LiP Watches

I'll ask my watchmaker that recommended this one in Hungary... I have no idea as I've been the owner of the Nautic Ski for lest than 6 months, i know the brevet epsa sc case numbers by hearth but have no clue to the workings of the electromechanical lip movements.

I work on the electrics (landeron and Lip) as a hobby so let me chime in - They are fairly straight forward but a different beast.

Depending on the issue, they can't be serviced without replacement parts. Most of the time, some previous person has thought there was a hair near the balance and grabbed it with their tweezers. But what they actually just pulled was the contact wire (like the Hamilton 500 movement, but smaller). And once those are destroyed, you need to install a new contact assembly.

The rest of the movement is more like a normal mechanical watch, serviceable by any watchmaker. Adjusting amplitude is done with a lever that moves the trigger point for the wires. So really, if the wires are still there, it can be serviced by any watchmaker who is comfortable.

No special machines or microscopes are needed like the Accutrons, there's no pawl indexing, and a normal timegrapher picks up the details just fine.

They really aren't that bad if you can get parts. Which is why I have a literal drawer of donors....

Landeron 4750 is the same, but better. Wires are like 50 times thicker and look like they are there on purpose, so they are almost never damaged.

Yes, but since we were talking about the Nautic Ski, I kept it relevant. Also the R50 didn't go very far. Mostly in women's watches and was technically a partner with ESA. So not a true in house movement like the 148/84

There are some funky/cool Lip models on Chrono24. NOS condition too.

https://www.chrono24.com/search/ind...=1954&year=1953&year=1952&year=1951&year=1950

I think you guys should hunt ebay.fr and ebay.it for them. There are deals to be had!

A few more Lips entered my collection lately. I added some older ones as well. All solid gold cases with a cal R 25:





And my favorite Lip pocket watch:

I’ve got a steel para-choc with gilt numerals. Very nice little watch for not much outlay.

Looks nice! I guess there is a cal R 25 inside. I like this typical Lip back: strong and nicely stamped with Lip’s symbol.

just for history. Lip is still very well known in France. I'm speaking about the brand that has a rich history. There were the first to use radium on dials. The idea was suggested by Marie Curie herself in 1904.
Lip as a traditionnal watchmaker went brankupt during th quartz crisis in the 70's. they use to produce mid end watches that were very popular and fewer higher end watches in gold somtimes with swiss movements. A bit like Hamilton in the US?
During the war, the germans confiscated the factory both because their bosses were jewish and it was considered as strategic for their war effort.
In the 70's when the company was about to shut down, after the direction decided to fire half the employees that were 2500, the workers decided to manage themselves the factory pushing the bosses out, (deciding that everyone in the factory had the same importance in production they decided to give the same wages to everyone) selling their watches directly at the door of the factory (see 3rd picture). Many people went to the factory to buy a watch in order to support the workers (my father did). .The moto of the wokers was "it's possible. we produce, we sell, we pay ourselves". they took posession of the stocks. The workers nickname was "the lips". The name LIP and nothing to do with a mouth or smile 😉, it's just a contraction of the founder's name Lipstein.
Eventullay, the goverment decided that this "leftist auto management" was a very bad and dangerous exemple and made everything to end the "experience", fearing it might spread to other companies. An agreement was eventually reached : a new boss was appointed against the keeping of the 2500 employees but the brand never recovered.

"Your boss needs you, you don't need your boss"



"against bosses and the police ; Workers control!



It's also important to note that LIP was amongst the very few brands that produced their haisprings in house.
The brand rebirthed in the 2001, assembling mainly miyota movements in Hong Kong. I hope that, like Yema they will aim at producing higher end watches with in house movement one day. Some models remain famous mainly in France among collectors (t18, Dauphine, Nautic ski, Roger Talon)

The design is cool. Miyota are no bad movements. Just that compared to the history of LIP, it's a little heartbreaking.
I like the titanium model very much.

Just a quick question……. When you take your Lip to the watchmaker do you get Lip service?