Chronographs classified as Chronometres.

Not sure if this HPC dial has been captured in this thread before....

Nice catch. Any idea of the serial?

caseback and mvmt missing so not a lot of help. But I don’t think someone faked the dial 😁

Too bad ( for my database that is)

Menta Watches has just posted this Tri Compax 122100 with a H.P.C. dial on IG. Serial looks like 1666585 @Mark020 but its not super legible to me. I’ll leave it with you. No movement photograph at the moment, sadly.

Apparently the watch came out of Brazil but has a Spanish inscription on the case back. Spanish is, of course, spoken in neighbouring Venezuela and Henrique Pfeffer Caracas was, of course, based in the capital there. Flimsier evidence you’ll be hard pressed to find but I’ve always liked Ben’s theory and these wild conclusions at least fit with it.

Here is another interesting watch for the thread. It is posted with the collector's kind permission.


Credit to IG user yygall_watches

The serial dates this watch to around 1950. The owner of this piece has no additional information regarding the H.P.C. branding. She was told that H.P.C. stood for 'High Precision Chronometre' when she purchased the watch but did add that she has never been able to substantiate this claim. The current OF consensus view after these seven pages seems to have moved away from this oft-repeated explanation cited in Sala.

This is also the first example of H.P.C. branding I can recall seeing on a UG ladies watch dial. It is yet another time-only piece where we see this stamp appear. I would be very surprised if two versions of this niche model were available at the time for purchase (a 'standard' version and this 'H.P.C.' upgrade with superior materials and/or a slightly more accurate movement) but I accept that it is possible.

I am struck again by the relative scarcity of these H.P.C. signed dials, which nevertheless make cameos across a wide spectrum of UG models when they do occur, and also by the length of time in which they seem to have been available. For me, purely speculating and without the contemporary promotional material that we all so desperately desire, the sparse sample data still leans more towards a retailer-branding distribution (ie a few random UG models ordered each year, male and female, over a decade-plus, from the same shop, carrying the same stamp), rather than a coherent UG 'premium' marketing strategy at the factory level, for which there seems to be so little surviving evidence in the archives, or even within the very cases of these seldom-seen watches themselves.

Very interesting. What movement does it have and is it numbered?

I could make very good educated guesses at those two questions but I shall ask the owner and see what she says.

Me too 😁

I wish we could crack this. We need more info/examples. I’m not crazy on the HPC being double signature for reasons already discussed, but additionally because I would expect those examples to come with some double branded materials like a box, papers, etc, which we have never seen.

I’m slightly warmer on the certificate of high precision theory, but again we’ve never seen any examples of such a certificate paired with an HPC watch, the previous examples were for chronometers.

so without more info, not sure what to say. Keep looking I guess.

Anyone who has a clue (or know where to find) the number of officially chronometer certified UG’s between day 1935 and 1945?

good point to remember, this thread isn't even about HPC ! As the title suggests its about Chronograph Chronometres, which as I understand it, is a completely separate unresolved issue? I don't think we have any accepted examples, so I'm not sure how the OP could provide a photo.

although I do find the wording in that original advert pretty weird, they list the cal 128 and 129 specifically, then all chronographs, then all automatics?! very odd way of stating something.

Are we ever going to figure it out? We need some UG marketing materials with definitive answers.