Timex and Giorgio Galli Release Their Magnum Opus (327)

Published on Mon, 03 Feb 2025 19:50:20 -0800

Synopsis

In this episode of the Watch Clicker podcast, hosts Andrew and Everett discuss several new watch releases and developments in the watch industry. They start by covering Christopher Ward's collaboration with Second Second for a Year of the Snake watch featuring a pixelated snake design in "venom green." They also discuss new affordable watches from Citizen, including the NJ0190 "Urban Military" model, as well as new releases from Timex's Giorgio Galli line, MKII's Fulcrum 39, and several other notable watches. The hosts provide detailed analysis of specifications, pricing, and their thoughts on each piece. The episode concludes with their "other things" segment, where they discuss finding local hobby clubs and share a long-term review of everyday carry knives.

Transcript

Speaker
Andrew Hello, fellow watch lovers, nerds, enthusiasts, or however you identify. You're listening to 40 in 20, the Watch Clicker podcast with your hosts, Andrew and my good friend Everett. Here, we talk about watches, food, drinks, life, and other things we like.
Everett Everett, how are you? The intention of the delay there, you know, you can't see this at home and you may expect, oh, Andrew wasn't ready to go at the appropriate time, but he was ready to go. He was a hundred percent ready to go. There was like a bit of defiance. like a five-year-old defiance in his eye. Yeah, I knew what I was doing. I knew what he was doing. Andrew, I'm doing well. I'm doing well. It's early Sunday morning. This is going to be a bit of a shift for us. We'll have to figure out how... how this works long term. And I say early Sunday morning, it's 10 o'clock. But you know, relative to our typical, our typical recording time, it's early. So I'm feeling a little like almost maybe disjointed, right?
Andrew A little bit. I mean, it's a schedule change, right? You got to settle back into it, redo your work. your workflow and.
Everett Yeah. I don't feel like encumbered by the other things that have happened today because very few things have happened today. Um, but I do, I think that the trade off is, you know, as we get, as I get older, I should just say the morning is filled with like things that need to be addressed. Like, like physical things that either need time or steroids or Advil to like address. And I'm like, I'm not quite into the, like, I haven't slotted into my day yet. So I've got like just a little bit of a headache and I feel like my throat's still a little like sleepy. So I, yeah,
Andrew I don't know, we'll see. That also comes in part with how long you've been awake. Yeah, that's true, that's true.
Everett What time do you wake up? Well, this morning I woke up around 7 45 just cause I wanted to have some coffee. I want to make some eggs. So I, I mean I have done things. I think I haven't taken a shower yet and I think maybe a lot of these little things could be affected by a shower. So, um, I'm like in my Sunday morning, like just kind of woke up and threw on a pair of khakis type of deal. I've been up since about four.
Andrew Oh, well, that's a much difference Yeah, and I'm going to bed soon. So that's right. Yeah, you you forced yourself up early.
Everett No, I didn't choose to be up Oh, I was awoken By a five-year-old and a dog by five-year-old defiance, which is which has led to you now delaying your intro copy Yeah. Yeah. Okay. This all makes sense.
Andrew No, I really, I really, I wanted, I wanted the crack of my, uh, my return to, to beer on the show to be at a reduced volume. Ah, okay. Well, let me ask you, Andrew, how are you? I'm good. Um, I, it's now February. So I did have a couple of beers, uh, over the course of January. Like I came home from a couple of really shitty days at work. I was like, I'm gonna have a fucking Taco Bell and a beer. Um, so it wasn't a fully dry January, but it was like, it was a dry January and like there's, I just, I needed a CNS depressant to hit me. Otherwise there would be no sleep. Like I got home from work and was just vibrating and was like, no Taco Bell and a beer. And that's, that's how we solve this. Uh, but so, you know, having beer again, uh, gotta, you know, tweak a little bit how, how I drink beer. Cause I'm, you know, That's good.
Unknown Yeah.
Andrew It was a good reset for, for the body. Um, yesterday I went to our local sportsman's show and had an absolute blast. It took my five year old and he's like coin toss any public outing, like how he's going to manage it. So since they get them free, I was like, okay, well it's $9. Is that the fairgrounds? So it's like, we can either have, you know, a fun 10 minutes that suck terribly, or we can have a fun couple hours.
Everett It'd be crazy. I probably would've liked to go to that if someone had asked me to go.
Andrew We had a fun couple of hours.
Everett You should go. Yeah, I should've gone with you because you told me that you were going and I, whatever. Hey, listen, you're hearing this. You're hearing this at home. You're hearing this is actual. This is us bickering. Dispute here. We're having a dispute. Was it cool?
Andrew It was and Calvin was he dug it. He got to the National Wild Turkey Federation had this like inflatable BB gun shoot Spot so he got to shoot a BB gun for the first time. Yeah smoked that turkey He put it right where I'd want it right right at the eyeball And then he put one in the breast and it's like well, you know, it's just a BB We can we can hunt that out But he was, he loved it. We saw the wild wolves of Yellowstone, which is like this traveling roadshow of wolves that are actors, I guess, which was cool. He got to fish in their little pool for a trout. He did not catch it because they are way fed. Yeah. Yeah. And they're pretty savvy too. And they're not hitting power bait. Yeah. They're just, there's like 75, I don't know, six to eight inch trout in there. And they're like, nah, bro. I'm good.
Unknown Yeah.
Andrew We've seen this. It reminded me of like the aliens and the claw machine and toy story where it's, uh, anyway.
Everett Uh, no, I mean, I mean, if you think about that, you think about like a pond like that, it's a pool. Right? Yeah. It is, that to me is one of the most horrifying types of things that humans do. Yes. Because it's, yeah, there's, fish are much smarter than they've historically been given credit for. That's just a horrifying event, but it is a thing.
Andrew Yeah. I mean, they're all stockfish. They're all going to get put back in their tank and blown into a river here soon and, and just have like some weird early life trauma. Um, yeah, it was, it was a lot of fun. He like, he was in it and with it for three hours. Cool. Yeah, it was, it was great. Uh, and my other thing is actually a result of this, but this is not my other thing. You know, there's always kind of weird booths at, at shows like this, right? Um, and there's this lady in like safari gear with a birdcage next to her just talking. And, but the signage behind her is like sugar gliders. And I was like, oh, interesting. Oh, what sugar gliders? They are tiny marsupials. Okay. So they're, Oh, sure. I know. They're like the size of a deck of cards and they soar and their tail is like the full length of their body. Um, and she's there talking about sugar gliders. And then she like reaches in, she has like the, like the tourist canvas necklace on with like all of her shit in it. And she reaches in and she's pulls out this sugar glider. And I was like, Oh, that was interesting. And she reaches in and she pulls out another one. And then she reaches into her cargo pocket and pulls out. And she's just like pulling these things, like one out of her shirt, one out of like her other pocket. And she's like talking about these things. She hands me one and this thing just sits in my hand. It's got opposable, like four, extremities with opposable thumbs and it just grabs onto my fingers like they're branches, curls up and just goes right back to sleep. And then it kind of does this little like traverse in the palm of my hand and goes up the sleeve of my jacket and just settles in. Just as comfortable as it could be. And I was like, this is... Amazing. Calvin's holding them. They're like felty. So she's there. She's works for this company that sells sugar gliders, uh, as pets and like, I don't start looking at all their materials. I'm like, these are fantastic pets. They're low odor. Like the odor comes from you not cleaning their cage sufficiently, but they're really social creatures. So they like want to be with you. They want to interact with you. They want to just be with you. This kid comes up and, He's holding her sugar gliders and he's like, I have one. And he reaches into his pouch and his shirt that's just like against his skin and pulls out his sugar glider. And I was like, What the fuck, how is this like, they're like clean, chill ferrets, right? Because they look kind of weird. They've got their like wings, because they can glide. I mean, they're like flying squirrels, but they're the size of a deck of cards. And I was like, how, like, dollar figure this? She's like, well, for the whole kit, for like the cage, the food, like the first go, and your first sugar glider, it's $8.95. If you buy two, and we, we don't necessarily recommend that you buy two, but buying two is just, it's kind of better. Cause then they have a companion always. If you're not around, it's only another 300 bucks. And I was like, we're into this 1200 bucks to have these two like baller, just hang out in your pocket, sweet things. And I was like, kind of tempted. And then last night I tell Sam about it. I tell the boys about it. Obviously, you know, Calvin was with me and he loved, he was totally on board. He's like, yeah, I want one. And Mark was like, yeah, I want one. Sam's like, we're not getting rodents. I was like, they're marsupials. But I had this terrifying dream last night that we got them and I couldn't find them. And I was like, are they dead or are they just like hiding somewhere? And I was like, Oh yeah, I don't need that in my life. Like I don't need to wonder, did my dog eat this? Yeah. Um, yeah. Fucking Doug would love them. Oh, but there's like all these pictures of these things. They bond to the other pets in the family.
Everett Oh, that's cool.
Andrew Yeah. I was, I was smitten. I still, I still want one, but the fear of, of just losing one is problematic.
Everett Well, Andrew, we're not here to talk about marsupials or elderly morning pains. Rather, we're here to talk about watches and holy Cripes. Some cool shit happened. Well, I'll tell you this, like prepping for this episode. So we, we send, we send links to one another for the show. That's how we each do our research independently. We said, you know, we've told you the story before, but if you haven't heard it, that's the way we prep for the show. We each do research. Hold on. Bless you. Oh, he's got one more. He doesn't get a blessing for that one. Uh, we, we each do our research independently and you know, come up with the watches that we would like to talk about in the show. And then we send them to each other. I oftentimes don't, uh, like if Anders sends his links first, I don't look at them. So I just send him the things I find. Andrew is usually a little bit more diligent about looking what I sent and then taking out the look Yeah, cuz I don't like doing it.
Andrew It's cuz I build the show notes based on all the tabs I have.
Everett Oh, yeah, that's right. So in any event I As I was prepping for the show I just kept coming across watches that I was like, I really want to talk about that So, I don't know you've never sent this many links. I I 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 I bet I've been close to that if not that many but anyway There was some overlap, but I don't think we're gonna get all of these We maybe need to do a speedrun when we get to the end because I do think we should at least mention each of these With that said there's a lot of cool. I just thought there was a lot of interesting releases sort of in our space and Yes, I you know in our space has sort of lost some definition over the years but in the sub like $10,000 zone sure and and even like even like Sub-2000 today, we've just just a ton of really cool stuff that has come out some of it more cool than others some of it like What, what? So with that- And some of it, just noteworthy. Right, right. And I may make one more point. If you're new to the show, welcome. Andrew will have his watches. I'll have my watches. But oftentimes these are, we've picked like the same watches. And so, and really that is what's happened today.
Andrew You actually sent one that I had on my list for last week. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And was like, ah. It's it's just noteworthy like I'm not excited by it.
Everett It's just something like it's I I guess point being these are our watches These are our watch and we own them and we we don't own them any of them Watch today with that.
Andrew I'm still jammed up and yours isn't even wound. I know it
Everett It is. It is. It's wound in keeping time. Um, Andrew, why don't you kick us? I'm going to kick us off. I want to start with no more with no more. Uh, uh, what do you call the things that's before the thing?
Andrew Preamble preamble. Correct. I don't know why that's the one that I went with, but it's close. Uh, Christopher Ward did a collaboration with a second second in honor of the year of the snake and they took I think probably the most fun possible route you could ever take with it. And it's, it's, it's really really fitting that so this is a 12 it is a what's the name of this green they have a special name for this green um venom green with a pixelated snake honoring we just had our lunar new year moving into the year of the snake fun enough, uh, snake was introduced in the year of the snake, the Nokia pixelated game. And that's what Christopher Ward and second second went with for their theme. Cause typically when you see a Chinese new year thematics, there's a lot of red, there's a lot of gold, there's a lot of kind of mythical Creature feels, you know, we've seen plenty of Chinese year new year year of the snake iterations Released in the past couple weeks and they're all pretty the same right? It's yeah.
Everett It's definitely leaning on the greeting gold Yeah, it's a snake
Andrew with some Chinese themes. This is venom green pixelated snake because the game snake was introduced in the year of the snake. And it's fun. It's the 12 is the perfect platform for this because it already has that textured dial. So introducing the pixelated snake through this bright, bright venom, venom green is perfect for it. It looks radioactive. Yeah. Into it is fantastic. The case back is really fun. Cheers to the snake year. This is really my favorite Chinese New Year, Lunar New Year.
Everett themed watch, I think ever. Yeah. Yeah. No doubt about it. This is, this is really, really cool. Really fun. I'm with you a hundred percent that it's, it's different in a way that's just delightful and terrific. That only these two brands could pull off. You know, you said something interesting just a moment ago. I'm not even sure you realized you said it, but you said our lunar new year, which is an interesting statement from a American who lives in Oregon. But it should be noted, and again, long-time listeners will know this, but our kids all speak Chinese and are part of a Chinese immersion program here in Eugene, Oregon. And so for our families, Chinese New Year is actually a It's a significant celebration, significant portion of the year. Uh, just, just to provide some clarity there, uh, the lunar new year, obviously no one has ownership. We, we own that as much as anybody.
Andrew We're not appropriating this for the purposes of the show. This is something that we're like culturally. indoctrinated, not indoctrinated, culturally immersed in. Yeah.
Everett That's a huge part of our, it's a huge part of it. If not our children's years, our years.
Andrew So yeah, it's, it's my favorite. Like I, when I was working on the other side of the weekend, I always take that night off to, be able to participate in the, in the event. Yeah.
Everett It's, it's, it's, it's cool. But just, I thought I'd give people some, give people some context there. Um, yeah, I think I'm with you, Andrew. It's a, it's a 12 and it's a, you say second, second or second, second. I, I say second, second, but I don't know which of those is right. So I'm not correcting you. I'm just saying that's fine.
Andrew We have the three varieties as our, as we are known for. Right. We just try it until one, you know, gets told we're wrong, and then we just keep doing it.
Everett I'm going to start off with cheap, novel, and almost, yeah, novel. I'm going to go with cheap and novel. Your mom. That's right. Far and Swit famously released a few years ago their Mixtape Volume 1. These are delightful sort of Casio-esque plastic watches that leave very little doubt about what they're trying to do. But they have this like cassette tape motif on the dial, or at least on the dial sort of bezel, the LED surround. And these things were terrific. They were $35 for one or $60 for two, or I actually think $34.99 for one or $59.99 for two, which somehow seems important to me, although maybe it's not.
Andrew So they've released their b-sides now and yes, I remember commenting on the colorways like oh it was a really missed opportunity to make one the a won the B and Oh, maybe this means we'll see another iteration to be the b-side and I forgot about it And now we have probably a year or so later the b-side.
Everett Oh That's right. So our B sides are different colors. So these have what I'd call jelly, jelly cases or bezels and straps. It's like a clear plastic. And now B sides coming with a negative display, which I don't normally like a negative display, but here it really, really, really works. It pops. In the context of what they're doing. Because it looks like the
Andrew Oh gosh, what's that called? It's not film, it looks like the reel inside the cassette. That's right, the tape. Yeah, the tape.
Everett And Farnswood has not raised the prices on these, even one cent. Nope. They're exactly the same price. So you can still, for $34.99, get one of the purple or clear. Or you can, for $59.99, get both, get the full set. And they're terrific. There's these are 50 meter watches, which is actually a significant amount of water resistance for what this is. There are 38 by 35 sort of Casio. They're an F91, F84 kind of clone. That's right. I think they're going to wear very, very similar to that. Maybe a little bigger actually than an F91. They're like eight and a half millimeter. I mean, this is just a... They're so clear you can see the spring bar.
Andrew That's right, yeah. These are just... It almost looks like an x-ray.
Everett Word on the street is that these, it's an 18 millimeter lug width, and word on the street is that any sort of Timex Q strap, of which there are both first party and third party versions of, will work on this watch. Now, I don't know why you would take this off of the delightful OEM strap, but to the extent you were so inclined,
Andrew I put a, uh, you could canvas or a nylon pass through on an F 91 after the buckle broke on one. I have an 18 mil. Well, Mark has it. I don't have it anymore. Yeah, I've got my F 84 on nylon and I really, I really like it on that. He, I think he prefers the nylon cause he has two. He has the, the gray F 91 on nylon. And then I got him a gold one for Christmas cause he like saw a gold watch and was like, man, So I got him a gold f91 and he wears it on the OEM plastic strap It's that's plastic and I think he prefers the the nylon even though it's a CNS like piece of shit It's like nicely broken in and like feels good fucked up gunky Like it needs to go through the wash
Everett Well, that's it barns with besides mixtape volume one besides Same great price really fun. Really fun. Love it.
Andrew Love this release Next up for me. I want to talk about since we're still talking about affordable watches I want to talk about a brand who is known for their affordable watches and is doing something different the limited edition Giorgio Agali S2 titanium.
Everett It's interesting. It's interesting. Your lead up to this is maybe a little bit misleading, but I'll let you carry on.
Andrew It's because it's Timex who's usually doing sub $300 watches and they're like, bam, two grand, what up? So this is a limited edition Giorgio Agali has done a bunch of collaborations with Timex. Well, Giorgio Galli, I think is the chief designer for Timex, but it's like when he gets his name on it, it's, it's a little bit more than just like, Oh yeah, he's designing for Timex. This is a, they're giving him, kind of like more than just recognition of you're doing your job.
Everett Right. There's a communication there. Right. So I'm not sure who it was. I think it was Vuk Radish wrote about this recently and, and this, this idea that he would be putting his name on these watches and sort of suggested that there's some hubris and, and maybe that's right. Uh, but yeah, that's, that's a communication that this is like, this is something special. design studio within Timex, perhaps is how maybe we can look at it. If you don't know, sorry, Andrew, just really quickly. If you don't know, Giorgio Galli is a longtime watch designer, has worked with Rado, Movado, a bunch of brands and for a long time now has been sort of helming Timex's sort of design department. So, um, but, but he, in a really unique way,
Andrew They're not all golly watches. Everything coming out of Timex is Timex, and then there's this golly line that's super unique. They're using the same case kind of structure. I don't know if these are unique to the, they have to be, right?
Unknown So watch.
Everett So we've got, sorry, he's the global creative director. So Gali is Timex's global creative director. So he's sort of the man with the vision for the brand, I think right now.
Andrew And then has a design studio within supplemented. I think that's right. By Timex. They're like, yeah, dude, as long as you put out the rest of these, you can, you can brand your own shit under Timex. I think that's right. Cause what we see maybe like one, maybe two Gali releases a year.
Everett Yeah, yeah, maybe maybe that's right. And this will be the third of the of the Timex galley. Yes. Yes.
Andrew So this is titanium forged carbon, carbon case. And it's lovely. Every time I see one of these I'm like man This could be the one that I buy and I'll say it again. This could be the one that I buy This is a titanium dial and what really got me excited was this bracelet technology.
Everett Mm-hmm application, so Do you mind so this is so Andrew this was the watch I was most excited to talk about do you mind if I just stop you right there before we get to the bracelet? Okay So, a little bit... I did slurp you. I did take it. There was some overlap, so I grabbed it first. We both had a ear. We both had a ear. I want to talk a little bit about the evolution. So, I think it was four years ago, the first galley watch came out, and there was a few notable things about it. The first was, it was sort of a powder metallurgy steel watch. So, injection molded, powder metallurgy steel, which is in and of itself pretty cool. It had these sort of recesses and cutouts. It was 500 bucks, which was a pretty big sticker for Timex, especially at the time.
Andrew This is sort of before... It's Timex's first foray into filling the Seiko void and stepping up market in a long time.
Everett Certainly modern Timex. Right. Right. And so that watch I think caught a lot of people off guard. It was really universally praised. I think that there were some aesthetic decisions that some people were like, I don't know about that. I don't know about this. Um, kind of reminded me of like early Vero, like being in their workshop of like, Oh, this could be cool. Let's mill one out. Yeah, that that's right. Although, although not milled, it is injection molded, which is really different.
Andrew But when I'm thinking about like, let's just, let's just do it like that. Yeah. I'll, I'll drop a chunk of steel in here and we'll like just see how it feels. It reminded me of that playfulness and like creativity.
Everett Yeah, that that's right, Andrew. And, and then, so that's the S one and really cool watch when they released the S two in 2023, uh, discordant over my phone.
Andrew What?
Everett The big change was that we're now a skeletonized case, and we were all Swiss made. And the S2 came out at, I think, just under $1,000. And even more so, people are like, holy shit, $1,000 Timex? And for what it's worth,
Andrew And no one's looking at beyond the Timex line of all Swiss made all right like brand new production This isn't just a Timex.
Everett This is a fucking cool watch came on a bracelet a really really cool watch beautiful sort of striking high contrast dial great steel case and Which brings us now to the s2 ti which? it If it's not obvious, this is very, very similar to the S2. However, rather than steel, we're now working in titanium. Injection molded titanium powder metallurgy titanium with a carbon insert in the mid case. So forged carbon insert in the mid case. And for the first time, we now have a galley S on a bracelet, which is where Andrew, you were going to pick up.
Unknown Yes.
Everett Tell us about the race.
Andrew OK, so we have this phenomenal butterfly link. Bracelet, but here's where it gets really exciting. One of the things that bugs me to no end about brands is is Adjusting their bracelets you get pin and collar you get screws that like for some reason in Manufacturing that bitch gets torqued down so tight in order to remove it you end up just stripping it You're like well, I guess I'm just gonna remove a different link Bracelet sizing is almost so annoying it's worth paying that however what 10 bucks to take it to Fred Meyer or Kroger and have somebody else do it for you because it's just annoying. And throughout the year you need to resize your bracelets like just being realistic like do you ever have to add or remove links?
Everett Yeah, yeah, of course.
Andrew Yeah. I mean, it's, it's infrequent, but yes. I went to put on my, um, my sector yesterday and I'm like, Oh, I've gained a little bit of weight because it's a little tight and I'm on the max micro adjust like, well, I'm not going to wear this watch today because I don't feel like unscrewing and replacing the link. I'm just going to change watches. Uh, My favorite bracelet of all time is on the Cartier Santos. It has this really brilliant like button to press easy. It's not, it's not quick adjust. It's not vulnerable to accidental depression and opening. It's just a really clever way to use something other than a pin or a pin, but in a way that you can manipulate it easily. This watch has that. So on the third, the outside link of this bracelet, there are, there is a hollow link that you can remove on a pin. It's on a, we'll call it a piston. It's not piston driven or anything, but you can remove it. It stays attached, twist it, expose the pin, remove the pin without tools, open the next link, twist your third link, replace the pin and close it. An encapsulated link. This is so simple. And so brilliant. I mean, that's, that's the best engineering, right? Simple solutions to problems that we all know we have, but no one's really come up with a good way to solve it. Yeah. This is a fantastic way to solve that problem. Cause you can still get the security of a pass through pin that passes through all three links. You have one link that's attached, that's fixed that you can open up the capsule, remove your pin and replace it. This is brilliant. This watch, if for no other reason, then this bracelet technology is worth every penny of 2,000 bucks.
Everett Yeah, so these links, there's no, like you said, there's no visible pins or screws or anything. We linked different articles to talk about this watch. You linked the Fratello article written by Dan DeGroote. I linked the Hodinkee article written by Tauntaun Wang. The reason I linked that article, Tauntaun actually met with Giorgio Galli, and really had some early hands-on experiences. Apparently, these links have a spring of sorts inside of them, which does the pull-out twist to the side replace method. And he raised an interesting point, which is that given an invisible or a concealed latent mechanism, there was maybe some concern about longterm viability of that, of that motion. And obviously you're probably not going to be engaging that spring all that often, which in and of itself can be a problem.
Andrew So there is perhaps, and maybe with saltwater intrusion, you get like a real fucking problem here, right?
Everett So there's maybe some long-term implications to what's going on. And we, of course, we don't know, right? We don't know what, how long this is going to, it might work just fine for forever and ever.
Andrew But this isn't a watch that you're going to be wearing to introduce to the water, right? This isn't a by-design dive watch. This isn't a by-design adventure watch. This isn't a watch that you're, you know, going to be intentionally hard on.
Everett You're not diving in this. I'm not criticizing it. I'm not criticizing. I'm just raising what I think is a reasonable observation that like, well, it's interesting. We'll see how, you know, these may start breaking or they may not.
Andrew I mean, how we have, we've had quick release bracelets for, you know, realistically what, three years? Sure. Yeah. And we're seeing them fail. I mean, we see spring bars fail. Like the, the most base technologies that we have, in these durable products are known to fail.
Everett I imagine this is very, very, very similar to a quick release mechanism. If I had to guess, this is probably a quick release bracelet mechanism that's been flipped around so that it faces in and stuck in these links. But it doesn't make it less cool. It is fucking cool. Dope.
Andrew And this butterfly on it is absolutely fantastic. I mean, this
Everett this made by not timex looks like a five thousand dollar watch they've done a few other things here andrew so the the dial is is very different and it's more different than you think at first so at first blush this versus the s the s2ti versus the s2 uh the the s2 is a a black dial there's a lot of contrast there's a sort of like Chapter ring as you get to the like in between the rehot, which is very small on the s2 here. We've got excuse me Here we've got a a Silver more perhaps a titanium is a titanium alert.
Andrew Mm-hmm the color match to the case So you like have no real delineation between the case and the dial. It's just this flowing
Everett three hand and then at the the location of the minute track there's no minute track but there's a steel segmented uh band that indicates hours uh and then from there you go directly into a curved rehau that comes all the way up to the thinnest bezel. So on the S2 the bezel is pretty big. Here we've got a domed crystal that goes all the way out to the edge of the case. So you've got maybe a millimeter and a half, maybe a millimeter of bezel on this thing. Huge crystal that goes all the way across the dial, across the band, across the rehat obviously, but then actually sort of cascades over the bezel so your actual visible exposed bezel is a millimeter and a half maybe. It's gorgeous. It is gorgeous. Now 38 millimeters, 12.2 thick, 50 meters of water resistance, Selita SW200, which I think is fine.
Andrew However- And we see plenty of SW200s in this price range.
Everett This is a $1,950 Timex. I believe this is the most expensive Timex that you can buy today. And I believe it's probably, even with inflation considered, the most expensive Timex that you could buy in, if not ever, in at least many, many, many, many decades. Yes. Uh, and, and frankly at like percentage to CPI or whatever, this may be the most expensive Timex ever released. I'm sure that there were some gold Timexes, but even then, I don't know with the price of gold being what it was, this may be the most expensive Timex ever. It could. And I, and I don't, I'm not even angry with it.
Andrew This, this should be, this should be, Everything about it is cool. It is innovative, like nothing about this watch. existed before.
Everett Yeah.
Andrew Yeah, that's right. This is, you know, brands like Manta innovating in every possible way.
Everett Yeah, and it's fair to note with that comment, orologically, this watch is- It's a three-hand watch. It's totally fine. As simple as it comes. So, orologically, horologically, this watch is not interesting. However, everything else is just almost mind-blowing. And so take the word, take the brand Timex out of the equation and put this in any other brand. Give this watch to, I don't know. Take your pick, yeah. Take your pick, right? And at 2,000 bucks, we're like, whoa. Whoa, now I don't know, I don't know how well this thing is finished. I can tell you right now, it's got a mail-in link on the bracelet, which I don't like, and it's got that sort of faux milling, which for me at this price point indicates that fit and finish and manufacturing techniques maybe leave a little something to be desired. With that said, you cascade into that bracelet where you can tell everything is just
Andrew Tight so I mean they might have just failed on the in link, which is not an uncommon failure exactly brands Producing watches at this price point a $5,000 watch you don't see and link problems Generally, they still exist And they are really common at 2000 and below.
Everett We've got the highest grade of SW 200 you can get. I still am maybe, maybe raise a bit of a, an alarm bell at the SW 200 versus something slightly nicer being used, but is this is the highest grade of the SW 200. Um, you've got that black rotor that you see on the elaborate grade 200, that black eye on plated rotor. I mean, there is a go state. So there were some compromises here. I think the compromises were to make it affordable with the technology in this bracelet. You've got to be right, Andrew. That's maybe the point I'm trying to get to and failing to get there quickly enough. Case back is attached with screws, which to me is always an indication of something a little bit more proper going on. This is a terrific watch. And I think if this watch is released by I'm just trying to run through brands, maybe Hanhart, perhaps Hamilton. If Hamilton releases this watch, that's a great brand. Or let's say Boliva, Hamilton or Boliva. If one of these companies releases this watch, people are drooling. And 2,000 is a steal. Oh yeah.
Andrew Because this has that Longine feel of like, we're doing cool shit, and we're doing it really understated.
Everett And Timex, the Timex logo is just teeny and it's that perfect vintage Timex font. I mean, this thing's terrific. Obviously, we don't have a ton of great macro shots here. It's a relatively new watch. It looks to me like the handset is stunning. Uh, this watch is really cool.
Andrew It stands to be my favorite release of the year. We're in February. Uh, I, it's going to take a lot to disrupt this as my leader for the year. Yeah. And there's only 500, right? So this is experimental. It's, It's this galley design studio within Timex.
Everett Timex has said this is gonna be, this is gonna wrap up the S line, the galley S line of watches. However, they've also suggested that there's like, they're opening up the doors to something new. So I think while- Do we think we may see grand Timex come out of this? Maybe, maybe.
Andrew Or like some kind of segmentation. of Timex?
Everett I think perhaps, Andrew. Yes, that's where my head's at. Yes, I think that's possibly what's happening. So the S line is, with these last 500 watches, being discontinued, but I doubt that this is the last we see of the spirit behind the S line. This is so cool.
Andrew I love that Timex is doing this. Love that we're talking about timex and we're talking about like true innovation in horology Really cool watches. Yeah.
Everett Yeah, i'm i'm with you um What do you have next we're I know we're deep into it. We were like we like really We we got really talked about that watch but let's stay affordable so citizen oh yes citizen you also picked this watch so i i i won't object to you jumping in here but citizen released a what two years ago the suyosa which came in at under 300 that wasn't two years was it Boy, I think so, but I could be wrong. Don't quote me.
Andrew It's fairly recent but time flies.
Everett That's right Which was like, oh man citizens got this $300 Citizens got this $300 sort of excuse me. I'm gonna sneeze again Andrew. What the fuck is up? I'm allergic to you.
Andrew I'm sorry, you guys.
Everett I'm usually a three sneezer. So you're a little lucky. But you know, this watch came out sort of jumped on the integrated sports watch craze. We have you know, citizen with all of its in house movement capabilities. Automatic. It's like, Oh, this This thing's really cool and it's genuinely affordable. If you know someone who wants either a cheap watch or just loves Citizen or is looking to get into watches, all of a sudden this is an incredibly viable place to go when you look at the dearth of affordable Seiko autos.
Andrew Yeah, once Seiko dropped the SNK and introduced the five line and once the or not the SKX and the five line and the SNK became, you know, it was no longer $100 watch Seiko kind of abandoned what got people like us into watches.
Everett And as we've stated on the show, I think that Seiko's abandonment of the entry-level crowd is vastly overstated. When you look at Seiko's entry-level offerings, although they are not quite as diverse as they maybe were 10 years ago, they're also not quite as cool.
Andrew They're way more diverse. They have 10,000 SKUs in the affordable line. Yes, but they don't have the same kind of like prospect like this is a no bullshit like this could last you forever
Everett But if you look at it, I stand by the position that we vastly overstated how much Seiko has abandoned the affordable market. Although they don't have the SKX, which is an ISO certified dive watch at 180 bucks or whatever, they still have so much cool ship. Anyway, long story short, Citizen, we've noted that Citizen has been doing cool things at the entry level and they've come back.
Andrew And they're also reducing their glaring errors. Like Citizen and Bulova can make a 90% watch, and then that last 10% just makes it a butter face.
Everett So this week, Citizen released the NJ0190, which marketing materials also refer to as the Urban Military, which I fucking hate that. I hate it. I hate that name. We'll move on. So what is this? This is a. This is a. This looks like a three and three and Nighthawk ish, but it's automatic. It comes in at like two hundred and twenty five euros. It's got an eight thousand. They're simple. Eighty two hundred three hertz movement. It's a mineral crystal which I think a crystal this size may be the wrong move. We've got an attractive minute track that goes around the outside and is Okay, this minute track, Andrew, from one to 20, it runs in single minutes, and thereafter, we just do every other. I'm not sure what the emphasis is and just the evens.
Andrew So we've- I think it's a timer. It's meant to be used as a quick reference timer. And one of the articles I read was like, I don't know what purpose it serves. And I think for like trying to combine this sort of dive watch feel, but keep it in the pilot watch, Genre, I think this is really clever. It's not a tachymeter, but it's a really legible Quick reference timer. Yeah, which is Not being a pilot wasn't visual intrigue.
Everett Yeah. Yeah, and we've got like a onion crown, which is which is evocative of pilot watches and Like really great case 46 and a half millimeter lug leg 40 millimeters across 12 millimeters thick Which is which is fine at a price this at a watch this price 12 millimeters is terrific under 300 bucks It is sort of slab sided. We've got a hundred meters of water resistance It comes in black and white it black is good the whites, okay, I Yeah, that's right. That's right. I'm with you, Andrew. This is just great. We've got a single link bracelet, but it articulates to me attractively. I just think this is really cool. I'm not sure that this watch is particularly interesting for like an advanced enthusiast or even perhaps an intermediate enthusiast, but for an entry-level enthusiast, I think that this watch presents a lot of attractive, it ticks a lot of boxes in a way that makes it a pretty attractive option for someone. You know, when you get that text message that says, Hey, I'm looking for a watch, I want to spend, you know, roughly 200 bucks. And I think with discounts, that's where this thing is going to wind up. The Suyosa came out at 300, but it's regularly found at about the 200 mark. I think we'll see this wind up at like 180. So for that person that's like, I want a no shit, really cool, attractive watch. Well, here are your options. The Suyosa is integrated. This is not, this is just a regular 20, 40 by 20, a banger of a beginner watch. This has no misses for me. Yeah. Yeah.
Andrew I mean, it's going to leave a lot wanting, but there's there's no misses.
Everett Yeah. Yeah. The, the, the nonsense is in the name, which yeah, is much, much preferable to nonsense in the dial.
Andrew Oh, it's a 19 and a half millimeter lug width.
Everett Why?
Andrew Come on citizen. Come on. Bull of a quit doing a 95% of the work and then doing some fucked up on purpose. They just went 40 and 20. Yep. Because God bless. No. And that's, I, that was my, my similar commentary on this is this is, this is the, It's thrown its hat fully and is, you know, now a powerhouse in the entry-level mechanical watch space. What's next, Andrew? Ooh, I want, what do I want to talk about next? We have to talk about the Fears collaboration with Studio Underdog. Sure, we have to. So this is a Brunswick 38 collaboration, or a variation with Studio Underdog serving up the Gimlet which is a full loomed dial in the Brunswick 38 and it is stunning. Absolutely stunning. We got the embargoed version of this
Everett like a week ago, two weeks ago? Yeah, we got photos of the.
Andrew And I was like, man, I'm really glad that we didn't record before I saw this, because there's no way I could have kept my mouth shut. The true studio underdog feel with this pinned dial to the case, full loom. It's a Brunswick 38. It's a Sellita movement. It's all the things you'd expect from both of these brands. And it's just like one of the most fantastic collaborations. Here's the problem, it's only available at London Watch Days that comes up in March for £1,000. So I don't know how much that is in real money, but lovely. I'm really excited for what Studio Underdog is doing right now. I love Fears and all the cool shit that they do. Studio Underdog, I think, is probably going to be the most exciting brand this year.
Everett Yeah, so they've added the Studio Underdog, that sapphire disc on the dial, which creates that depth and has those rivets. I don't think they've increased the thickness on this as a result of that, which is pretty terrific. Obviously, you're not gonna get a ton of water resistance in this but it's still at a hundred and I think Dimensionally, we're 12 millimeters.
Andrew I mean, yeah thick 38 millimeter case 12 thick 43 and a half lug-to-lug These are nice come I mean the Brunswick 38 is a really fantastically sized watch and it's co-branded at 12 o'clock Which I think is terrific Yeah, I like, I like the decision to keep the branding all at 12 o'clock rather than splitting it. Uh, I, I, I kind of like that negative space. Yeah. In the, in the Southern hemisphere of the dial.
Everett Yeah. I'm with you. Um, I'm calling a little bit Andrew here, but I'm going to talk about our, I'm going to talk about our friend, my friend, uh, bill. Yeah. Oh yes. Uh, released a watch sort of. Okay. This watch is, I love everything about it. I'm going to get to a place where I'm puzzled, but that's a, that's a preview. Um, I think we'll, I think we'll land at the same place. Puzzled. So Billy out of Pennsylvania, probably as much as anybody is, Credibly could be credibly described as the og of the micro brand watch movement There's a few other guys that one of the most influential people in micro brands.
Andrew Yes That's right.
Everett And and and and right there right there at the beginning a founding father perhaps founding father. That's right I mean this guy was So 2002 is when MK2 was introduced as a brand, which if you're doing the math at home, we're going on a quarter of a century that MK2 has been making watches. And MK2 is known for making watches that really brush up all the way to the extremities of that homage descriptor, which is to say they make watches very, very evocative of historic watches, historic military watches. One of their first models, in fact, not the first, I don't think, but very early, was the Fulcrum. This was a 42 millimeter mil-sub, which at the time was modern sizing, for a watch with a really historical provenance. That was a good word choice. They have now released the MKII Fulcrum 39, which is a MIL-spec. diver, it's a mil-sub. This is a 39mm mil-sub. And while MK2 has taken on the brand Tornick Rayville, they've acquired that brand, and are now releasing watches under the Tornick Rayville brand. Tornick Rayville historically being really like a military supplier brand. It gives MK2 the opportunity to sort of juxtapose its sort of military releases with its civilian releases, all of this being perhaps tongue-in-cheek, because it's really a fictional dichotomy that MK2 has set up. These are both homages with this watch with this fulcrum 39 they were also releasing like a 35 page magazine that has a like a historical it's a they're calling it a zine that is a fictionalized story or includes fictionalized stories of the men who continue to serve in the military in the post-vietnam years and an exploration of how the Fulcrum 39 was sort of adopted by use of these now, you know, former military, now civilian people hearkening back to their military watch experiences. There's just a lot of really fun storytelling here. And if you're not familiar with the way these brands have positioned themselves with this sort of fictional, but also compelling and real life narrative about how the brands work in the market. It's fun. It's fun. It's not real. It's fictional, but it's plausible. And it's, but it's also happening. And it's happening. Yeah. So these, so anyway, I maybe digress. The watch, this is a 39 millimeter dive watch. It's actually 39 and a half where we've got 316 steel, we've got 20 millimeter lugs. We've got sort of loomed block indices. We've got baton indices loomed at 369 and a big triangle at 12. We've got loomed sword hands, a date at 430, which- Or not, a date and no date option with different movements to eliminate the ghost date, which I think is
Andrew Amazing and it's something I would absolutely expect to this brand to be like no. No, we're just gonna do the right thing We're not we're not just gonna pull the disc and change the dial. We'll just change the movement because it's
Everett That's the way to do it. Stainless steel bezel with an anodized aluminum insert, which is perfect for this watch because it's doing what it wants to do. You've got a 9015 or a 905S depending on which date configuration you want. Now here's where, so 200 meters of water resistance. Uh, it comes on a bracelet or on a Nitex general purpose strap, which I think is a Tornic Ravel or a MK2 product that's meant to replicate an old military supply 1960s woven nylon strap. Um, a lot going on here. Now, here's where, here's where I scratched my head a little bit. 14.1 millimeters thick here. And I just don't understand why. Yeah, I struggled with that too. And I'm gonna give some deference to Bill because he's such a careful dude. So I've produced a watch and my manufacturers also, my OEM also has experience working with MK2. And I know from reputation only that when Bill Yao makes a watch, he is very, very specific. about everything. And if something's not right, he sends it back. This is not right and it needs to get fixed. So this is not an oversight. And I'll give deference to Bill in that regard. But I am curious about why. I'm wondering if it's to be able to retain 200 meters. I don't think so. It shouldn't be. No, you can make, this watch could be 200 meters of water resistance and be much, much thinner. So there's something else going on here. Now, maybe it's a dimensional, maybe it's a dimensional thing. I will say it's got a double dome sapphire crystal that sits up pretty high and that's probably contributing. But even then, we're talking about 13 millimeters of actual watch dimension. Yeah. Maybe, I mean, maybe you get down to 12 and a half and then the questions go away. The case profile at this dimension is just gorgeous. It doesn't look obnoxious. No, it looks so good. So, so maybe, maybe, maybe that's it. He's like, this is the way this watch is supposed to look. I'm gonna, I'm gonna. defer to Billy Howe in all things ever. But that decision did puzzle me. The bezel here is terrific. Everything about it's great. And it's a thousand bucks. And it's a thousand bucks. That's it. Yeah.
Andrew This is a thousand dollar. It's amazing. And I think you're getting every penny out of it. On a bracelet. Yeah. You're getting every penny of value out of this watch.
Everett So orders are open now. This is, I don't believe, limited at all. So this is something you can buy. We've got a double-domed sapphire crystal AR coating on the inside, which is the way you want it, drilled lugs, 120-click unidirectional. I mean, there's no surprises here. Anodized, this is terrific. This is just a terrific watch.
Unknown Yeah.
Everett Yeah, this is a banger. Yeah, well done Bill. The original fulcrum 42 millimeters, right? Did I say that Andrew? Yes. This is a much more modern and also perhaps historically accurate 39 millimeters. Yeah.
Andrew I think we might need a speed round. Yeah, let's do it. So my first speed round, we have some new Seiko 5 releases. It's a partnership with a Japanese artist now living in Australia, Kentaro Yoshida. And he, they're just... Beautiful. So he is trying to capture the feel of Australia with Australian motifs in these three Seiko 5 sports watches. We have kind of a sandy gold, a full black, and then a multicolor steel with like an olive-y bezel. And they're really lovely. It's kind of, it's, they sort of fit in that Seiko 5 urban kind of faux art category, even though this isn't faux art, because this is a real artist designing these, which is a little bit complicated because there's so much shitty Seiko faux art that to drop this guy's real art in with it is a little bit, I don't know, like insulting to him, but he's also working with Seiko, so it's kind of... Yeah, he's part of it, yeah. Yeah, I don't know. But they're all really lovely releases, and I think I'd wear any one of these three watches. And they're being added to the Seiko 5 line for 700 bucks. They're all Australasian, is the word that they use. Limited editions of 500 each, which is appropriate for something like this, celebrating Japanese designers who are living abroad in Australia, or a Japanese designer, an artist living abroad in Australia.
Everett Rick Murray's brand, Aquastar, resurrected just five years ago, which seemed wrong to me, has released what they're calling the Benthos Heritage 2.
Andrew I feel like this is about the fifth Benthos we've seen in the last 12 months.
Everett Well, yeah, that's right. Maybe not 12 months, but in the last couple of years, they have released several Benthos. Notably, they released the Benthos 500, which is a deep Diver and I can't remember the dimensions off the top of my head, but it big bitch It was enormous right and and I think a lot of people were like this is cool, but it's just stupid So they released their heritage to bentos which takes that same those same ideas and makes them much much much more acceptably acceptable palatable Yeah, that's right. So we've got a 40 millimeter by 44 millimeter by 11.9 millimeter thick watch. This is a four o'clock crown and a two o'clock helium release. So still and 300 meters of water resistance. So still very much a deep diver, capturing that history of the Benthos and Aquastar in a way that is reassuring. It's 904L steel, which is also really cool. We've got this radial brushing on the dial. I mean, this watch is terrific. This is I'm almost sad we didn't have more time to talk about this and it's speed rounding. But if you like Aquastar, you like Benthos, you like what Rick Murray is doing, I think this watch is just terrific. Salida SW201. These are pre-order right now for $1,190 or $1,290 on a bracelet, which I'm not sure actually you need the bracelet. It comes on a bead of rice, but it seems a bit of a mismatch to the watch to me.
Andrew Yeah, I think the Tropic is the right way to go.
Everett Yeah, and they're slated to deliver I think in late spring Of this year.
Andrew Those are good.
Everett I think bentos is gonna I think I think our star is gonna get a lot of our attention this year $1,500 is $1,500 regular price so you can get that for quite a bit less right now It's like a $300 discount if you if you prefer one of these so what's next in Bamford the d300 in full ceramic so Bamford I think
Andrew I think we've talked about some of these Bamford watches before. This is a full ceramic version of their D300, and it's a big bitch. It's 42 millimeter case, 45 lug to lug, only 13 thick for a full ceramic, 300 meters of water resistance, comes with a white, black, navy, khaki, or green dial. Titanium core in the ceramic. So it's ceramic built around titanium Salida 2824 or SW 200 movements to grand and these are Great like pro spec big no bullshit watches.
Everett I really like these absurdly big. I mean just I know We're hearing 42 millimeters, but that because these watches really present as a square it's this big sort of
Andrew They look very Hublot. These are panoramic panoramic huge. Yeah, that's right. They're big But terrific 2,000 bucks and an all ceramic titanium core like these are these are no bullshit dive watches 28 24 201 movements.
Everett I think they're these are like availability based Movement releases. Yes, which we've seen a few times in the last handful of years. I I think this is one of those watches where if you look at what it is and what you're getting, the price tag seems... And I think if you have a preference to movement, you could probably get the movement you wanted, but... Yeah, I won't speak on that because I don't know, but you might be right.
Andrew But if you don't, I imagine you're just going to get the movement you get.
Everett I think Andrew, last watch for me, depending on what you talk about here moving forward, Captain Cook. Overpole came out last year or perhaps two years ago, which was a steel Lerato in the Captain Cook line. They called it the Overpole. And it was like sort of weird. It was really cool. 37 millimeters, which when we talked about, I think we said, that's a terrific Size for this. Um, but also just it just felt a little weird. They re-released. Cause rotto's weird. They've re-released the overpull. This time in a yellow gold PVD at 39 millimeters, 11 millimeter, 10 nine thick. This is a, what I would call a dive looking watch, but it has a world time bezel that rotates to allow you to set at the, the offset to whatever time you want to indicate. It's sort of a, a, a historically accurate, but, but uh, a very simple method for dual time keeping really a vintage watch in every step of the way. I love the fact that they've gone with yellow PVD here. Very rare. that we see yellow PVD not be either brushed or blasted. Here we have a polished surface. PVD, if you don't know, PVD is a very thin coating, very strong, very resilient, very durable, but very thin. So whatever the surface of your watch looks like is what the PVD will look like. So this is a polished case that's been PVD applied. So the PVD is just, stunning and polished and gorgeous. It really, this watch looks terrific. Gold hands, white dial, great fonts everywhere you look. Every font. We've got the rotating anchor at 12 o'clock, which is a Arado hallmark. I love this watch.
Andrew It's very 1960s.
Everett And it's what, 2,000 bucks? So 2,700 francs. So not cheap. So three grand. Yeah. Not cheap, but really cool. A hundred meters of water resistance. Really neat watch. Where are we at? Yeah. We've got time for one more watch, Andrew.
Andrew Last one I want to talk about. Oh, And you know, I wanted to talk about this before. Uh, we have some new jazz masters. Uh, there is an open heart auto at 36 and 42 and they are really, really lovely. Uh, I like the Hamilton jazz master line. They're not for me, but I, I like seeing them. I like looking at them. I like that they exist. These are great sizes. Midnight blue and Emerald green being introduced into the lineup. Open worked.
Everett Um, You know, Hamilton, Hamilton's so funny to me because anything that says khaki, we're like, yup. And Jazzmaster just does not get the love. Although these watches are really, really well made. They're usually sized very well. Here the 42, I think comes in at 11 and a half. Yeah.
Andrew The price on the 42 is
Everett uh 1200 on a steel yeah i mean in thickness oh okay yeah so so the 42 comes in 11 and a half but the smaller size comes in at 10 flat and that's really compelling it is 36 but for this style of watch i think that is a really compelling dimension and these are so well put together i i think these are cool they were on my list too um ultimately it's a jazz master and we're gonna Not give it the treatment it deserves because that's the way jazz masters go because they're kind of ugly But I also really like looking at I hate open art. I just I'll just say for the record I don't like the bracelet.
Andrew I don't like open worked more more often than not Yeah.
Everett I said the last watch because I thought you were going to talk about something, but you didn't talk about it and I'm going to talk about it. Which one? So Autodromo brought back their Monoposto, which I think was, again, their second watch, but perhaps their first. Going back to 2012, Bradley Price released this. And I think people were like, it's cool. I get it. I maybe don't get it. They've... um here we are 13 years later uh bradley price and autodromo are sort of stalwarts in the really niche the most niche but highly respected areas of microbrand watches they've now done a thing so they re-released the monoposto this watch is a huge 42 millimeter, 43 millimeter. Non-chronograph three-hand watch, which I think is gonna catch a lot of people off guard. It's got these very, very, very thin hands. They look like gauge hands, if that makes sense. Bradley Price and Autodromo being auto-focused, it makes a lot of sense. This is a round case, wire lugs. Huge sapphire crystal, the original I believe had a mineral crystal and with a crystal this big I'm glad he went sapphire. It's 10-8 thick so this thing's a big flat disc that you wear. Monoposter historically had a red band painted on the crystal, this doesn't. But for the first time, they've now collaborated with Mobile One. And so what was historically sort of an homage to racing now becomes an actual sort of... Piece of it.
Unknown Piece of racing.
Everett Yeah.
Unknown And these are cool.
Everett I was in Gold Plated also. Oh yeah, that's right. Actual gold plated for not that much more. So these are 875 steel, 950 gold plated, 100 pieces of steel, 50 pieces of the gold. This is a really, really cool watch. Just look at it. If you like it, you should get it because this is really freaking cool. And it's got that mobile one red, what Pegasus is what we call that, a red Pegasus at six o'clock.
Andrew and the branding on the case back.
Everett As a font guy I will just say Autodromo and Bradley do fonts as well as anybody in the business and I think this watch is just terrific.
Unknown I agree.
Everett Andrew, other things?
Andrew You've promised great things. I promised a thing. I don't know if it can be great So I went to the sportsman show this weekend And obviously as you're walking through all the booths with a five-year-old when there's a booth that has dogs Contained within it you you will go visit And I'm talking to these guys, and it's these two old fellas from a club called the Green Valley Hunting and Retriever Club. And it's just these guys with their dogs. One's got a King Charles Spaniel, the other one's got a Black Lab, and these dogs are just seated. Chill. They're not chill. Oh boy. These dogs are just seated on their platform vibrating with excitement. Oh, but they're not moving. They get pet and they're like, okay, yep, pet me. Yep. Do some more of that. Like you want to give him a treat? Like you give him a treat. I'm like, these are just the, the most disciplined dogs, the beefeaters. Yeah. And so I'm talking to these guys and they're like, Hey, we have, you know, we have a club meet up next Saturday. Our whole thing is like you have a $50 family membership fee, but the whole thing is that, you know, it's a bunch of people who just get together and train their bird dogs. I'm like, wait a second, hang on. They're like, yeah, no, our tagline of our club is we train you to train your dog. I'm like, huh. So I get looking into it and that's this whole thing. It's this group of people and like, and you know, obviously week over week throughout the year it ebbs and flows. Uh, so my thing is finding clubs. So, so much of the, so many of the hobbies that we get into are really individual. Uh, and there's like a lack of information or the information is out there, but you gotta really dig for it and you gotta suss out like, Oh, that neckbeard. Actually, though he knows what he's talking about, he's just a fucking asshole. So I'm next week gonna go with my 10 year old to... I'm a nine-year-old. He doesn't turn 10 till later, but my nine-year-old we're gonna go to this club meet with like all these old dudes and their bird dogs and Participate in this group activity of doing this thing that they love to do and are just these enormous Encyclopedias of knowledge who just want to share it.
Everett It's like an in-person subreddit Yes, like almost like it's go back to 1985 that so that's my other thing is so many of the things that we do though They're highly individual.
Andrew There are other people out there who give a shit and and maybe that's like that's why we have this podcast that's why this this show has survived is because it's a community of people though disparate and are coming together to share knowledge and to experience it together and to build a community and find communities for the things that you like because they are out there and they exist and they don't necessarily just have to be subreddits.
Unknown Yeah.
Andrew Cause I never would have thought to look for a birding club.
Everett What a delightfully anachronistic but beautiful other thing, Andrew.
Andrew I love it. Yeah, so next week I'm gonna go hang out with a bunch of old dudes, my kid and my dog, and we're gonna work on training my dog. That's terrific. Yeah. Yeah, I'm curious to hear how it goes. Oh, it's gonna be awful, but it's gonna be really fun. No, it won't be awful. Oh, it's gonna be cold, it's gonna be wet, it's gonna be unpleasant, but it's gonna be a lot of fun. It's gonna be very memorable.
Everett I love it. I've got another thing. Do me. My other thing is another thing that has been another thing before. Oh. This is a perhaps a long-term review, I think is the modern jargon or vernacular for what I'm gonna do. I, last year, last spring or late winter, I really kind of took a deep dive on knives. Knives, pocket knives. Knives. Knives. And I bought quite a few knives in a relatively short period of time, and I really, really enjoyed it. And I wound up with a collection of, I don't know, I've got probably about 20 knives at this point. Some of them are absurdly expensive. Some of them are delightfully affordable. But within that, there was sort of a- Some of them will take your pants down. Yes. Yes. Correct. Some of them are huge, um, and heavy. Uh, but within that there was like a sub category of like an, uh, the EDC knife. Right. And, and I think for different people, that means different things. I would just say for the record, my true EDC knife, the only knife that I have on me almost all the time is still a case sod buster. So here I am, 20 plus knives later, the one knife that I always have on me is an old carbon steel, it's not even old, but a carbon steel anachronistic slip joint Case Sodbuster. I love that watch. That's not my other thing.
Andrew My other it's like based around the old buck knife field, like you see grandpa and it's like wood handled buck knife that pulls it out of his pocket to just do whatever.
Everett And part of the reason I have that is because it's so cheap. It's made in the United States. It's got this like resin hand anyway, but that's not what we're here to talk about. I, I do love that knife and I feel I throw that in my little pouch that goes in my briefcase all the time. And I just have it. The only time I don't have it is if I've taken it out of the pouch because I have to go through a metal detector at a court that I don't have like a attorney entrance for. In Lane County, I can take it into the court because I use the attorney entrance and I don't have to go through the metal detectors. They're not worried about you. With that said, at one point I grabbed four knives, four knives that all were intended to meet the same goal, which is to say they were all lightweight, they were all dimensionally small, and some of them, the dimension that they were small in was different. Several of them, two of them, in fact, were very, very thin. They were all relatively thin. They were all relatively short in total length, but also blade length. And I didn't really know which of these I preferred, but here I am now, about 10 months later, after I started this sort of process, and I think I had some early thoughts, but one of those knives, has emerged as the clear favorite. And it's emerged as the clear favorite by a very wide margin. And that's not something I've thought about. It's just the one that I want to use the most, which I think is the truest expression of a favorite. It is literally my favorite. um and so i'm gonna review before i before i announce which one it is andrew i'm gonna review the watches that were candidates for this the knives the knives so i did i say watches you did oh the knives that were candidates so the first was a benchmade bug out i got a very special benchmade bug out mine is the oem carbon fiber i can't remember what the model is on this it's an s90v blade it's beautiful it's light it's wonderful it's sturdy i like the bug out a lot of people give it shit i think it's a great knife another one was the spyderco sage 5 spyderco sage 5 has the sage line is like all the same knife but they have different locking mechanisms. This is Spyderco's compression lock. It's G10 handles that have got like a carbon, a faux carbon fiber weave on them. This knife is terrific. It's a leaf blade. It's got Spyderco's sort of hole opening system. I love this knife. A little big. Then we've got the Benjamin 940. I've got a G10 940. And that thing is just ugly as sin.
Andrew And I love it.
Everett Same. I love it. It's so ugly. It's so weird. And yet it fits so well in the pocket. It's so functional. I love this. These are not the knives. Did you get purple? I did. I actually got some terrific, uh, I actually got some terrific, uh, anodized titanium. purple hardware for that, and I just think it's great. The knife that has jumped out, that has jumped to the top, is actually the Zero Tolerance 0545. Zero Tolerance has awful naming conventions. They're all three digits, and it's hard to remember which one is which. This knife has jumped out as the most carried knife in my collection, short of the case, which is always in my briefcase. This thing is clearly a Benchmade Bugout, perhaps Benchmade Narrows thing. It is a titanium locking side carbon, real carbon fiber show side knife. It weighs about nothing. It is about zero millimeters thick. Yeah, it's totally forget has tremendously thin blade stock, but a relatively sizable blade. Uh, this is the balance on it's wild. The balance is wild. The blade is, Big, with a really nice, effective cutting edge. The action on it, as it's broken in, when I first got it, it was a little stiff. The detent is pretty positive. I was a little, like, uncomfortable with this thing when I got it. It's zero tolerance, so just flipper. You do not have any other option for opening it. But the action is... Amazing. I I love this knife Andrew. It's kind of a weird knife It's doesn't feel like zero tolerance zero tolerance is known for their big beefy over built lots of screws This is not that and I am just in love with this knife it is by a wide margin of all of the knives I've purchased, my favorite, my most used. It's not good for everything. It's a little lightweight for cutting like thick corrugated cardboard. It's not my favorite for that. But for just about every task that you do with a knife on a regular basis, It's perfect. It's not a hard user. I'm a lawyer, okay? So if you're like a construction worker, and you're like, that guy's an idiot. Like, listen, for me, a guy who doesn't do knife things professionally, this is about the perfect knife.
Andrew Well, a construction worker should just be using a razor knife with replaceable razors.
Everett That's right. But I mean, if you're like, if you're like a professional outdoorsman, That's not the knife. Right? It's not the knife. Okay. So don't, don't at me. But you know what could be? Go get something else. The Osborne. Perhaps.
Andrew Or any of those other three options. That's right.
Everett Could be that option. Cause they're just enough beefier. For me, this knife is just got everything I want. Size-wise, action-wise, they're a little expensive. These are 270. So this is- That's not much more than Benchmade, though.
Andrew It's, you know, a third, again, more.
Everett Well, I mean, if you compare it to, if you compare it to the Bugouts that are similar materials, or perhaps even a Narrows, it's way cheaper. I mean, it's half of the price. They're made in the USA by Kai here in Oregon. This is MagnaCut, titanium, and real carbon fiber. I mean, it's got everything you need. This is an absolutely perfect knife. The one criticism I have, and it's not even a criticism because I like it, it's got a really dinky little pocket clip. It's that micro clip. It's a micro clip. And so depending on the pants you're wearing, that may not be the best, but the knife is so light, it does everything you need. but I think a slightly more substantial pocket clip could... You can't put much more pocket clip on it because of how thin it is at the base.
Andrew That's right, that's right.
Everett So my other thing for the week is the Zero Tolerance 0545. This is not, I don't think this is one of... zero tolerance is more popular knives. I think when it came out, a lot of people were confused by it. I still think a lot of people are like, what the fuck is that? That's so different. It's not what I expect. I don't want it. But for me, I just think this thing is almost perfect in every single way. And I love it. I love it. And you know, you're looking, Andrew, you're looking at about $2,500 worth of knives sitting on my lap right now across many, many brands. And you know, I've got I've got two like $600 watches or knives sitting on my dresser right now, because I didn't bring them over. Of all of them, this is the one. This $270 Zero Tolerance 0545.
Andrew Zero Tolerance 0545.
Everett For backpacking, I mean, if you're, for backpacking and you want to have, like if the bug out is something that you're interested in, but you don't like the stigma or whatever, whatever.
Andrew Don't like the the handle shape of the bug out.
Everett I don't mind it at all. In fact, I love this bug out So it's not as it's not as comfortable as the Osborne I maybe agree with you on that the Osborne is a special knife. It's just super comfortable But but the Benchmade is probably an ounce lighter I Personally like the blade shape better on the bug out than I do on the Osborne.
Andrew I don't like the kind of goat foot Osborne blade shape
Everett I mean, the Bugout is one of the most popular knives in the world for a reason.
Andrew And the Osborne's also a runner-up for a reason.
Everett That's right. These are both great knives. There's no doubt about it.
Andrew But you go to Benchmade's custom knife maker site and the first two knives available are the Osborne and the Bugout.
Everett That's right. Or blade HQ or whatever. Yeah. Right. These, these knives have just sold millions. And you know, like I said, this isn't for everything. This isn't for every task. You know, I've got a Spyderco Shaman here that it for a big beefy knife, probably my favorite. Um, this isn't for every task, but for my,
Andrew Every tool has a job.
Everett That's right for my Average for your day every day carry. Yeah use case this knife is just I just can't imagine anything ever beating it well, which is a silly thing to say I realized that but today for now yeah for now this thing i i mean so if you if you like knives you maybe have seen this knife but kind of disregarded it give it a look this thing is crazy good it's and the blade the 272 right now from zero tolerance super slicey super slicey blade i mean this thing's just terrific like if you want the best backpacking knife that you could possibly buy For me, I think this is it. Unless you're doing like hard backpacking. Like, this isn't the knife that you get to... What do you call it when you hit the knife with a piece of wood?
Andrew Yeah, you're not hammering with it.
Everett That's right. That's not...
Andrew This is a really specific everyday carry. Oh, I need a knife really quick.
Everett Yes, knife. That's right. So maybe also have a big fixed blade. Yeah. If, you know, for doing like more like wood chopping or whatever, but this thing for everything else, for food prep, I've used this thing for real life food prep and it's perfect. Perfect.
Andrew like it.
Everett That's all. All right. Uh, Andrew, we're here. We're at the end. We made a long episode. Anything else you want to add before we go? I'm out of things. Hey, Hey you guys, thanks for joining us for this episode of 40 and 20, the watch clicker podcast. Do me a favor, go to our website, watch clicker.com. That's where we post articles and words and pictures. If you'd like to follow us on social media, you can do that on Instagram at 40 and 20 underscore watch clicker or at WatchClicker, and that's where we post more photos and occasionally announcements about what we're doing on the website or on the podcast. If you would like to support us, and oh boy, we hope you do, the way you do that is you go to Patreon, patreon.com slash 40 and 20, and that is how we get the money to keep this thing going. And a lot of you support us already, and we thank you. And if you don't, think about it. A couple bucks here or there goes a really long way. People come, people go. But that is how we keep the wheels turning on this bus. And don't forget to tune back in next Tuesday for another hour of watches, food, drinks, life, and other things we like. Buh-bye.