. It was kind of a white dial deck watch. |
| James Stacey | What a cool watch. Yeah, that's really, that's right up your alley as far as the sort of like, yeah, the nautical, observatory style watches. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah, yeah. Those are beautiful. But then they made that really funky, I think it was called the Pro Diver, that really angular diver watch. Yeah. Lime green dial on one of them. Oh yeah, yeah. Great stuff. And then of course the Flieger and they make some really neat sort of asymmetrical dial, single register Flieger chronographs that are really sharp. Yeah, again, that's a watch I've never handled, never owned. |
| James Stacey | Yeah, me neither. I'm definitely on board. And then what was the other one you mentioned was Archimede, yeah? |
| Jason Heaton | Archimede, yeah. You added this to the list and I totally forgotten about it. But, you know, I bought an Archimede 45 millimeter automatic Flieger for my dad for his 70th birthday, which was, well, I won't say how many years ago it was, but he's worn it for a very long time. And he wears it all the time. He loves it. Every time I see him, I I just look at it lovingly. I think it's a great watch. And, and Archimedes, another under the radar kind of brand, another German brand that makes really solid pieces. |
| James Stacey | Yeah. Yeah. I haven't, I haven't owned, um, well, no, that's not true. I had a pilot's watch briefly. Uh, it came in and out on a trade years and years and years ago. Uh, you know, it was a, uh, you know, they, they do, they do sort of the standard Flieger style. |
| Unknown | Right. |
| James Stacey | in the same vein as like an IWC Big Pilot and the rest of them. But what's interesting about them is they offer a lot of variety. So if you want a Big Pilot that's not big, they make a Pilot 39. They make it in bronze. They make a Pilot 36. So that's a 36 millimeter Flieger. You can get them signed and unsigned. So where there's nothing on the dial. I believe they've done, they definitely do a 42 millimeter GMT. That's a pretty cool looking watch. Oh, wow. Um, they do a pilot's chronograph. They do it in titanium. They do it in bronze. They do it in hand wound. They do, they do a bunch. Um, the, the Archimede that's always been on my radar and I've even came close to buying, I guess, two in the used market, not in the last few years, but a few years ago is this port talker is their dive watch. |
| Unknown | Oh yeah. |
| James Stacey | Yeah. I don't really know why I've never owned one of these because I have been kind of obsessed with this watch for a while. It's a 41.5 millimeter kind of modern, dive watch has a date at four, which is in line with the crown, which sounds weird. And like, I should hate it. And I still haven't decided it's been probably seven or eight years. This watch has been on my radar. It's right where a marker would be. So I don't think it bothers me that much. It's not a four 30. It's not between two markers. It's at the 20 point on the bezel. They make a few different versions. They're 12 millimeters thick. Uh, They make a version with a 12-hour bezel, which of course is right up my alley. These are Ickler-cased dive watches. They use Sellita SW-200s. I think these are really killer. |
| Jason Heaton | I'm looking at a picture now. The bezel looks great. It kind of looks like a slightly thinner version of the... Seamaster. Or Planet Ocean, sorry. Yeah. But the knurling on the side or the Edging on the side looks a bit like what we're talking about with marathon, except just slightly shorter. Yeah. I love the combination of red and black. |
| Unknown | Yeah. |
| James Stacey | Yeah. Around a thousand euros, not a vintage effect thing. Definitely worth taking a look at for the price point. |
| Unknown | Yeah. |
| James Stacey | Um, I, I think this is a really interesting brand, a brand that I probably should have bought years ago. I should have bought a sport talker a long time ago. Um, I, I dig these quite a bit. They make a handful. Their, their cases are really nice. I think I've seen maybe three or four. between having the pilots watch briefly and then get togethers and stuff. Yeah. So they're not common. Maybe they're more common in other areas. I'm not sure. But they're not that common here. But I do think that they have a really nicely well-rounded, good-looking lineup of watches. Yeah. Some of them are borderline homage to other famous watches. Right. But it's up to you if that bothers you. I don't think any of these are so heavy-handed that it bothers me. And I like the look, especially of that sport talker. It's a watch I think about and then forget of so many times, and I should have just bought one a long time ago, for sure. |
| Jason Heaton | Sometimes I wonder if these brands fall off our radars because, well, for one thing, I don't spend time on forums like I used to. I am not on forums like I used to be. But also, you know, they probably don't spend money on PR, so we aren't getting press releases. They don't have a big presence in social media, but it's refreshing now. I mean, it's kind of the anti, you know, whatever, anti-heroes of the of the watch space now, these brands that kind of, yeah. |
| James Stacey | Yeah. No, I don't, I don't disagree. I think that's probably, probably true on, on, on all counts. Um, how about, how about you pick our next one? What you got of our, from our list? |
| Jason Heaton | We're moving pretty quickly here. This is good. Yeah, it is good. Um, so let's see here. All right. I'm going to, I'm going to pick one. This is a, uh, Newmark. So Newmark is, um, a brand that was, uh, the, the name is connected with a company back in the sixties and seventies that made, watches for the British military. Specifically, they were one of the fab four so-called asymmetric pilot chronograph makers. Name went defunct and then it was started up several years ago by a guy, I believe he's a British military veteran watch collector, denizen of the Military Watch Resource Forum. And he decided he wanted to revive and make one of their asymmetric chronographs, but with a bit of a twist. So he wanted to make it pretty faithful, in fact, very faithful to the original design, but he wanted to make it affordable. And so he opted for the Seiko Mecaquartz movement. So this is a two register watch with one sub-dial being the counter for the chronograph minutes, central sweep hand, of course, but then the other sub-dials, that 24-hour register, which isn't terribly useful because it's synced with the main hour hand. you know, there's no way to like make it into a second time zone, but, um, if you want that design and aesthetic, um, you know, it comes in a white dial version, which wasn't technically made back in the day, but he kind of had lived a bit and I think it's really cool. And I owned one for a while or, or kind of the more standard black dial. But then he also recently came out with a dive watch and then kind of a field watch based on the same aesthetics. And I think, you know, these watches are sub $500, watches with just a great look, great aesthetic, pretty decent build, and I don't know, I just like it. If you're kind of into that vintage military, kind of stoic, sort of pilot-y kind of look, I think it's a good option. |
| James Stacey | Yeah, I only know these. This is a brand that you brought to my attention, you know, when you got that HS. Yeah. Chrono. I like anything, a sport watch with a white dial and a matte case. How can you go wrong? The price is right. They look great. I dig it. Yeah. Not one I've ever seen in person. You know, if I get the chance, that'll be fun. But now I'm just scrolling through what they've got on their offer on their site. That's a good looking lineup. Definitely deserving of a little bit more attention. If you're saying it's made well enough to support the looks, which it appears to be. Very cool. Let's see. Oh, next up, I'll pull Aster and Banks. We've chatted a little bit about them on the show. I've covered them maybe two or three times for Hodinkee. And yeah, especially just recently, I covered the, uh, in October of last year, the fortitude, which is their sort of like, it's a steel sport watch. Um, but like no bezel, it's, it's a time, time and date scenario. They did one with a really fantastic mother of Pearl dial, which I thought was really fun on a watch of this sort of size. Um, I, I think that they're punching way above their weight class in terms of like general maturity. A lot of these brands, whether even if it's a Hallios or, or if you think of like Benares and then Raven, it takes time to get the refinement locked in. |
| Unknown | Yeah. |
| James Stacey | In terms of feeling like, like, like I can see the watch and go like, Oh, I know what that is. I don't have, I don't necessarily have to read the brand name. Um, but with the, with the Astor and Banks, I was just, I'm just been so impressed by their last watch, the Ranger. And then now with the Fortitude, the Fortitude, I mean, this is a, a, a nice, uh, you know, 9015 powered steel sport watch at, uh, 38.5 millimeters, 11.9 thick, 46 lug to lug, drilled lugs, 200 meters water resistance, really bright Superluminova C3 X1, a bunch of different versions. And they were all coming in at as little as $525 is what their pre-order had started at. And I'm sure they're now operating at their normal price, which is $700 to $650 to $695. at that price, they're absolutely great. I mean, the bracelet's much better than I expected and something I've been very impressed with. The watch itself is very refined, super wearable. And again, this is another one of these small brands, a Chicago-based brand. Folks supporting their families, putting food on the table by selling watches to enthusiasts, which I'm really on board for. I think it's a really pretty watch as well. which isn't always the case. So, you know, that the, these ones look really good. I thought that, like I said, the bezel came out really well. I love the fully loomed secondhand, super, super random to, to have the entire, you know, the entire stem of the secondhand to be loomed. Yeah. Not common, but fun to see. So I wouldn't want to put this list out without at least hitting an Aster and Banks. Yeah. I do think we have time for, for at least one more depending on how long it takes you. So I'll let you pick the next one. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah. I mean, I, I, I, Like you did with Helios, I'm, I'm hesitant to leave the list without, um, without talking about CWC and I don't know if they even qualify anymore because, uh, you know, we've talked about them a fair amount. I've written a couple of articles. I think their star has risen, at least in, you know, kind of non military collector's eyes. I think people are starting to pay attention to them as, as a really cool niche sort of piece. Um, but I really liked them there. I would actually put them in my top, uh, top four or five brands that, you know, if we're going to go down that road of, of liking brands. But I just think across the board, I like what they're doing. I like the folks that run the company over there in London and their history is great. And, and I can't, I can't recommend enough their quartz dive watches. I just think their Royal Navy dive watches are just so, so authentic. They're, they're very much along the lines of marathon as we discussed, um, originally made to military spec. Um, they really haven't changed them. They're, they're kind of old fashioned, you know, quartz watches from the, from the early eighties and, uh, they just keep making them, you know, fixed bars. If you can live with that, I hope they, you know, I hope they never go away from that. I think that's part of their, their thing. And I think, uh, you know, forcing people to wear Nados is, uh, something I can get behind. I think it's, uh, it kind of, it's like standing firm in their space. And, uh, and I think that's great, but they're a little more expensive than, you know, what you might want to pay for kind of a, a quartz beater, so to speak. But I think to me, Um, once you start looking at some of their old issued pieces and what they're selling for and, and kind of the, the build quality and, um, and kind of the classic aesthetics, I think they, uh, they stand right to, to long wear and ownership. So yeah. Killer. I like it. Any others? |
| James Stacey | Uh, well, you know, I think the, the other one that I would like to suggest just because we can point people back to the episode is let's end on let's on down Scarfa. |
| Jason Heaton | Oh, good call. |
| James Stacey | Yeah. So yeah, Skirfa watches. It's Paul Skirfield, who was on episode 90 of the show. I highly recommend you go back and listen to it. He's a really fascinating guy with an awesome story and has taken a career in saturation diving and started making watches that suited his career. A really fantastic story. And I don't think that we could do this whole scenario without a brand like Skirfa. I think that they're a halios come several years later. And I think they make a really cool product. And they also have some pretty ardent fans of that product, which I like a lot. You know, people are willing to buy into the limited editions. He'll do these very limited runs of titanium versions of their watches and stuff like that. And I've been tempted a few times and I see them pop up on a few of the Instagram, the like more dialed in, like indie micro brand fans. They seem to have a good home with them. So, yeah, definitely Skrfa is, I think, a great place to end this list. |
| Jason Heaton | I think so, too. And, you know, I talked earlier about your review of the Raven Trekker 39 with the blue and the yellow. And I'm looking, you know, Paul has one of his Skrfa's, the Diver 1 D1 500 in blue with yellow hands. And he does a nice orange dial. He does great blues. I love his blues. The yellow dial with the steel bezel is really sharp. So, he plays with color in a watch that is just utterly no-nonsense. I mean, these are These are not expensive watches, but I, I've, I owned one for a while, many years ago, one of his early ones and, um, just rugged again, you know, marathon CWC territory, just a great, you know, bomb proof courts piece. And I think that's, you know, Paul's very upfront with that's what he wants to make. I mean, these are watches that, um, you know, you don't have to baby, um, might be your weekend watch. It might be your, you know, dedicated diving watch and you wear your speed master the rest of the time or whatever. And he's, he's totally on board with that, but it's, uh, It's good stuff. And Paul's just an interesting guy knowing he's behind the company and that he's tested these watches in, um, you know, diving bell and at the bottom of the sea is, is just an added benefit. So yeah, good, good place to end. I think. |
| James Stacey | Absolutely. All right. So with that out of the way, we are moving forward. I have a hard out in 12 minutes, so you're going to get a 12 minute, uh, final notes. Uh, but it's a final notes that I'm actually like legitimately excited about at a, at a pretty grand level. We've got two pretty solid stories. How about you go first? It's a great story. |
| Jason Heaton | Yeah. So this one's really exciting. This is from rockandice.com or the online portal for rock and ice magazine, longtime Alpine sports magazine. They've been kind of republishing a number of their older print articles from over the years. And the one that popped up recently was from 2007 and it's an article called the secret of Nanda Davey. And it was written by Pete Takeda. uh, well-known alpinist and writer about mountain sports. Um, and it's about this, uh, incredible mission back in the sixties to, uh, install a, uh, sort of a, a spying listening device on the border between India and China, um, on behalf of the CIA. And it required the use of mountaineers to climb up this peak, Nanda Devi, which is a sacred mountain in India, Northern India and the Himalayas. Um, and they, needed some power source to, to allow this listening device to work over time. And so they decided to use a nuclear device, something that was using, I believe it was plutonium as the fuel. And, uh, so these mountaineers had to go up and, and, and plant it up there. And, you know, over the years there's been controversy and questions and it's all been kind of cloak and dagger and, um, you know, kept confidential, um, for, for obvious reasons as to whether or not, They accomplished their mission, whether or not this thing was still there, whether or not it was jeopardizing the headwaters of the Ganges River, which provides, you know, drinking water and irrigation and everything else for much of India. And so, you know, this is one of these stories that combines, you know, mountaineering and, you know, spycraft and clandestine sort of Cold War stuff and in just a really awesome long form story. I think it's just as well worth sitting down, you know, on your lunch break and just scrolling through this one and reading it. I'm really glad they republished this because, you know, if it was only in the print edition in 2007, most of us wouldn't, wouldn't ever come across it. |
| James Stacey | Yeah. This is a, this is a new story for me and you sent it to me. You seemed kind of excited about it in, in Slack. And so I jumped on it and yeah, it's, this is a must read. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. Really, really nicely written, really curious story, really kind of wild scenario in which the cold world was a crazy time. Wasn't it? They were just, they were just doing anything that they thought might work. |
| Unknown | Yeah. |
| James Stacey | And a great story, please. Everyone listening, go, go and read this. I included it as my, um, my, uh, my, my weekend roundup for Hodinkee last week. Cause just cause I think it's, it's such a great story. And yeah, huge props for rock and ice for bringing some of these back. I've enjoyed, I've enjoyed these, uh, archive polls so much this year. |
| Unknown | Yeah. |
| James Stacey | Really, really good. Um, all right, let's get to mine so we can, we can finish the show. Mine is actually a video, um, from Hagerty's YouTube channel. That's Hagerty, the car insurance company. Um, they have recently started a massive and really well orchestrated push into YouTube topics, uh, YouTube content. So they took some time and shored up a lot of the most incredible high talent in the car industry. So they gave a show to Jason Kamisa, one of my absolute favorites in the whole of the car industry. They gave a show to Chip Foose. You can watch him redesign cars. An incredible car designer. If you don't know Chip Foose, he ran a company as well, Foose Automotive. They gave a show to Magnus Walker, the Porsche collector. And he kind of talks about what the up and coming collectible cars are. So Mercedes wagons and I'm blanking on other ones. The most recent one I watched was Mercedes wagons. They gave a really incredible show, a kind of a buyer's guide show to Sam Smith, one of my absolute favorite automotive writers in existence. He's actually a really good video host too. It must be tough to be that talented, Sam. And the latest is called Rad Ventures. And I don't actually know, Ryan, I apologize. I don't know how to pronounce your last name. I should have figured that out before going through this, but it's S-Y-M-A-N-C-E-K. Symancec, Symancec, I'm not sure. Yeah. I think Symancec is at least close. Anyways, this is off-roading in a Defender and a Range Rover. There is a lot of stuff from their YouTube channel that I think would align with TGN. Anything that Kamisa is making is worth you watching. He's just the best. And he has a few different shows that kind of fill his day of the week that get, uh, get promoted, but this is the most TGN of what they've created yet. Um, so, uh, Ryan is driving around in New York somewhere off road in a series, I guess the original generation Range Rover, the single light, uh, round lamp, uh, kind of what you'd expect the Royal family to be in, you know, back in the days of princess die. And he starts off in that and he's driving it around off road. And the car is actually prepped and owned by Churchill Automotive, who are the same folks that prepped the cars for the English Tour a few years ago. So that's actually a buddy of mine, Jared, that's his Land Rover, the Range Rover. And so they drive around, they eventually get stuck, and then he goes and gets a Defender. Very similar in spec to Jason's, a white defender with a few upgrades. And this one has back seats and the rest. And he goes and kind of finds, it traces a path through even more challenging terrain. It's really nicely shot. Ryan does a great job hosting it. The cars look amazing. You're not going to beat a white Range Rover Classic or a white defender in a sort of snowy Northeastern setting. They just, the car, the defender especially looks so good. It's jaw dropping. I mean, I've watched Top Gear specials where supercars don't look as fun as this Defender is, going 18 miles an hour across a field. I really, really loved this video. I highly recommend anything. You should be subscribing to their channel if you like cars. But especially if you're just interested in the Land Rover-y, Defender-y, sort of rugged-y, off-road-y, overland-y stuff, this is a really great video. Ryan and Haggerty did a fantastic job. And I can't wait to see more. Uh, his videos, Ryan's videos, aren't going to focus necessarily on off-roading, but on this sort of rad era of cars. So if you know, the, the Radwood guys, it's this eighties and nineties is the window. Um, and, and so that that's kind of the focus. His first one was drift cars, like Sylvia's and S 14 and stuff like that. And then this one is, uh, is the Range Rover and the defender. And, uh, I'm roughly out of time out of time, but I just loved it. |
| Jason Heaton | I love the concept. I love the concept of this, that he, he takes the Range Rover first and he's giving all this background about the vehicles. And then, well, I shouldn't give it away. You know what? I'm not going to give it away. I just like the concept of the video. I like, I like how he introduces both vehicles and how both are put to use. So definitely worth it. Worth a watch. |
| James Stacey | Yeah. I highly recommend it. Please, please watch that. Please read, uh, the secret of Nana Devi as well. Uh, two really, really great final notes too. I couldn't be more happy with. Yeah. And, uh, a really solid show all round. I think it's time to call that one. You know, with the last one we snuck in, I think around an hour. That's not going to happen with this one. We're going to do an hour and a half. So, as always, thank you so much for listening. You can hit the show notes by Hodinkee.com or the feed for more details. You can follow us on Instagram at Jason Heaton and at J.E. Stacey and follow the show at The Graynado. If you have any questions for us, please write TheGraynado at gmail.com and keep sending in those voice memos for our next Q&A. We're staging that now. We would love to get your questions and they don't just have to be about watches or TGN stuff. If you have a question for Jason and I in a more grand sense, feel free to throw that in as well. Finally, please subscribe and review wherever you find your podcasts. Music Throughout is Siesta by JazzArr via the Free Music Archive. |
| Jason Heaton | And we leave you with this quote from Mother Teresa who said, be faithful in small things because it is in them that your strength lies. |