There are as many different reasons to buy watches as there are wearers, and today I'd like to talk about a personal motivator: engineering. Being an engineer myself, I appreciate and savor the work required to find an innovative and elegant solution to a problem, particularly in field of materials science.

So how does this related to Sinn? Sinn is a German company making watches with Swiss (ETA) movements, and their engineering is simply superb. I've chosen three of their watches to talk about, and I think that by the end of this article, you will agree that Sinn engineering is indeed something special.

The Sinn UX

First off is the Sinn UX, a seemingly standard looking quartz diver's watch with some decidedly non-standard features. Made of steel designed for submarines, and further toughened by a process called tegimenting, it sports a sapphire crystal with super-hard anti-reflective coating and 7-year battery. But that's just the beginning. The case and dial are filled with silicone oil which, having the same refractive index as the sapphire, removes reflections and makes the dial visible from all angles and avoids the underwater "mirror effect". Sinn had to use quartz here because no mechanical movement can function while immersed in oil.

But the silicon oil isn't just for visibility. In conjunction with the construction of the case, and a special gasket system, the oil allows the watch to withstand enormous pressure. For the sake of comparison, a Rolex Submariner is rated for 200-400 meters (about 650 to 1,300 feet) of depth, depending on when it was made, and a Rolex Sea-Dweller is guaranteed to 1,200 meters (about 4,000 feet). Pretty impressive. But the Sinn UX is rated to 12,000 meters or almost 40,000 feet! Or, put another way, slightly deeper than the deepest known part of the ocean. Of course, the movement will stop working around 5,000 meters, but at that depth, you have more to worry about than telling the time.

Last month, I had the opportunity to interview John Patterson, the owner and founder of Bathys Watch Company. This month, I had the privilege of reviewing their best selling automatic timepiece: The Bathys 100 Fathom.

The Head

The head of this watch is by far the selling point. It is fantastically well finished. The crystal is sapphire, slightly domed, and has an antireflection coating which glows blue in flashes of light. The real pièce de résistance is the ruthenium grey dial which has many subtle tones and is quite iridescent, flashing grey and brown. Although this is not the most popular 100 Fathom model (the black on black is their best seller), this dial is truly unique and like nothing I have seen on another watch. The markers on the dial as well as the hands are covered in superluminova, a paint that glows brightly in the dark. I wore the watch to "Live Free and Die Hard" and I can attest to its very capable luminosity which easily lasted the duration of the film. And then there's the stainless steel, black PVD-coated case which somehow both gives the watch a stealth appeal, and actually makes it stand out more than any of my more shiny watches. The PVD makes it scratch resistant and adds to the overall depth and quality of the piece. The caseback is also PVD-coated, and is engraved with a map of the Hawaiian islands. The watch is water resistant to 200 meters (about 660 feet, or roughly 100 fathoms, naturally), and is known to be very reliable in an aquatic environment as it was designed for divers and surfers.

One unfortunate fact of life for those of use who like Japanese watches is that the most interesting models are often only sold in Japan. There are internet resellers of Japanese models, but you've then got warranty difficulties if service is ever required, as the domestic service centers will require you to ship the watch back to Japan.

I bring this up because of the wonderful Citizen PMT56-2711 from the Promaster line. This particular watch is no longer in production (though it's still available here and there if you look hard enough), and has been superseded by models adding radio synchronization and such (like the new Citizen Attesa). It's an analog quartz watch, solar-powered, with a blue face and titanium case, and there's something very elegant in its simplicity.

Things I like about this watch:

• Surface-hardened titanium case and band, trade name "Duratect". Almost impossible to scratch, and with the brushed finish, it yields a subtle, low-key metal that's quite attractive.
• Domed sapphire crystal. Again, almost impossible to scratch. The interior has an anti-glare coating, which reduces reflections. The doming also reduces reflections and makes it easier to read under water.
• Perpetual calendar. Although this makes for an involved setting procedure, it's nice not to have to worry about resetting the date at the end of some months.
• Eco-Drive. This is Citizen's solar power technology. The face of the watch is a solar cell with a subtle hexagonal pattern that also serves to add visual detail to the dial. The battery on this one is good for five years, so even if you forget it in a drawer, you're unlikely to need to reset it!
• 200m water resistant (about 650 feet). Several people use this watch for SCUBA diving; it's more than enough for any use you're likely to have.
• Travel friendly. Unlike most watches, you can change the hour without stopping the watch. This is fantastic when traveling. You pull out the crown, press the button while rotating the stem, and the hour advances. I used this when going from the west coast to South America, and I can testify to its usefulness. With other watches, more than once I've set the local time wrong due to jet lag haze. Also nice for accuracy fans, since the seconds and minutes are not affected.
• Power saving modes. This adds some personality to the watch, and makes it fun to interact with. After a minute or two of darkness, the second hand stops at 12 and stays there until light returns. Meanwhile, the minute and hour hands continue to display the correct time. If light remains off for three days, all the hands stop, only to spin to the correct time when you take it out of the drawer. These makes the watch seem a bit more alive -- more than once, I extend my arm and watched the second hand wake up from falling asleep under my coat. The watch will warn you if the battery was depleted far enough that it lost time.
• Luminosity. The face has large, clear markers with Luminova on them, making it easy to read at night. The second hand is not lumed, instead having a painted red tip. Perhaps they left the lume off the second hand due to the power saving feature above (you only need lume in the dark, and in the dark, the second hand doesn't move), but either way I rarely need to see seconds in the dark, anyway.
• Readability. The face is a mixture of military style numbers (sans-serif, upright and distinct) with an aviator-style inverted triangle at the 12 o'clock position. The hands are simple white with clean lines and contrast nicely against the blue dial. These, combined with the domed crystal, make for a watch that can be read at a glance at a wide range of angles. Day or night, no problem. The red-tipped second hand is a nice touch, too.
• Weight and size. The combination of 40mm size and titanium makes this watch seem quite light when you pick it up. I've been wearing a much heavier steel watch, but once I adapted, I quite like the reduction in mass. You just don't notice wearing it at all, even on the matching metal (titanium) bracelet.
• The blue of the dial is gorgeous and unobtrusive. They put the minute markers on the chapter ring, so there's a nice balance of empty space and text.

Citizen has just released a new limited watch in their Japan-only Attesa line: the Perfex Multi 3000 20th Anniversary Limited Edition, an atomic Eco-Drive powerhouse that manages to look semi-dressy while still packing in the features:

• Worldwide atomic receiver (works in Japan, US, and in Europe).
• Eco-Drive (Citizen's term for solar powered), with an astounding 2.5 year power reserve.
• Second time zone LCD and an analog UTC subdial.
• 99-minute countdown timer.
• Stopwatch with a resolution of 1/100th of a second and a maximum duration of 24 hours.
• Integrated bracelet (nice enough, but a minor negative for those of us who like to switch to a strap occasionally).
• Two world time alarms.
• Titanium case and bracelet with DLC coating (diamond-like carbon — very scratch-resistant).
• Synthetic sapphire crystal with antireflective coating.
• LED backlight.
• Battery charge indicator.
• Water resistant to 100 meters, or about 330 feet.

The Citizen Attesa Perfex Multi 3000 is 41mm in diameter which is a nice contemporary size without being too large. It's 12.6mm thick, and 102g in weight. The ATV53-2832 goes for ¥115,500, or about $944.

I consider the Attesa line to be in competition with Oceanus watches from Casio and the Seiko Brightz World Time. These are superb watches if you travel frequently as they are maintenance-free (Eco-Drive), extremely accurate (world-wide atomic), and they make it very easy to switch between time zones. The Citizen Attesa even makes a decent dress watch, though the LED display would probably bar them from the most formal settings.

By Paul Hubbard