A hand-me-down from my uncle's jewelry box we went through years ago, it has been tucked in my drawer since. It takes a 1.35v mercury battery, so I'm trying one of Wein's air cell batteries. This is an early '70s electronic (not quartz) Girard Perregaux ESA 9154 "Electronic".

I know it's not collectible or valuable, but thanks to the folks on here I found out about the Kong dog toy and could finally get the back open.

 

So far, my one and only.

 

Bought this a few days ago and it arrived this morning.



My first Girard Perregaux and I must say I am very impressed with the presence the watch has I can fully understand why it is considered a premium brand.

Previous to purchase this brand was not really on my radar for adding to my collection as I normally buy autos and this is not but now having one of these I might look for one in a later auto.

 

This arrived today. Very pleasantly surprised by it. I bought it on a bit of a whim having stumbled across the Gyromatic HF story. Says here they only made 662 of the movements and then cased them up in all sorts. Super-slim 34mm C-case, but wears bigger. Sorry for the terrible photo which doesn't show the nice vertical brushed finish on the dial. One of the last gasps of high accuracy mid-range mechanical movements before quartz, I read somewhere. This one dates from around '67, I think. Love to hear here from anyone else who has one of these.

 

All of this is perception. If, this Friday, Hodinkee writes that GP has been undervalued and the watch world has made a terrible error you would see them shoot up like a rocket. Each piece should be considered in its own right. There are two kinds of watch producers, those that make movements and case them and those that basically make cases & buy movements outside. There have been many of the latter who have produced very interesting, even spectacular watches. In my opinion, they are under appreciated and under valued.

In my opinion, the allure of a Rolex is that it’s expensive and pretty much instantly recognizable. This is what most watch purchases are really about; not unlike cars (and now that Hodinkee has hooked up with Leica, cameras too). Perfect example, go to Horinkee’s site and they have a nice little tool to remove spring bars for $199.00...it has their name on it. Go on eBay and that tool is $15.00....there is a lot in a name that doesn’t always translate to performance.

Carry on...

 

Very true, some things are famous for being famous with little real intrinsic value, I wouldn't go so far as to say Rolex is the Paris Hilton of watch collectors but it does ring true for many other "Branded" watches.

 

Have you regularly worn a Rolex for any length of time? I think it’s easy to fall into the idea that they’re popular purely based on branding, but I have to disagree. They simply work. They’re solid watches, well made, with timeless design (many of them) that are extremely rugged and can handle pretty much anything you throw at them with relative ease.

Much like a Porsche, there’s a reason why they’re popular and it’s not just the name. They’re simply a good product.

 

Just have the one, I'm afraid.

 

There are bucket loads of watches that meet all this criteria, yet are not Rolex and do not have the following Rolex does. Rolex have marketed the crap out of their products, which is the primary reason they have the place they do now in the watch world.

 

Is it underrated? Absolutely.

Perhaps decades ago it wasn’t high end, but everything can change (for example, LONGINES), isn’t it?

I really love some of the watches they made nowadays, like Laureato. And even if it is underrated, when you buy it at the correct price, you receive a lot of value for it.

This has just entered in the collection

 

I’ve got a Gay Freres GP bracelet incoming, and wondered if anyone here knows the model on which it would have originally come ? I’ve tried googling vintage ads and catalogues, as well as early seventies watches, but not spotted one fitted onto anything. In fact the only other one I can find is in an old timezone sales post. Any ideas?

https://forums.timezone.com/index.php?t=msg&th=2397732&rid=0

 

Foudroyante and rattrapante

 

So does a turtle two times older than me, serviced once and still beating, it works, it's a solid watch same as my neighbors VW Beetle. Marketing

 

great read on this fratello's article but somehow it failed to mention the cool feature of this GP observatory watch - pull out timepiece from the case.

https://www.fratellowatches.com/tbt...rYWcntQCv2ZJ1WogyzHwXyJt2fpz4F1erNOF4PtE#gref

 

This 1960s (?) watch due back from service today.

 

weren't the HF movts. a collaboration with FL, & others, based on an AS ebauche?

 

Girard-Perregaux revealed as Official Watch Partnership.

 

They are good watches but they are never as exquisite as truly high end brands, you can sort of tell when you see them in person.

 

As a Rolex owner, I agree they're a great quality product. However, I don't think my Rolex feels any more solid than my Seiko turtle at 1/10th the price (or less).

I think maybe other people's points, which I agree with, are that a lot (most) of the Rolex pricetag is not from the solid-ness, and certainly not from their hand crafting (there is basically none).

 

I agree with this sentiment.

I do wonder though, as someone else has also pointed out, if hodinkee posted an article tomorrow about GP, would our opinions here change?