Early Automatic Watches & other fascinating timepieces

Glycine fought hard during the early automatic quest and got its rightful place within the pioneers of self-winding watches. This particular model though is a later model from 1939. The model which was presented at New York's World Fair hermetic, shock and water resistant.Patent: CH149138

Incabloc shock protection was initially developed in 1929 in a more primitive form and took the shape of what we know now in 1935. Looking back in horology, Breguet used pare-chute system as shock protection in 18th century, so it's again a diversion from pocket-watches to wrist-watches .

In  1926, the famous "Harwood", the first industrially produced automatic wrist watch, leaves the factory of Blancpain, in Villeret. The movement for this watch was produced in small quantities for the French market. This is a 9k gold ( rose gold ) cased Harwood. Thanks to its British case-maker, it has city and date hallmarks. It's from 1928, London, cased by John Stockwell. Patent: CH106583 

The movement initially was mass produced by A.Schild. Distribution partner was Vogt from Fortis Watch Co. , later Blancpain also got a share of Harwood production and distribution. Harwoods with case-back time setting mechanism are made by Blancpain.

Within numerous invention attempts, one which has made it to production was this Rolls, invented by Leon Hatot in Jan 1930. Not many are available of this timepiece which could be an indicator of its production volume. Rolls has a particularly unusual automatic winding system in which the movement itself served as the oscillating weight. It is therefore accurate to say that the watch’s movement literally wound itself.  Mechanically, this was accomplished by imparting the motion - caused by  shaking the movement - onto a sliding arm guided by ball-bearing between two runners inside the case. 

Blancpain is involved after Harwood also in Rolls by signing an agreement with Léon Hatot on September 30,  1930. It gives Blancpain exclusivity for the production of watches with the  “ATO” system. Hatot S.A. reserved the right to manufacture 300 “Qualité de Genève”  (Patek Philippe quality) movements yearly.

Blancpain commits to manufacture good quality anchor movements. Later on the two companies agree to work together to further improve this movement for the “Rolls”.

All movements are clearly marked “Licence Hatot” or “ATO” on top or underneath the watch case. Also, all brochures, ads, catalogs and other printed articles mention at least once that the watch was produced under license.

Hatot receives at least 10 francs per manufactured movement, respectively 15 francs per 9 x 20 mm baguette movement To control manufacturing quantities, all movements are numbered. The partners target sales of approximately 15’000 pieces of the “Rolls” in Germany and another 40’000 in the USA. However, the watches are steeply priced: a wholesaler must pay 1600 francs for a gold watch and the lady’s model with the baguette movement costs 1750 francs. Consequently, despite the innovative nature of this new watch, it is not a commercial success.

Today these early automatic watches are very sought after as collectors pieces. Rolls Patent: CH156803. 

The signature trademark on Rolls watches most often was Blancpain. However, examples bearing the ATO name, which corresponds to the phonetic pronunciation of “Hatot” in French. In passing, it also is interesting to note that a certain number of Rolls wristwatches were produced by Walter Vogt and his Fortis Watch  Company – manufacturers notably of the Harwood and the Autowrist - for distribution outside those markets reserved exclusively for Blancpain.
 

John Harwood obviously didn't stop after inventing his Harwood Automatic, he initiated also this Autorist automatic which winds via its lugs. He also has a pendulum automatic watch patent (  CH177308  ) but I have not seen any of his pendulum aut. watches. Patent: CH156173 

Autorist, was being wound by one of the lugs movement. How much can a lug move any way? And the moving distance, a few mm. A very weak winding mechanism however very creative attempt.

Anything moving or moveable has been put to test to make it a self-winding mechanism. So was the idea with Wyler's invention.  This watch has kind of double case-back and a pin between them. When the outer unit touches the inner unit, the  pin winds the movement with kind of pump action. Ideally the watch should self-wind but what happened is that wearers had to finger tip their watch from the crystal up and down to wind it. Patent:  CH156804 

The hole on the movement is where the winding pin sits to activate the gears to store power in the barrel. Not that efficient, but survived to our timeline. Maybe due to its inefficiency ?

Leon Levy was a seasoned watchmaker and he invented this Pierce Cal 861, linear automatic. This mechanism winds only in one direction from 6 to 12 o'clock. There are two executions of Cal 861; center seconds and eccentric seconds. In this particular model, eccentric seconds, the crown just sets time and has no winding function like in early Glycines. Patent:  CH183727 

Even though the moveable track in the case looks short distance, Ronald Ranfft claims that it is more efficient than modern days ETA 2824:

quote/  With a two stage gear, a kind of saw actuating the first wheel, and a  click it is simpler than most rotor automatics. And 300 shaking cycles  of the 5.8g heavy weight are enough for 24 hours running. A modern ETA  2824-2 needs 650 revolutions of the 3.4g rotor for 24 hours, and  therefore can't guarantee more efficient winding / unquote ( http://www.ranfft.de/cgi-bin/bidfun-db.cgi?10&ranfft&&2uswk&Pierce_861_AUT )

Buren was a very innovative company. Apart from contributing to the first automatic chronograph, they have invented alarm watches, the micro-rotor and this fascinating movement Cal 525. Patent: CH331276 

Within many pendulum, side- winding, or jerk ( secousses ) self-winding offerings, this was another un-orthodox approach.

Hans Kocher, who was Buren's head designer and watchmaker has invented and registered the patent on Buren. Hans Kocher has stayed on board even after Hamilton acquired Buren in 1966. Patent:  CH331279 &  CH297476

Buren has manufactured several versions of this movement with and without seconds, with and without date function. Universal Watch Company got in trouble while trying to copy Buren's invention and were found guilty for patent infringement. Buren and UG later came to an agreement and UG had to pay a certain amount to Buren for each UG Polerouter manufactured.

At the Japanese front Citizen has also an interesting automatic watch from the '60s. It's mainly in Para 7 models aka autodater. Different versions exist for day/date configurations

Not like their Swiss distant cousins using a micro or half rotor, Citizen came up with a complete ring rotor. It has also a quick-set date by pulling out the crown. It's an elegant timepiece. Citizen group now owns the legendary company Angelus and has resurrected them.

This is a weird mechanism, I would understand it in the 1930s but '50s is a bit too late for still trying to diversify automatic mechanisms. Here the rotor touches the pin to wind the movement. Patent:  CH278649 

This mechanism is also called as impulse automatic. It's a difficult movement to spot and obtain.