Accutron 214 Astronaut

[Canuck]

Who knew?

 

[Foo2rama]

I did.. but the definition of space is up to debate civilian x15 pilots like... Niel Armstrong did not get space flight credit for decades while the USAF pilots did because the USAF has a different definition of space then the rest of the world.

Cool watches though.

 

[SpeedyPhill]

@Canuck
The hands on the Accutron in the video are wrong... X-15 test pilots got the version shown in the photo You posted...
The X-15 hypersonic program was very interesting & fascinating to say the least and also saw the first Rolex in space as William Pete Knight passed 85 kilometers altitude (50 miles) which was consider space to obtain USAF wings... wearing his Rolex GMT
( Officially the FAI considers the Jarman line at 100 kilometers altitude the boundary of space)

@Foo2rama
Neil Armstrong made a total of 7 flights in the X-15 before joining the 2nd group of the NASA astronauts corps in 1962
During these test flights he never flew above 50 miles ( Highest altitude for Armstrong was 63 kilometers )

For those interested ... More photos & info at : https://wristwatchlover.tumblr.com/archive

 

[Foo2rama]

SpeedyPhill

@Canuck
The hands on the Accutron in the video are wrong... X-15 test pilots got the version shown in the photo You posted...
The X-15 hypersonic program was very interesting & fascinating to say the least and also saw the first Rolex in space as William Pete Knight passed 85 kilometers altitude (50 miles) which was consider space to obtain USAF wings... wearing his Rolex GMT
( Officially the FAI considers the Jarman line at 100 kilometers altitude the boundary of space)

@Foo2rama
Neil Armstrong made a total of 7 flights in the X-15 before joining the 2nd group of the NASA astronauts corps in 1962
During these test flights he never flew above 50 miles ( Highest altitude for Armstrong was 63 kilometers )

For those interested ... More photos & info at : https://wristwatchlover.tumblr.com/archive

13 flights by eight pilots met the Air Force spaceflight criterion by exceeding the altitude of 50 miles (80 km), thus qualifying these pilots as being astronauts. The Air Force pilots qualified for astronaut wings immediately, while the civilian pilots were eventually awarded NASA astronaut wings in 2005, 35 years after the last X-15 flight. The only Navy pilot in the X-15 program never took the aircraft above the requisite 50 mile (80 km) altitude and thus never earned astronaut wings

I thought Neil had the hieght. There is still the question “is that space?”

 

[SpeedyPhill]

The X-15 program ended 50 years ago (October 1968) as the 200th flight was cancelled... great the story still gets told from time-to-time !

 

[Waltesefalcon]

Even after the Astronaut lost out to the Speedmaster during the Gemini trials Apollo used Accutrons for the clocks onboard the Command Modules.

 

[SpeedyPhill]

Of course ... Veteran astronaut David Scott even requested a personal mechanical Bulova chronograph and a Bulova stopwatch he took & used aboard the Apollo 15 mission in August 1971. Both of these time pieces have been auctioned since...
.

 

[connieseamaster]

Waltesefalcon

Even after the Astronaut lost out to the Speedmaster during the Gemini trials Apollo used Accutrons for the clocks onboard the Command Modules.

IIRC, Omar Bradley was the chairman of Bulova through the early space era, which probably helped Bulova's position

 

[SpeedyPhill]

American instruments in US built spacecraft...

 

[connieseamaster]

It's not like "Buy America" was a thing yet, and arguably Hamilton was more skilled at navigating military contracts and procurement (H21/H22/etc).

 

[Canuck]

connieseamaster

It's not like "Buy America" was a thing yet, and arguably Hamilton was more skilled at navigating military contracts and procurement (H21/H22/etc).

But if NASA had chosen Hamilton Electric watches,...................! I don’t want to think about it.

 

[SpeedyPhill]

@Canuck
Last such Bulova watch to flew in space was an Accutron "Astronaut" tuning fork watch at the wrist of astronaut/physician Norman Thagard aboard space shuttle Challenger missions STS-7 in June 1983...
Exactly as Mercury astronaut Gordon Cooper did in May 1963( Speedmaster on left wrist, Accutron on the right wrist )
.

 

[SpeedyPhill]

After an e-mail on the subject of the Bulova worn by the first astronauts/test-pilots I'm coming back with a few details taken from official NASA photos, showing exactly which Accutron Astronaut tuning fork wrist watch astronaut Leroy "Gordo" Cooper was wearing...
It was clearly a two line dial version ( Accutron Astronaut ) with thin pointy hands and the characteristic 24-hours bezel... on a steel mesh bracelet ( Komfit-Forstner, later Jacoby Bender Champion )
. 📖
.

 

[bobbee]

Here are the first steel Accutron Astronaut ads from 1962. They show pear hands, and if you zoom in they are skeleton pear hands. The dial says only 'Accutron' and has no 'pips' between the hour markers like later models.






Here is a made up example, that was sold as genuine back in 2016. The buyer took it apart and found the dial was fake, and the hands were blued railroad hands that had been painted, instead of plain steel.


View attachment 707418

Edited: Feb 11, 2019

 

[Uscjake87]

There are other early variations of the 1962 astro dial. I picked this one up recently.

 

[ac106]

bobbee

Here are the first steel Accutron Astronaut ads from 1962. They show pear hands, and if you zoom in they are skeleton pear hands. The dial says only 'Accutron' and has no 'pips' between the hour markers like later models.






Here is a made up example, that was sold as genuine back in 2016. The buyer took it apart and found the dial was fake, and the hands were blued railroad hands that had been painted, instead of plain steel.


View attachment 707418

I can't be 100% sure of the details but I think I remember this watch on the Watchtalk Accutron forum. A banned member "accutronitis" put it together and then later claimed it was original. I think the original thread was deleted or edited because I couldn't find it at the time but I clearly remember him acquiring the dial separately. Could totally be a different guy with this watch however.

 

[bobbee]

Uscjake87

Oh boy. Don't mention him please. It's like conjuring up beetle-juice when you say his name. He is a very knowledgeable guy on Astronauts, but from everything I have heard is that his "early astro" watch was advertised as being owned by an X-15 pilot when it wasn't. Lots of rumors about that sale and how he had to refund the money to the collector. As far as it being a fake dial, it's entirely possible it was faked but "bobbee" is frequently found doing back and forth banter with Accutronitis on about 5 or 6 different websites about this. Both of them get banned as a result of their arguments which have spanned any decent thread on astronauts. A re-dialer company could take the simple silver dial seen in this thread and re-dial it to any color and text arrangement, so the prospect of faking the dial without the astronaut text at the bottom is very easy. You would need to check the date codes on the back of the dial like I posted to see if it's original or not. On his own website he talks about getting the lume updated on a different M2 astronaut with luminous markers at a re-dialer and he basically destroyed any originality in that watch. I personally haven't seen any other astronauts with the white spade hands on google images or any other source except for his watch, so that makes me question if any exist or if it was a demo model only for the advertisements.

Regarding the dial, other vintage examples have been seen with just 'ACCUTRON' below 12 o'clock. The only trouble is, all of them had lumed hour markers.
Here are a few examples.








The faked example uses one of this type, but with the radium lume removed to expose the white markers beneath.
See this close-up of the 'faked' dial, where the discoloration caused by the radium has left a slight yellowing to the markers, with a lighter edging.



View attachment 716578



Note also in the above photo from the owners photobucket account how the dial is ill-fitting, and has slipped out from beneath the rehaut despite a brass spacer having been fitted.

Regards, Bob.

Edited by a mod: Jun 26, 2019

 

[bobbee]

Uscjake87

There are other early variations of the 1962 astro dial. I picked this one up recently.

This is in really good condition. I have seen a couple of these before, but I would say still pretty rare.

 

[bobbee]

Uscjake87

Bob,

I don't disagree with your assessment that he cobbled it together. If you gotta paint the hands to make it look like the ad, then you are trying too hard to reproduce something. Nothing of that age should look that crisp and new unless it is redialed. I have not seen ANY examples in the wild that show this so called gen 1 astro with spade hands. I would like to be proven wrong though. Astronaut watches were certainly produced in 1962, but I agree that they all had luminous markers and said "Accutron" or in my unusual one that says "Accutron - Bulova". I wish collectors would appear and start showing early astros with white spade hands, but I doubt it.

I do find it strange that you feel compelled to interrupt a lot of posts about accutron astronauts to discuss his watch. I get that you want to educate the public that this person does unscrupulous things with watches, but it is borderline internet stalking. If he starts trying to cobble more of them together and swindle people, then yeah, educate everyone. If you went to every thread on a particular Omega reference and constantly posted an old re-dial to bash some other guy, you would be banned in a heartbeat. Get over it.

Why do you feel the need to keep bashing me? What did I ever do to you?

 

[Canuck]

bobbee

Why do you feel the need to keep bashing me? What did I ever do to you?

Perhaps because every time you stir the merde, it stinks. Use Google translations if you must.