The Grey NATO – 195 – Big Watches With Oversized Charm

Published on Thu, 02 Jun 2022 06:39:46 -0400

Synopsis

This episode of The Gray Nado podcast discusses big watches that the hosts Jason and James enjoy wearing, especially during the summer months. They each pick 5 watches that they consider "big" and share their thoughts on why they like these oversized timepieces. The watches discussed include models from Bremont, Omega, IWC, Panerai, Seiko, Citizen, and Oris. The hosts also share some book and product recommendations during their final notes segment.

Transcript

Speaker
Jason Heaton Hello and welcome to another episode of The Gray Nado, Lou's discussion of travel, diving, driving, adventure, gear, and most certainly watches. This is episode 195 and it's proudly brought to you by our ever-growing TGN supporter crew. We thank you all very much for your continued support. And if you'd like to support the show, please visit thegreatnado.com for more details. Gosh, you know, speaking of that, I mean, just over our long holiday weekend here, James, I saw a bunch of new supporter folks sign up over the weekend and I've shipped off those kits today. So, you know, exciting. I mean, the crowd keeps growing. It's really, it's really awesome.
James Yeah, for sure. Yeah. And we're obviously in a moment, I'll do a re-up on the wind-up watch fair attendance in Chicago, which I think already looks incredible. Yeah. But then for those of you who are wondering, the kind of annual run of the packages will reset in November. And at that time, we will announce what the next year's package comes with for new or continuing supporters of the show. We will have a bundle. A lot of you will come to the end of your first year around November, and then that'll run kind of until the next November, if that makes sense. Because we do get that question a little bit, and I think that's kind of solidified. Yeah. As far as bundles, if you want a different way of getting the bundle, you're going to need to get to Chicago. That way, we don't even have to ship it to you. We'll be selling the bundle along with a handful of other things at the Windup Watch Fair, July 15th, 16th, 17th at Venue West in Chicago. We're really thrilled that we got an offer from the Windup team, the guys at Warn & Wound and such to come by and run a table and say hi to people and be part of the programming, record some shows, the rest of it. I think it's going to be super fun. Most of the plans are in place. We've got a bunch of really fun merch. We've got even everything from free all the way up to a supporter bundle and annual supporter bundle will be available. Lots of fun stuff that I don't think we're really just going to share. I think you've got to come to the show to see what we've kind of put together. Yeah. But it's some stuff outside our norm and some stuff that people have been asking for for a while. Yeah, so the show runs for the bulk of those three days all day. Swing by, say hi, we'd love to see you, love to meet you. Goodness, the other list of vendors, if you needed more reasons than just go to see Jason and I or whatever, the vendors list is incredible. So there's some amazing brands there. We're looking forward to it and we hope to see you there. If you can make it, again, that's July 15th, 16th, 17th. And then the other thing that has come up about WindUp is people were asking if we're going to do a specific kind of outside of wind-up TGN hangout? The answer to that is no. Not only is wind-up happening in Venue West, there's also a Pitchfork music festival in Venue West. So finding a bar that could take a few hundred people, at most probably, maybe more like 100, 150 people like we had in New York a few years back, would be almost impossible. And the other thing is, it would be doing essentially the exact same thing we're doing all day at the show. There'll be a bar at the show. You'll be able to get a beer if that's what you want to do. So if you want to come towards the end of the day and have a beer and say hi, we'll be there. That's what we're there for. And that I think will count as the meetup. We're essentially doing three, the 15th, 16th, and 17th of July. Venue West in Chicago, the Wind-Up Watch Fair.
Unknown Yeah.
James So that's the plug for the big fair. I'm awfully excited about it, Jason. I think we're actually ahead of our planning schedule. We've got a place to stay. We've got... Knock on wood.
Jason Heaton I hope so. Yeah. I hope we haven't forgotten something crucial.
James You know, we definitely have forgotten something, but thankfully we have the better part of what, six weeks here still. So we can still put it together.
Jason Heaton We have a place to stay. You have a plane ticket and, uh, and we've got some merchandise on order, uh, ready to, to bring along. So I, I think that's the bare minimum. I think, uh, I think it'll be awesome. I think it'd be great to see a bunch of people. Everyone's ready to bust out. Not only because it's, well, it'll be midsummer by that point, but, uh, it's been, it's been a few years, so it'll be great.
James Yeah, no, I'm looking forward to it. I've never been to Chicago before. We've already gotten some some nice emails saying like, hey, if you guys are here to do this or that, we're still kind of solidifying what the show schedule looks like. But it's full days for the days that we're there. Yeah. So this, unfortunately, won't be a more social visit visit than being very social at the show. Obviously, if we get a pocket of time or something like that, there's a few few spots in town I'd like to see from sort of a, you know, a tourist perspective. But other than that, mostly just going there for the show. That's what we're excited about. Jason, aside from the new news and that, and that kind of stuff, uh, how's the last week been?
Jason Heaton Uh, good. Yeah. You know, we had, as I mentioned, we had the three day weekend and you and I talked just before we pressed record that, you know, long weekends are so wonderful. And then Tuesday hits and it's like the reality sets in of this compressed week with, with lots to get done. But boy, looking back, it was, it was a great kickoff to summer. It felt like a proper old fashioned holiday summer weekend. We, um, we did a little gardening here at home and then Um, went out to see my parents and spent a couple of nights at their place. They live on a little lake. It's very peaceful. And, um, I helped them with some yard work and we took some time on Sunday to go for a really long bike ride. We rode to a town about, uh, 15 miles away and got some coffee and then rode back and that was fun. And we grilled salmon on our little, uh, snow peak, uh, grill outside and managed to go out for dinner another night. I finished a couple of books and then I did something I just don't do enough of, which is I just took several naps. I mean, I just kept like between activities, I would just lie down, like put my earphones in and, and before I knew it, I was asleep. And it was like, I don't know, naps are wonderful things. I really wish I could do it more often. It was great.
James That's awesome. Yeah. I, I went when it happens, when a nap happens, I'm certainly not against the idea. It can be hard to plan for it though.
Jason Heaton You took a long weekend as well. I mean, obviously you're, you're in Canada, but, uh, Your work for Hodinkee means they were probably shut down for Monday as well, right?
James Yeah, it was a little quiet for that. So I was around, I ended up spending a good portion of the weekend chasing down some electrical issues with the Jeep. It wouldn't start reliably. And I went back and forth, you know, with dozens and dozens of YouTube videos and a multimeter trying to figure out if it was something more extensive than the battery, which of course I replaced in February. I sunk a ton of time into sorting out the Jeep and trying to figure it out. And then, uh, you know, the, the bummer was that I believe it was the alternator. Uh, it looks like it was a diode in the alternator or several diodes in the alternator, because when the Jeep was running, it looked normal. You know, it was providing a charge, the battery would hold a surface charge, all that kind of stuff. But, uh, it looked like something was leeching. from the battery when it was off. And, uh, you know, after going over a bunch of the vehicles, wiring and checking grounds and, and condition of the wires and all the plugs and the rest of it, um, I finally pulled the alternator and ran, uh, another test and it failed that. So I've, I've swapped the alternator in on, um, Monday morning, yesterday morning. And, uh, and so far so good. I mean, I think, I think the damage might be permanent to the battery. Uh, it doesn't, it's not looking good. Uh, it's, you know, it's, it's having trouble. It's dropping, you know, below eight volts on crank, which is a pretty bad sign for the life cycle of what's a brand new, fairly expensive battery. Uh, so yeah, still, still keeping an eye on that, but hopefully this is a kind of the end of that saga and it'll just cause otherwise it's been running great. And now I, now I don't know if the last battery that died in February was because of the, this alternator starting to fail in sort of a sneaky way.
Unknown Yeah.
James So I don't really know. I did my best. Electronics is not really my strong suit. I'm at this point getting better with a multimeter, but some of it's pretty nebulous when it comes to cars. And then I've made a significant number of updates to the Jeep's electronics in terms of the lighting. I don't think there's an incandescent bulb left in the vehicle. So I didn't know if it was something like that had happened or or an animal had gotten in and chewed through something and it was it was causing some sort of parasitic drain or something like that. So hopefully this does it. Otherwise, I've got to go to a different sort of layer of work. But while dealing with that, I did get up to the cottage and we did a bunch of work there. So, you know, put some trim and did a little bit of demo in the kitchen and a lot of paint and that kind of stuff. So it was still a really nice weekend. I spent Sunday evening with my family. uh, with a little celebration and it was, uh, all things told aside from the kind of background headache of, of not knowing if your car is going to start. Uh, it was nice. Yes. It is always nice to have a long weekend, but boy, does Tuesday really come in with a bang?
Jason Heaton Oh yeah. Did you have to do any bump starts like park on a Hill and start it that way?
James Nope. No, I'm, uh, I'm, you know, I'm, I'm really, you know, not a fan of bump starts outside of maybe a dirt bike or something like that. you know, I find it pretty hard on the vehicle and such, but no, I didn't have to do that. You know, the we'll get to it in my, in my final notes is it's the item I picked for my final notes, but I have a, I quickly ordered when I realized that I wasn't going to be able to trust the vehicle's ability to, to charge. I ordered something for boosting it. And, and then at one point promptly left that at home and needed to get a boost in a parking lot, which is still a Uh, kind of an old school experience, right? It takes me back to my days of being like 16, 17 with a car that was never reliable. Uh, it was just always a problem rather than sometimes experienced a problem and asking somebody for a boost in a random parking lot. So it turns out people are still lovely when, when you make that request. And, uh, if you're quick, it's really not too much to ask of another person. So, yeah. Yeah. Always fun. Always a new thing. This, I mean, this is also what comes with driving older cars, right? I mean, you, you know, this, both of your Land Rovers are much older than the Jeep, but the Jeeps, you know, Yeah. Well over 200,000 kilometers and over 10 years old. So it's just, you got to stay on top of it. And for all I know, that was the original alternator. I don't know. Yeah.
Jason Heaton Cool. Well, I mean, so, you know, summer's full on kicked in. We, we did an episode recently where we talked about summer gear and EDC, which turned out to be really popular. And now we just had our kind of first full on long summer weekend. What, uh, have you, have you moved to your, your summer watch that you talked about on that episode yet?
James Yeah, I sure have. I'm pretty much just wearing the Bremont S302 these days. Aside from the stuff that I have in for review, I have the S500 Bamford. That story will go up probably the day before this episode comes out, I think, or maybe the day this episode comes out. One or the other, around the same time as this episode. You can check that out on Hodinkee. I, of course, have the lovely Vertex, but I wanna be careful with that. It's a loner, so I'm definitely not gonna be smashing trim and all that kind of stuff like I would with one of my own watches. Uh, but yeah, I'm, I'm wearing the brain on it's on that, that ZD three 28, the, uh, from watch gecko, uh, rubber NATO.
Unknown Yeah.
James And it's just super comfortable. I can sleep with it on the loom last all the way through the night. I can watch a second time zone for, I've been using the second time zone for formula one. Oh yeah. Uh, to follow formula one, uh, Monaco was this past weekend and it was pretty exciting race. Uh, although I don't at all agree with, uh, you know, race controls prerogative about how well those cars can run in the water. I think they should just let them race. That's what they're there for. It's a spectator sport. I suppose that comments out of line for the show, but any Formula One fans listening, I hope would agree. But yeah, no, just a love in the 302. It's just a, it's kind of a synthesis of so much of what I would want from Bremont in one package. And we've talked a ton about it, so I don't have to continue, but it strikes such a good balance for me in terms of size and specification and quality and loom and timekeeping. It's super accurate, like one of my most accurate watches. And it takes a ton of different straps. And I think, I think it's perfect for the summer. You know, we're, we're well into dock jumping season at this point, especially if you don't mind the water a bit cold. And this is certainly not a watch I have to worry about taking off.
Jason Heaton Yeah, definitely. Yeah. And I think today for, you know, when I look at my choice today too, we, we sort of went against our, uh, episode topic, um, both not wearing overly huge watches. I, I, I guess I had a few to choose from that I could have, uh, gone with the theme, but, um, I'm wearing the, the Tornek Rayville, uh, TR660. I've, I've worn this watch so much over the past few weeks. And it's a beautiful watch. It just works really well for, um, kind of all the varied things I've been doing, you know, the kayaking I did last weekend and the gardening and just sort of general just tromping around here in the summer. And it's, it's super comfy. I've, I've just, just lives on a NATO strap and, um, just love looking down at it. It's really accurate. Good loom, really good loom. But it's small. You know, I mean, this is it's 40 millimeters. It actually feels like it wears a little smaller because the dial is small and it's got kind of that wider bezel. So it kind of shrinks everything down.
James But pretty similar to the Brema where the bezel is the part that's 40. Yeah. And that middle case element on the on the S302, I think it's only like 38, 38 and a half millimeters. Yeah.
Jason Heaton But it's it's it's been such a great, great watch. I can see getting a lot of use out of this over the summer. So for sure. we're kind of both playing against our theme here because our main topic today is kind of generally discussing big watches. And you know, um, the, the current sort of trend these days is to, is to play against that and go with smaller watches. Everybody's kind of talking about how smaller watches are, are back, you know, 38, 36 millimeter dress watches, smaller dive watches, et cetera. Um, but I think, you know, we're here to kind of argue that there still are some, some big watches that are worth looking at and wearing.
James Yeah, I mean, I think, Jason, it's the same for you, but when I got into watches, 45 was kind of de rigueur, right? Yeah. It was kind of the size, Panerai was big, Breitling was big, both big physically and in terms of their scope within the market. And things swing back and forth, tastes change, it's a style thing, it's a fashion thing, and they kind of move around. And right now, I think we're kind of in one of the sort of widest swings back towards a smaller size. People appreciating and not only in vintage sizing, but having modern watches also be offered in a smaller version. You finally saw it in something like the Black Bay 58 at 39 millimeters. The big thing is, is I do prefer a smaller watch. My taste has kind of just followed what the kind of conventional tastes at the time. And maybe I'll go back to preferring a large watch. But just because things have changed from a decade ago doesn't mean that a larger watch can't be just right. for a certain time of year, for certain risks, for certain expectations, right? Especially when it's summer and it's a, it's a, you know, well, summer for us, as we're always clear to say in this hemisphere, especially because it's summer and you're wearing a t-shirt and sometimes a big watch just feels like more fun or, or more aligned with, with the day or your activities. And so we basically each got five big watches that we're going to chat about. And it's not so much that these are watches that are necessarily large. Like I don't actually think any of mine, I got maybe one that's like over 45 millimeters. It's more that I find them to wear very large on my wrist. So if I were to go for it, it would be a sort of once in a while scenario because it would be kind of too big for day-to-day. So these are all still very, very sort of subjective picks. These are for our wrists and you may have a very different idea of what constitutes a large watch. And while I could be one of the main people on a site like Hodinkee or whatever suggesting that a watch might be better two or three millimeters smaller. There's watches that are kind of just perfect for their size or even special because of their size. If that makes sense. Yeah. Yeah. Jason, you want to kick it off with the first of yours?
Jason Heaton Yeah, definitely. Um, I, you know, we, we each decided to choose five watches and I originally had a sixth on here that I was toying with the idea of talking about, which was the Chronomat 44 from Breitling, but I thought I would eliminate that one. Um, we can, we can discuss it certainly if we want to, but, I decided the five that I picked are watches that I've either owned a version of or at least worn for review. Right. And, you know, no coincidence here, they're all dive watches. As I think, yeah, yours are too. Mine are all divers. Yeah. I mean, which stands to reason. I mean, other than something like the IWC Big Pilot, which is a Pilots watch or that sort of ilk.
James Which I was tempted by, to be fair. But in my opinion, I picked a vastly cooler IWC.
Jason Heaton Yeah, definitely. Definitely. So yeah, I'll kick it off. I mean, you know, my first pick is the, the Braymont Supermarine 2000. Now this is a watch that, um, I own, I've had it since I, gosh, I think 2013 or 2014. Um, it was there, you know, they started with the Supermarine 500, which was a big watch and on its own at 43 millimeters, but then they decided to kind of up the ante and go with this S 2000, which is a 45 millimeter, you know, big chunk of steel. You know, I used to wear it. Quite regularly. And even up until last year, I mean, I did a trip to Bonaire in August that I took this along on the bracelet, um, which makes it just a beast. I mean, it's just a big heavy watch. Um, and the version I have is, is not the current version. It doesn't have the new dial, um, configuration and color ways, but, um, you know, form factor wise size wise, it's, it's still the same watch. You know, I think Bremont works well in the large size. I think there's no doubt this is a very heavy watch. And fortunately for those that don't want to go this route, Bremont makes two other sizes in the Supermarine family, you know, the 300 series and then the 500 series at 40 and 43 millimeters. But right. You know, if you want full on kind of, you know, you're a guy with muscular forearms, which is not me, but you know, you like kind of that look or you can pull this off or you just want like a big heavy duty do anything dive watch. It's really hard to beat this. And they're kind of the way that they design the lugs on these watches and the way that Bramonts kind of tend to hug your wrist. I think this works as well as if not better than most watches of this size, you know, compared to something with kind of straighter lugs or something. I think the S2000 really can pull it off and it just looks good. So, yeah, that's my first one.
James I think that's a great pick. And, you know, I would follow up my commentary on that pick with my first pick, which is the S500. I've got it in, you actually, we had a few overlaps and this is one I left cause you went for the even larger one. And this is where we have that, the, you know, kind of taste of preference on wrist. Yeah. And I have the new Bamford special edition here, which I spoke about a couple of minutes ago. And it was kind of my, my most recent reminder of the S 500, which is I wear it and it's, it's absolutely a big watch, but it feels like purposefully big. Yeah. And like you said, the S 300, which is what I have a version of which I have on my wrist is a watch that I really like and is nicely sized. and I would think a little bit more conventional in its thinking, but there's a charm that's lost between the two. The S302 in being more conventional feels less kind of special than a 500 or, you know, conceivably a 2000, especially the earlier generations that had a little bit more of the elegant dial design and a little bit more of a design standard with the lollipop hand and the rest. So my pick would be an S500, but really if you're going to spend the money In my mind, you buy the S502 Jet, which gets you the GMT. If you're comparing rubber strap to rubber strap, you're paying $700 for the GMT function and a full DLC case, which really doesn't sound unfair to me. You can obviously start an S500, like the blue in steel is about $4,400. Oh, sorry, it's only 600 bucks between the two, now that I have the page right in front of me. And of course, they make several other versions. You're $4,900 with the steel bracelet for a black dial. They make a vintage, the vintage effect one, the 501, like the 301. I like these quite a bit. I think that probably my favorite aesthetic in the S500s is actually the 2000s. I like the colorful bezel they do now. I like the kind of simplified dial design, but you still get the lollipop hand. You still get the kind of inner dial design, the kind of two phase dial. I like all that kind of stuff. You know, At 45 millimeters, it's a big watch. At 43 millimeters, I would contend it's a big watch. It's certainly big on my wrist. And it's also something where the wearing experience becomes very connected to the strap choice for my wrist. Yeah, true. I have a bony, not really a circular wrist. My wrist is more oblong shaped, as I think a lot of people with a bony wrist would say. I find that their straps are very padded, and I think they probably work better for people with a larger wrist, with more kind of meat around their wrist. For me, I want to go to a NATO. I want to go to a thinner two-piece leather, something with a little bit less padding, something that's a little bit less stiff. And then the watch really sits nice and tight against your wrist. I mean, it's still a bit of a hockey puck. It's like this is kind of the 500 and the 2000 are kind of their tunas, if you will. And that said, I don't think it ever... I don't ever look down at it and go like, oh, I bought a watch that's too big for my wrist. It's more, I bought a big watch, right? Yeah. It's kind of a different scenario. So I'm a huge fan of both of these. My money, as we've been clear, is going to go for something like the S302 or the S300s, for which I'm a massive fan. But we don't have to retread that ground on the same episode. But yeah, that would be my first pick. And I would offer it as a sort of support, a cosign for your first.
Jason Heaton And just as a side note, you know, you mentioned guys with muscular, big wrists. And if you look at the ambassadors that, that pretty much chooses to model these, these big supermarines, it's like Jason Carl Fox and Aldo Kane, these, these like massive muscular, you know, special forces guys, Ross Edgley, you know, the, I mean, these guys are, they can pull it off. I mean, it's yeah. So very cool.
James Good, good choice. I think, I think it's a winner. What have you got for, for your second sort of,
Jason Heaton big but lovable watch. My second one is a watch that I used to own a version of that it's one of my very few regrets that I got rid of. This is the Omega Ploprof, Seamaster Ploprof. But what's interesting about this watch is I'll dig out, I have an old wrist shot of me wearing my first generation steel Ploprof 1200. I just took the shot in a mirror with my camera and the watch actually looks small on my wrist. So this is a You know, the form factor of the Ploprof is a weird one, as people know. It has that the left side crown with the big crown guard and then the push button on the right. But it's largely kind of almost a square watch. Actually, it's rectangular with the width side, kind of the nine to three dimension being 55 millimeters made up largely by that big crown protector. But going the other way, the lug to lug is only 48 millimeters. I mean, this is not a watch that's going to drape over your wrist. There are no lugs at all. The strap, the strap goes right in underneath the little hoods on each end of the case. And the version that, that, you know, I kind of specifically picked for this episode is the titanium version, which when I had the steel, I mean, one of the reasons I got rid of it was it was, it was a heavy watch. It was, it was thick. It was a big chunk and you could feel it didn't like cradle the wrist nicely because of the kind of the squarish dimensions of it. I remember trying the titanium on it at a Basel world several years ago. And that is a game changer. I mean, I think the one I picked is this sort of muted gray bezel, gray dial titanium on the, on the Milanese bracelet. I would love to own this watch. Let's just put it that way. I would love to own it. I'd love to wear it. I'd wear it a lot, especially in titanium. I think it would just sing. I think it would just be spectacular, but now it's up to a $13,800 watch. So a bit beyond my means these days.
James Yeah, it's big money for a big watch, but the interesting thing is, like you said, it's 48 millimeters lug to lug, and a lot of you are thinking, like, oh, wait, I have small... I have 36 millimeter watches that are 47, 48 millimeters, and that Bremont S502 Jet is 51 lug to lug. Yeah. So it really does come down to just being a really unconventional shape for a watch. Yeah. But if you go back and just Google... Google ploprof images or find stories with... There's that Agnelli wearing one on top of the cuff of his T-shirt. Right. Right. I think it's what's wilder. And if I can find the photo easily, I'll put a link to it. He's doing all sorts of weird stuff in that image because his sunglasses aren't even on his ears. Oh, right. Right. Right. It's a very strange image. But he's wearing one that, you know, this is a king of style, Italian king of style, you know, with it on top of his his over shirt. Yeah. You know, on what looks like a ski holiday. They're weirdly kind of anachronistic. stylish, strange watch. And I mean, that, that checks a lot of boxes for me. They've never been in my price range, but man, would I love to, uh, to own one, even if, even if it was just for a little while, you know, super fun.
Jason Heaton And the titanium one has, well, actually now that I'm looking at Omega's website, I mean, it says it's not even available anymore. So I'm not sure. I'm sure you can find them on the second, uh, secondhand market and maybe some dealers still have them around, but, uh, maybe they've been discontinued. Huh? It's a no date dial. I mean, coaxial movement. I mean, these are, these are amazing. So, Anyway, yeah, classic big watch. So we're off to a good start here. What's your second pick?
James I'm going to go with the biggest watch on my list. And that is the watch I've talked about before. I think it's the almost like the ideal of an affordable big, you want a big watch experience. You're going on a dive holiday somewhere and it's the Seiko SUN 023 Kinetic GMT. Yeah, which it's it's sort of this modified tuna like case with a shroud like with a sort of a shroud that protects the bezel. All right. And so it's 48 millimeters of case, but the bezel is 42 millimeters across. So it's kind of this this weirdly nice wearing all black. And then it's got tons of loom. It's a it's a flyer GMT. And so they're selling it when you can find them these days for about six hundred dollars. And I think if you want to have that one big watch in your collection and it's not going to be a full size Garmin, a G-Shock Rangeman, something like that. I think this is a great alternative with a really handy functional set and a dive, and it's a full dive watch. It works really well on a rubber. I don't remember if I wore it on a NATO, but it feels weird if I didn't. It was just years ago. I took this on a dive holiday in 2015 to Hawaii and dove with it a bunch as the kind of backup for my dive computer, and I fell in love. I think this is an awesome watch. I know this is counterintuitive to the point of today's show, but it's one I would love to see them shrink a little bit. you know if it's the kind of thing where they could fit that movement into a smaller watch maybe one with a little bit less depth and width but really like this is up there with with some of the other big Seiko's it's just big with all this intent and purpose and I think it sells it really well it wasn't uncomfortable to wear you're in you know shorts and a t-shirt hiking around going on dives it just works out well it looks great at the bar in the afternoon when you're having that That first beer is the, you know, the sun starts to cool off a little bit. Uh, yeah, no, it's a, it's a good one for sure.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Yeah. No, that's, that's a great pick. And I remember this watch being recommended to me by a good friend of mine, Adam Morelli, who's a great photographer, by the way, an artist. Um, Adam's got just a killer collection. I mean, he had like a Jaeger LeCoultre Polaris for a while. And then he had, um, gosh, like a mil spec Blancpain or something. So this, you know, he had some heavy hitters and he's like, no, this is the watch. You know, this is the watch I wear it for travel. This is what I wear most of the time. And, uh, I hadn't seen it before. This was many years ago. And then there's something about just the interplay of colors and that little bit of blue and then the orange. And then in that all black case with the big rubber strap, it's just, it's such a great looking sort of summer vacation watch.
James Um, it looks like a piece of dive equipment, like a regulator or like, like it just doesn't look out of place and it feels great. And, and it's so legible.
Jason Heaton And this is the kinetic movement, which is, uh, nobody really talks about anymore because everything's all about, um, I guess it's sort of a simplified or less tuned version of, of kind of what you'd consider a spring drive maybe. Um, but it's not their solar, you know, I mean, Seiko is kind of really pushes their solar prospect stuff these days, but you don't hear a lot about their kinetic stuff.
James Yeah. It's a watch. It's still, you know, it's, it's a quartz watch, but it's still powered by movement. Yeah. Um, which is, which is kind of clever and a solid store, a solid sport watch. It's also like, easily the least expensive or most affordable on my list. If you've been a diehard at the 36 to 40 millimeter range and you want to try something else entirely, this might be one of the easier ways to try out what is legitimately a very large watch. Visually, it doesn't wear that big, but it's overpowering on a small wrist for sure. It's a specific experience. All right, what have you got for a third?
Jason Heaton Yeah, I'll follow up your Seiko with a Seiko. I picked the Marine Master 1000 meter automatic. The current iteration has the reference SLA041. I had an older version of this watch. I don't remember the reference number. It was an SBDX something or other, but this is affectionately known by Seiko fans as the Emperor Tuna. You know, big titanium monoblock case with a black shroud. You know, just a spectacular watch that you know, despite the thousand meter rating, I think they've strapped one of these to, to one of their deep sea submersibles over in Japan and took it down to something close to 4,000 meters or something like that. And until it finally stopped. So, you know, these are overbuilt, over-tested watches. I think the history of the, the tuna line of watches is just so fascinating and so representative of what Seiko does well. Yeah. And, and has the most, probably the most iconic and unique look in any watch. I mean, you could argue there's some others, but to me, there's just nothing else that looks like the Tuna Seiko's and others have come close and kind of emulated, but Seiko just owns the space. And what's interesting about this watch is, you know, it's a 52 millimeter, they say 52.4 millimeter across, but then the lug to lug, I mean, it's a circle. I mean, it's a big circle with these stubby little downward facing lugs. So it's... Yeah, exactly. And so the lug to lug is almost identical to the diameter. They say lug to lug is 53 and a half. So still big watch. I think when I owned a version of this watch, I just, I loved playing with it. It was one of those fun watches. It had, you know, little screws that hold the shroud on the, the, the bezel was very precise and fun to play with great loom, excellent rubber strap, but it's, it's 17 millimeters thick. I mean, this, it just sits so high on the wrist. It wears like, a dive instrument. It wears like the, the big compass you'd strap on next to it. And as a day to day piece, it, I just couldn't, I couldn't keep up with it. It just, it didn't work. Um, and it also, it kind of worked okay on a NATO strap, but didn't look quite right. So it didn't last terribly long with me. I did wear it to when I did my big Seiko trip to Japan, I took it and then I took diving there, which felt appropriate and it was fun. And I met the, the engineer that was kind of responsible for the original Uh, professional diver in 1975, the original tuna and it was wearing it and he brought out the, so it was all, it was all very appropriate for that time. And I just love the story. Um, and I admire this watch like crazy, but, uh, I won't own another one, but I think, um, as big watches go, if you like tuna, like go to go to the big one, go to the emperor.
James Absolutely. Yeah. You know, my, my pal, Johnny Lieberman, um, you know, automotive, great automotive writer and a watch nerd. Uh, certainly he, uh, He has a big risk. He's a big guy. He's got a big risk. And this is one of his absolute favorites. He's got a, I think the Darth version of them. I, some of the tuna nicknames get a little bit lost on me because it's not a specific branch within the Seiko tree that I follow. But for those of you know, the reference numbers, well, the SLA, it's going to be limited edition. So this is the one that Jason picked as a kind of a nice gray blue dial that was designed for their 55th anniversary, limited to 1100 pieces. And of course, for this kind of big money, you're over $4,500, but you get an eight L 35. So it's essentially a grand Seiko automatic movement. Uh, the case is a mix of titanium and they're ever brilliant steel. And, uh, we talked about the dimensions. It's a, you know, this is, this is the, this is the full fat dive watch from, from Seiko. And I think there's, it's so cool that they exist and that they make baby versions, little look, smaller tunas for people who either don't want to spend $4,500 on, on something like this, or want the kind of aesthetic, but at a, at a, you know, the size of an SKX or something like that. I think these are super fun.
Jason Heaton Yeah. I think, I think this is, this might be the kind of the pinnacle of, of where dive watches are at. If you were a guy who, you know, spent all the time in the water and you were on dive boats all the time, maybe you did it as a, as a career or you live near the sea and you were diving every week. I mean, this would be the watch that to own. I think, I mean, you, you can't go wrong. I mean, Seiko's quality is legendary. It's, it's kind of, reputation in the dive watch space is unsurpassed. And I think this is, this is the pinnacle. I mean, this, this watch, it just won't break. It's going to keep good time. And it just looks the part. So I think just as kind of a, for a guy who lives in the Midwest and, and, you know, doesn't get out diving as much as I'd like to. I mean, I just think it just didn't quite fit for me, but I think it's just such a spectacular watch.
James Yeah. And I mean, the case could be made that this is kind of their plow prof. Yeah. Totally. It's the big pro model. Omega has obviously gone even a step further with the Ultra Deep. And I think they would share a lot of similar sort of audience values and interests, but there is something really cool about the Japanese take on it and the Seiko-ness of it all. You could wear this on the weekend and then later in the week wear an SKX or something else and see the similarities in the dial and the rest of it is all kind of special. There's this family lineage that obviously speaks to people who love watches. Yeah.
Jason Heaton Alright, number three for you.
James Yeah, I've got a pretty cool one. This was a tough one because I really wanted to pick an IWC from a while back when they were all kind of on the larger size. I wanted something with the sort of GST era black and yellow and an interesting function set. I came really close to picking the Deep One, which I still think is an incredibly cool watch. Deep Two, crazy cool. But I ended up going with the Split Minute Chronograph, which is a 43.8. We'll call it 44. It's going to wear even a little bit bigger. I just think this is a weird watch, which I like. I think they're gorgeous. I really love this era. We talk about it a lot. It's a great era for IWC. There's a few more simple versions of the AquaTimer from this era that I would love to own. This is one I have to admit I've never actually seen in person. I've never had one of these in my hand or on my wrist, but it's among this weird kind of collection in my mind of really cool IWC kind of tool watches from You know, the mid 2000s. This one dates back to 2004. And it's the, for those who care, it's the IW372304. Jason, have you ever had a chance to see these in person?
Jason Heaton I've seen them in person and I've had an iteration of this watch in steel, certainly not the split minute version. And it wore really well. And, you know, despite the limited strap choices, aftermarket strap choices, IWC used to make such great straps for this watch and it was all this quick release stuff before a lot of people were doing quick release um you know the bracelet was always excellent they made a really cool velcro strap for this and then the rubber was great they made it in two different lengths but i'm just looking at this this photo and it's such a crisp angular just a beautiful piece of design just classic iwc um right down to the kind of the embossed uh logo on the on the strap it's just what a great pick i didn't realize this was a 44 millimeter watch, but it's just beautiful. I love that interplay of black and yellow. Um, this would be one to seek out. I mean, you know, if you found one of these in good shape, it would just be a fun watch and very versatile. I mean, you get, you get the chronograph, you get the dive function, lightweight titanium. I mean, they were, they were really crushing it back then. This is great. It says 2004. Wow. That was ages ago.
James Yeah. And if you, if you look at a photo of the watch, I will try and explain the functionality. So you have a standard chronograph layout, right? A two button chronograph. the lower chronograph pusher has a knurling on it. And if you turn that, it rotates the Ria, which I think is that alone is cool enough. And then you have this split minute complication. Um, the idea is that you could, you can basically use this, uh, trigger at eight o'clock to start a second minute hand that runs beneath. Normally it stays beneath the standard minute hand.
Unknown Yeah.
James And now you have the ability to essentially track two things while you're diving, so not just elapsed time, but it could be elapsed time and time at a certain depth, I believe, is the idea. Again, it's not something I've ever had a chance to play with, but I do find it deeply cool. Yeah. What a great pick. Wow. Yeah, really fun. Probably on the smaller wearing size of these larger watches, but 44 millimeters for me has become too big. it would have to have this awesome functionality, this cool story. Obviously, they made it with a bracelet as well. I could see making a really cool exception for a number of IWCs. They've got really cool perpetual calendars that were all 44, 45 millimeters, some of them not crazy expensive, some up into the top gear space and the big pilot space, much more expensive, but some really rad watches from their dive and pilot line. And this is just the one that sung to me today when I was planning for the show. Yeah, good pick.
Jason Heaton I love that it went back in time for a big watch. I mean, probably not a bad idea given the current trends.
James Like in 2004, it wouldn't even have been considered that big of a watch. Yeah, true. It's crazy. I mean, you could still buy a Rolex Deepsea about that size today. Yeah, yeah.
Jason Heaton What have you got for your next? I'm staying in the Richemont family, just sliding over a couple of booths at the old SIHH show for a Panerai. You know, you can't do a big watch episode without mentioning a Panerai. And in this case, it's from the submersible line, and it's the PAM 1305. And again, this is a watch that I had worn a version of in the past. I had the PAM 305 that I did a review of for Revolution magazine several years ago. And I took it to boner for a week and really fell in love with the watch. I mean, I was not a Panerai fan back then. I, I, I briefly owned, gosh, I don't remember their nomenclature, but you know, just kind of their basic Luminor, which, which I liked for a while, but I really missed kind of having some kind of functionality to it. So when the submersible came for review, I was kind of blown away by this sort of steampunk aesthetic. and just sort of the dive functionality in a Panerai. And this is a 47 millimeter watch from the submersible line, which means that it has a rotating dive bezel on it, as opposed to the Luminor or the Radiomir collection, which is a more sterile, minimalist form factor. I mean, like I said, when I tested this out, it was the PAM305, now it's the 1305. They've clearly updated a few things in the years since, but it still has the big locking uh, you know, crown guard and then, and the, the kind of riveted look, um, bezel. I mean, this is just a big watch. There's no, there's no two ways about it. It's, yeah, it's a watch that, you know, you will, people will notice you'll notice on your wrist. Um, and, uh, you know, I don't know. I mean, like I said, I mean, Panerai has kind of arguably started the, the big watch trend back in the, in the early two thousands. And, uh, and this is, this is probably one of their biggest at 47 millimeters. You like the smaller version, the 42 millimeter, which is still a big watch.
James Yeah, it's actually probably one of the larger wearing 42 millimeters. That's the PAM 682. Do you have to say both zeros? PAM 00682. I did really like that watch. I wanted to love it. I wanted it to be kind of my dream watch. I'm still on the fence about liking the skeletonized hands that aren't skeletonized in any way that actually helps. Like why not just fill them in with loom? Yeah, true. There's no data that falls behind those two little windows. That always kind of bugged me. And then the other one that bugged me, and it still bugs me to this day, because people are still sending me text messages about, like DMs about it, is when I wrote it, the unit they gave me, the bezel never aligned. Oh, huh. See, like this is a $14,000 watch, or like maybe more, it was like $17,000 or $18,000 Canadian. And the bezel was always, like if you tried to align it, it was never quite a It wasn't aligned either. So I'm not really sure what the deal is. It's definitely within their ability to not have that problem. Yeah. But to, to what you said, I have to agree as much as a pan or I can get under my skin. You can't really do a big watch thing without talking about a Luminor or a submersible. I think that they, like you said, maybe just alongside a few options from Breitling kind of defined the giant watch space of the mid early two thousands. And yeah, so I think a big submersible is always gonna be a very fun watch. And obviously, they make them now up into the $40,000 and more, made out of special materials with special movements and the rest of it. For me, a Panerai doesn't have to be a technically fancy watch. It's about a certain aesthetic, it's about a certain minimalist function set and that sort of thing, and I think the 1305 hits it. Yeah, yeah.
Jason Heaton This is a very design watch. It's very, it's a watch all about the aesthetics and your point about the skeletonized hands. I hadn't really paid attention to that, but now I can't unsee that. It's a little weird, right? Yeah. And I, and also, you know, your remarks about the bezel not aligning. I mean, not that we're here to bash this watch, but you know, it's very noticeable on a bezel like this because the bezel is very minimalist. It's just these big minute hashes for the first 15 minutes and then just kind of these rivets for the rest of the five minute marks. And so it would be very noticeable if it's not aligned because there's no real fine scale. It's all about the design. Whereas I think something like, you know, the Seiko, I mean, although it's very unique, there's just a lot of function, function first features to it that this one is like, you want to have a Panerai and you want people to know you have a Panerai on your wrist and that's why you get this one.
James So yeah, that's a watch I'll always attribute to, like you said, the big muscly guy. Yeah. The Schwarzenegger types. You need kind of a big arm and a big vibe to make it happen. And comparing it to the Tuna is kind of a pretty fantastic thought exercise, because that must that in some ways, I don't want to be unfair to either. I don't think I am being unfair to either, but that is the delta between Japanese design and Italian design, right? Yeah, true. There's the Panerai is a little bit more style forward. And I think a beautiful design for the most part, especially if we go down to the core of a Luminor or Radimir is submersible. The base of them is very elemental. Yeah. Whereas the Japanese take kind of adds layers of need and prescribed use and that sort of thing, which I think both are fascinating. Yeah.
Jason Heaton All right. What's your penultimate choice here?
James I'm going to go with one. It was really tough because I wanted to go with the Ultra Deep because I think it's just an obvious option. Really cool watch at kind of a weirdly competitive price point for what it is if you have the wrist for it. We talked a bunch about it. And if I follow my heart, if I really go with what's inside, the watch that I wish was just a little bit more wearable for me personally, I'm taking a little bit of a different take on this, is the standard Planet Ocean 600 meter GMT. Oh, yeah. So this is a 43 millimeter watch. That's I think a little over 17 millimeters thick. Let me see. 17.6 millimeters thick. Yeah. And I swear it wears like 46, 47 millimeters because of it. And I love this watch. I adore the way it looks. It's so well made. Like it's so nicely made. The movement is great. Uh, the function is great. The, the dial is lovely. The bracelet's awesome. I like, I have no complaints about it except that I don't have the wrist for it. So this is one where like, I think if you're in the zone and, and, and it can, and you've got more wrist, I'm, I'm, this is a great big watch for sure. Yeah. Yeah. I love these watches. I love POs in general. And of course they don't make a 42 PO these days, I don't believe. And I think if, if, if we saw this, in a little bit thinner. It's the thickness that's more of an issue on wrist, I think. And we hear that a lot. People say that to us a lot. This isn't an idea that we came up with. You have to respect all of the dimensions. And I think because of this one's dimensions, which clearly aren't causing it to sell so poorly that it would be discontinued, it's been in the collection for a long time in few different versions. So this is very much, like we said, kind of personal to our wrists. But I just really like that black and white one with the split bezel. and the otherwise kind of monochromatic vibe, the cool loom, but it's just, it's too big for my wrist. And I can't take anything away from the watch. I would just love if they made a second, you know, if they downsized it a little bit, maybe do the same thing in 39.5, right? Cause they make a 600 meter, 39 and a half time and date. You know, I don't know. I don't know if maybe, maybe when you add the GMT to the coaxial movement, you just get so much thickness that it's gotta go in a wider watch. I don't really know. But I love this watch. I loved it when it first came out, but I will forever remember picking it up off the table, putting it on my wrist and going like, wow, I love the way it looks, but this does not fit me.
Jason Heaton Yeah. I mean, you know, my, my first high end watch was the 45 millimeter planet ocean and 45 and a half actually at the time. And, and, you know, I, I still have very much a deep affection for, for that watch. I could almost see reowning that one, one day. And I've, I've long loved the, the planet ocean family. And I think, you know, the watch that I chose to kick off with was the Braymont S 2000 and that one followed my planet ocean, not by much. And when I look at this and consider the dimensions and kind of the general aesthetic, I feel like this is a bit of a, kind of an older school Swiss version of, of like a supermarine, you know, Braymont, I think they kind of wear, they both wear thickly. They both are beautiful watches to look at. I mean, just, yeah. Ultra capable, you know, high water resistance, um, just, you know, kind of bomb proof, uh, build quality. Um, this, yeah, I'm just staring at this watch, you know, the posted just, just beautiful. Yeah. It's so functional, but you're right. It's it'd be a chunk, especially on that, on that bracelet, but yeah, good pick. I mean, for those of our listeners out there with, uh, with big wrists that, that like big watches, um, you know, we're giving you some, some tempting offers here. This is great.
James Yeah, for sure. And the nice thing is, is you can go to an Omega boutique and try this on, right? Yeah. It's not a hard watch to figure out if it might suit your wrist or your style or the rest of it. I'll continue kind of like I do with a handful of other brands to pine that we might one day see, yeah, like a 40 or 42 millimeter version on that sort of nice rubber strap that they do for the 300M. Yeah. And it would just really make a lot of sense, I think, for the lineup. And maybe moreover, I'm just projecting my own taste, but... Yeah. Why don't you give us your fifth? Because I was gonna pick a Citizen, and now, thankfully, you picked one, and I think it's the perfect one.
Jason Heaton Alright, this one's a doozy. This is easily the biggest watch on my list. This is the Citizen ProMaster EcoDrive 1000 Meter. Just a crazy bonkers watch. I had one of these in for review several years ago. I talked about it on a... What are those? Hodinkee used to do a Friday Live, I guess that was in New York, and I was wearing this watch. I did a review of it for Hodinkee, which we'll throw a link in the show notes. Cause it was, it was so much fun. Um, I believe at the time and probably still, this was considered the deepest water resistant eco drive watch. Not that I think the two really matter together. I mean, not like you're charging the watch underwater anyway, but regardless, um, just a crazy watch big. Bold in the way that citizen is making a lot of its dive watches these days just kind of crazy big numerals super fat Hands, I mean look at how wide that minute hand is. Yeah, lots of color and then this the cool feature about this was this This bezel lock function, which is this sort of added like disc under the under the bezel itself With like this little I guess you'd call like an ear that says free and lock on it. And you kind of click it one way or the other to, to lock the movement of, of the rotating bezel. Um, you know, complete overkill, um, but super fun to play with. Uh, this watch was, um, incredibly thick. Uh, it is a 53 millimeter watch across and it's largely a circle. So, you know, we're talking probably about 54 lug to lug. Um, Uh, they're saying the lug width is 28. I don't remember that. I don't remember a strap that wide, but it's entirely possible.
James Well, it's hooded, right? So it goes way up inside. Yeah. Like it doesn't look that way in person.
Jason Heaton Yeah, but it was so thick.
James I think I posted 28 millimeters.
Jason Heaton I think I've got some side on photos might've even been in my review for Houdinki. I mean, this thing was so thick, but so fun to wear. I mean, you know, I talked about the tuna. Uh, you know the seiko tuna is being a very particular feel like a dive instrument and and You know really kind of only work if you're in short sleeves or like spending a lot of time on a dive boat This takes that to another level. I mean this thing is you can't wear it with sleeves. You just can't it's so giant on the wrist But it's made of citizen super titanium. So You know, I mean they just pulled out all the stops again. This is one of those watches you I don't think you could break I don't think you could scratch it. I don't think I mean it was just uh such a well-made, kind of just felt like an instrument. It felt like something you just want to constantly be playing with and using. So impressive. Not my aesthetic at all, but it was so fun to have on the wrist and play with for a while.
James Yeah. And I remember we shot a project a while back, you know, long before the pandemic up in Tobermory here in Ontario. And this was a watch you had with you. And at the end of one of the dives, we were shooting watches for a different brand for that project. you threw this on and like, that's when it suddenly made sense. You're wearing a dry suit. You had a dive computer on and then you put this watch on and you go like, Oh yeah, this is what they made this watch for. This isn't, this isn't for a vacation dive and then going to the bar afterwards. This is meant for like, right. I have to go do four hours in the North sea or six hours or 24 days or whatever. Um, and, and this, this becomes the way that I track something kind of crucial to what I'm doing and, and the other parts of it don't really matter.
Unknown Yeah.
James Yeah.
Jason Heaton I love how I'm looking at citizens website, you know, and under the product listing, they have all the different photo choices. And then one of them is this sort of computer generated wrist with the watch on it to look at how big would that wrist be? I don't know. I mean, there's no, there's no frame of reference. They don't tell you. That's not how it looked on my wrist.
James No. I mean, for it to look like that on my wrist, this would be a 40 millimeter watch. Yeah. Yeah. Hilarious. But yeah, 53 millimeters across about 1800 bucks is what they're listing for. it for right now, which is kind of remarkable, really, when you consider everything except maybe its wearability. That's a lot of watch. That's functionally a lot of watch. Yeah. Yeah.
Jason Heaton Spectacular. That's a solid five. Yeah.
Unknown Yeah.
James All right. How are you finishing things up? I'm going to close out my five with, I wanted to balance my perspective on the Omega Peel by saying that there are larger watches that are simply wearable. So I'm ending the story on one of my favorite, quote unquote, larger watches for my wrist, and that's the Orister Meistertaker. Oh, yeah. And so this is a 43.5 millimeter titanium dive watch that uses a regulator layout. And the point I want to make here is the size of the watch doesn't always indicate how it wears because the Oris Aquus, of which Jason and I have a ton of experience with at and around 43 millimeters, is kind of the original core. They do a bunch in 40 and even smaller, and then they do some of the pro stuff even bigger. But around 43, They just wear so well. So that gives you the ability to have a big watch visually that doesn't have the cumbersome elements of a physically large watch when it's on your wrist. This is a titanium watch that's hyper legible, really easy to wear, makes sense on top of a wetsuit, works as that sort of vacation vibe. I went diving this morning and this afternoon I'm hiking and tonight we're gonna go eat crab legs or whatever it is. I really love this watch. It's not currently for sale, but they can be found. They're not a fortune. I mean, they're not inexpensive. It's a nice Swiss watch. The point I'm trying to make here is that the 43 and a half millimeter Aquas are surprisingly wearable for their size. It's not something I would necessarily say about the Bremont, certainly not something I'd say about that IWC Aqua timer. I'm sure all of them are wearable if you have the correct wrist and it suits your tastes, but I'd be surprised if a lot of people, as long as you maybe hit the seven inch wrist or more, that 43.5 wears really well. And there's just no other dive watch like the Durmeister Tucker. If you don't know what I'm talking about, I chat about it a fair bit on the show in the past. I've, I've picked it in, in, in other episodes, sort of like this. Um, but if you don't know it hit the show notes and take a look because it is, um, you don't get to say this that often. It's a unique dive watch.
Jason Heaton Yeah. Yeah. I mean that, that regulator layout. Um, and I think the, the specificity of the design is, is what I, have long loved about a lot of Oris dive watches, you know, they're, they're just kind of go their own way with it. And it's a very, you know, I think a few of them that we talked about today, um, with very specific design features, you know, whether it's the plow prof or the tuna, um, or even the split minute, you know, I mean, this is, what's fun about a lot of dive watches is this sort of desire to solve problems and make specific designs that will Serve the diver who's wearing it. And I think, you know, Aura says this history, um, you know, going back to that TT family that we both love, um, that can be seen in, in, in the Durmeister talker. And I think, uh, yeah, I hope they bring some version of this back. I'd love to see, you know, they, they just did this Holstein edition recently that, you know, and they have been looking into their archives, um, with great regularity going back to the diver 65, of course. Um, I'd love to see kind of a new version of this. Wouldn't it be cool with. you know, with one of their in-house movements someday and kind of do a limited edition, kind of a throwback tribute piece to this watch. I think it'd be really awesome.
James I think it'd be awesome. I think it's something we can expect at some point. I think, you know, they only ever made it with the black dial, the red accents, uh, the, this kind of kooky regulator layout, and then the black bezel again with, with red accents, I'd love to see it just in a different color way, you know, attach the color way to one of the ocean projects or like, just take, take the layout. Yeah. And then extrapolate it into something else. It could be... Imagine if they did another version of the Upcycle, so it'd be the Upcycle Dermeister Tucker regulator. Oh, yeah. So they're kind of fun like that. And does it need to be 43 millimeters? I don't know. I genuinely don't know enough about this movement. I wore one of these for a while when I went on the Clipperton project, which was supported by Oris, and that's how I got on the boat. Yeah. But I fell in love with this watch. You were talking about some of an earlier regret of yours in selling the ProPlof, and my regret is that I didn't finish Clipperton and immediately offer to buy this watch. If at the time money was tight, I had just spent a bunch of my vacation time to go on... I still had a normal day job at the time, and despite the fact that the trip was covered and everything, there were costs associated with the trip that I was picking up, and I didn't have the cash flow to buy an expensive Swiss, especially after having that whole experience. At a certain point, you can't be You can't always double down on the selfish aspects of this hobby. And I regret it. I wish I still had that one with the scratches I put on it. I've got wrist shots from Socorro and Clipperton and all these spots with it. A really cool watch and one I recommend. And I think about when I think of a slightly larger watch that I enjoyed. Because like I said, you can get an Aquus in 40 that wears quite lovely. but these have a presence of their own and a weird layout and just their own vibe. So I didn't want to shoot the whole list of five and not have something in the larger size of the Aquus. And certainly the Dermiser Talker speaks to me in a big way. Yeah.
Jason Heaton I mean, that rounds out our lists of five. And I think before we go move on to final notes, I think, you know, we had recently gotten a question from somebody who was asking about like, Oh, what's the size of, there was a certain Certina watch. And he was wondering like, is this going to be too big for me? whatever. And, you know, we, we can't really answer questions like that with, with great authority, you know, cause we don't know your tastes and your wrists and how things will look. Right. Um, I guess my response was, you know, lean into this sort of thing. You know, this is, um, if, if you truly like a large watch, um, whether or not it fits your wrist, you know, according to somebody else's opinion. I mean, if you think you just like the way a big watch drapes over your wrist, even if you've got a tiny wrist, I mean, go for it. Like, Big watches are, are its thing, you know, it's like wearing a loud tie or a big brimmed hat, you know, I mean, just, just, uh, just own it. I mean, I, I do love the look of a big watch and I don't wear them as much as I used to, but I have a few that I, I pull out on a day when, you know, it's a hot summer day and you're like wearing a polo shirt or something and you just want to like kind of rock this big watch that sort of just hangs off your wrist. They're, they're a lot of fun.
James Yeah. And I would say this is also a nice opportunity to explore a new color. Don't buy another black dial. steel, kind of stoic, demure, sort of subtle design, you're buying a big watch, go with a big color. Breitling gets this, Aorus gets this, Panerai gets this, Seiko gets this, right? They know that sometimes you want that watch that is kind of this big, bright, fun, hilarious, summertime sort of watch. And that's what we wanted to talk about with this episode. And Jason, your five, the Bremont S2000, the Omega Ploprof in titanium, the Panerai Submersible PAM 1305 and 47 millimeters, the Seiko Marine Master 1000 meter automatic Emperor Tuna SLA-014, big name, big watch, and the Citizen EcoDrive 1000 meter. I think five pretty solid picks for great big watches, right?
Jason Heaton Yeah.
Unknown Yeah.
Jason Heaton And then you have the Bremont Supermarine S502 Jet, the Seiko SUN023 Kinetic GMT, such a killer watch at 48 millimeters. The always stellar IWC Aquatimer Split Minute Chronograph in titanium at 44 millimeters from 2004. And Omega, another Omega, the Planet Ocean GMT at 43 and a half millimeters. And the Aorus, their Meister Talker, such a great piece in titanium at 43 and a half millimeters. Wow. That's, that's, that's 10 monsters that that's such a cool, uh, cool, um, 10 watches for us to, to go through. And I'm sure we missed another dozen or so that, that people can let us know in the comments. Yeah.
James Yeah. Swing by the show notes. Uh, you'll see a link, which will take you to sub stack. If you haven't gotten into the sub stack, you can kind of get in there and take a look and not everybody's commenting, but we welcome any and all comments. Please let us know if we missed a big watch that you love. If you kind of have a favorite big watch, that's your weekend piece or your vacation piece or, or whatever. Or if you're just a big watch guy in general, we've got something to learn from you. If you, if you've kind of stuck with it and you like something a little on the larger side, and you're tired of people like me saying, well, wouldn't this be better at 40 or 39 or 38.5 or 37.7, right? Like I get it. I get it entirely. At a certain point, it is a lot of broken records sort of stuff in this. And that's why it's nice to have a chance to actually sit and chit chat. We read all the comments. Um, and certainly when needed, or when we feel the push, we, we get in there as well, but that's at, uh, the sub stack, which you can find at the gray, nato.com. Jason, you want to jump into some final notes?
Jason Heaton Sure. Yeah. I mentioned, uh, over the three day weekend that I read a couple of books, uh, loved having the opportunity to do that. And one of them that I was super eager to, to read, um, just was released on May 24th. This was a book called, um, with a mind to kill by Anthony Horowitz. Horowitz is one of my favorite authors. I've really come to love his writing over the past year. Um, he's, uh, he's a British writer. Um, He's been around for a long time. He's, he focuses largely on, gosh, his, he's got quite a varied background. He's written some really popular kind of teen adventure fiction in a series called the Alex Ryder books. Um, if you're familiar with it, maybe, maybe even a couple of movies, uh, about the Alex Ryder storyline. He wrote, um, the screenplay for all of the foils war series that was on PBS. And I think probably BBC over in the UK. And, um, and he, he does a lot of, he does magpie murders, which is, uh, you know, kind of these kind of cozy thriller mystery kind of British mystery thriller stuff. But then he's a huge James Bond fan and this is his third and final James Bond double Oh seven continuation novel. And, you know, for those that might not be familiar, you know, obviously Ian Fleming wrote 14 James Bond books. Uh, it was his creation, but since his death in the, in the early sixties, several other authors have stepped up and with permission from the Ian Fleming family and foundation, um, have been given authorization to write kind of continuation novels or books where they put James Bond in different scenarios and write different stories. And Horowitz has done three now. And I think he's the best by far. He's a stellar writer. He's, you can tell he's a fan of Fleming's writing. He does it in almost identical style. And I've read his two others. Um, And those are both worth tracking down and they're easily found. But, uh, with a mind to kill, which I just finished yesterday is just spectacular. I mean, it is to me, I mean, maybe I'm, I'm too, too close to just having finished it, but I would almost say it's my favorite James Bond novel by anybody. Oh, wow. Including Ian Fleming. It's high praise. The plot is so tight and it's so well written and it kind of bounces from, London, it's set just after Fleming's final novel, The Man with the Golden Gun was released and then Fleming died. It was actually published posthumously. So it picks up like two weeks after the completion of that story. So in the mid-60s. And his knack for description of 1960s Moscow, East Berlin, London, you know, a lot of the familiar characters we're used to hearing about. It's, uh, it's worth it. And, and I happened to listen to it as an audio book and it was read by Rory Kinnear and Rory Kinnear, um, has read a number of Horowitz's books, uh, in audio format. Um, uh, you might familiar, be familiar with him as Bill Tanner in the James Bond movies. So he plays a chief of staff, Bill Tanner, um, you know, usually kind of a minor role in the movies, but, uh, but he's, he's a great actor and, uh, he's just got the perfect voice for it. He does all the kind of the accents and the, different inflections and things and really nails it. So I can't recommend this book enough. Uh, check it out with a mind to kill you and I'm sure it's available everywhere in all formats. Um, but if you're someone who likes audio books, definitely track down that, uh, Rory Kinnear version, um, of this book. So there we go. There's my literary pick for this week. It's a really good one.
James Yeah. It's definitely one to add. I just finished, um, Tony Fidel's build. Oh, yeah. The other day. So I'm I'm working my way through the pile. Need to get to a couple others, but it's always nice to have a list a little longer than my ability to actually keep up. Yeah, it is. That's awesome. Well, high praise. Very cool. My pick for this week is like I alluded to earlier. It's something that kept the car alive when the battery really wasn't prepared to do that or the Jeep. Sorry for those of you who don't like it when I call anything a car. This is the Noco Boost Plus GB40. Uh, I bought this with my own money. I bought it on Amazon and it's essentially a lot of you in the audience are like, how did you exist without one of these? This is a very casual thing to have in your car. I've used them on other cars before. I never really bothered to buy one for myself. I can use a battery tender when I'm at home. If I have a battery issue or if it's just insanely cold, but it's summer and I don't really want to give up being able to go to the cottage or go visit my parents. And we're talking about, you know, kind of long drives in some cases outside of the range of what you might try and you know, deal with the headache of calling AAA or CAA as we have here in Canada. So yeah, this is the Noco Boost Sport GB20. It's kind of the smallest sort of entry level lithium battery booster slash power pack. So you can charge your phone on it or other stuff at a USB level. It's not like an especially fast charger, but it can also do, I think this one does something like 20 jumps. from a full charge. It's not super big. I think I paid about 135 Canadian for it. I'll put a link in the show notes, obviously, to a source where you can find it and read more about it, and then you can find it locally. I think the GB40 goes up to four liters. I jumped a 3.8 liter trash Jeep motor several times with it with no issue. It's a small thing, but like I said, this is the time of year where I move around a lot, and I think that might be the same for some of you. As long as you remember to keep a charge, it's a nice thing to have in the car. And it could keep you from having to call AAA or who knows, you could end up in an area where maybe there isn't somebody locally nearby, you know, a few feet away to give you a traditional boost. So I highly recommend these. I've used them with less reliable vehicles in the past, and I guess my Jeep now qualifies for that as well. So it is in the car kit that goes kind of in the back of the Jeep moving forward.
Jason Heaton That's a good pick. I mean, I have one of these as well. I bought it right when we got the Defender and we're planning to do more camping with it. I wasn't sure if it's reliability, which Fortunately, I haven't had to really use it much. But I think, you know, where was something like this back when I was in college with my old Volkswagen Rabbit that was always dying? You know, I mean, this would have been such a game changer to be so self-sufficient rather than always having to dig through your trunk to find, you know, the jumper cables and track somebody down and try to maneuver their car close enough to connect up the cables and whatever. I mean, these are so cool. Now, my question is, I didn't realize that it'll do up to 20 jumps on a charge.
James Uh, yeah, up to 20. And then, then they make a, uh, uh, a GB 40, which is for engines up to six liters, diesels up to three liters, and that'll do twenties. Then the 50 is to seven liters for gas 4.5. It just keeps going. And then you get to 30, 40, and eventually 80, but just spend quite a bit more money. It just depends on the displacement and style of your motor. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Um, but yeah, so about 20 charges.
Jason Heaton I'm just curious, you know, I, keep mine for very long periods of time in with my kit, you know, that goes with me in the car. And I'm just curious how often you need to kind of top off the actual Noco Boost Sport. Like how often do you have to keep that charged for it kind of just loses its juice? I'm sure it says in the manual or on the website, which I haven't really looked, but regardless, I try to plug it in. Like if I know we're taking a camping trip or going on a longer trip, I'll kind of top it off before I pack it away.
James Yeah, the nice thing is it has It has a little power meter. Yeah. So you can actually, you can do a little quick battery check by just by turning it on and it'll show you, you know, two reds, a yellow, and then a green. Yeah. So it's, it's pretty straightforward. The other nice thing is it, it doesn't really require any special process to use it. You literally connect the two leads, turn it on, start your car and disconnect the leads and, and get, get going. Yeah. And, and, you know, you were talking about having a rabbit that used to leave you stranded. I had a Cavalier wagon. And that one, I think the jumper cables just kind of lived in the passenger footwell. I always put them back in the trunk. Yeah. You know, I had several different weird issues where sometimes that car wouldn't start. Yeah. Don't talk to me what I did for the cracked ignition cable because it wasn't safe. But yeah, so the things you do right when you're young and a car is kind of as expensive as it possibly can be. This is a nice backup. I did get some good use out of it out of this week and a nice It's kind of a nice product all around. It comes with a nice burly cable. It's got a built-in flashlight. So if you ended up having to do this in the middle of the night, it actually has quite a bit of power. And then you can very easily charge it with a normal, I would call this a USB micro, USB-B sort of cable. And then it has a standard USB out, so you can connect any of your normal cables and charge up your phone and other stuff. So as far as a bit of emergency power in the car, that can also be charged from a normal charger in your car. So even if you were about to leave on a long trip and you realized it was mostly dead, you could just plug it into the cigarette adapter and charge it as you went, as long as your car was starting at that point. And then it works as a... I see this also being of value to people who are going and doing some car camping, because now you've got a light in your tent, you've got some power for your phone overnight, and then a little bit of safety of a specialized feature set, which is a lot of amps to help the car start like a boost. Not bad for What about a hundred bucks U.S. I guess?
Jason Heaton Yeah. Good, uh, good graduation gift. We're coming up to that time of year anyway, or somebody getting a first car or something. Yeah. We're not doing the dads and grads, uh, gift episode here, but, uh, this would be a good one.
James Yeah. Yeah. Take, you know, take, take it, take a close look at what, uh, what the kids drive in. If it looks a little on the iffy side, um, maybe this is a good pick, right?
Jason Heaton Right. This and some fix a flat or something. Yeah.
James Been there. Oh yeah, for sure. Or, or just a CAA membership. Yeah. Right.
Jason Heaton A triple A. That might be better. Yeah. Yeah. Well, this was a great episode. I'm, I'm, uh, I'm actually tempted to, to swap out the tournique, uh, for, uh, for the S 2000 now or something just to kind of feel some big watch on the wrist here. So, yeah. But, uh, as always, thanks so much for listening. If you want to subscribe to the show notes, get into the comments for each episode or consider supporting the show directly. And, uh, in which case you can grab a new TGN sign NATO, please do visit the gray, nato.com music throughout a siesta by jazz are via the free music archive.
James And we leave you with this quote from Terry Pratchett, who said, why do you go away? So that you can come back. So that you can see the place you came from with a new set of eyes and extra colors. And the people there see you differently too. Coming back to where you started is not the same as never leaving.