c.69 Halfhunter: Is that possible?

c.69 is normally a calibre of lepine watches. In the IWC archives there are c.69 savonettes from 1897 with the description 159901-160200 Sav.c.69, 18 Lig. Mod. 1894. I am not sure, whether anybody has seen one of these savonettes.
All other c.69 watches are lepines.
The watch I show is built in 1903, movemment Nr. 289627, in the archive that should be a lepine, but as you can see it is a (half)savonette, probablay withw a hidden second-hand. It is a Peerless case, the movement has 16 Lig.
I have discussed that watch with Ralph E., he is sure that it is unique c.69. I wonder what the forum means?!

Hans

Hi, nice watch!

In the picture of the movement you can see that the wheel that drives the escape wheel is opposite the winding stem. This is normally the wheel that the seconds hand is mounted on, it usually turns once per minute.

So my guess is that this is a lepine movement that has been turned 90 degrees to fit in a half-hunter case.

Best regards,

Henrik

Hallo Hans-Georg,
Another interesting half Hunter, thanks for posting.
In the previous thread Ralph E. stated there was no need for a small second at 6 o'clock as the half hunter case was hiding most of it. Nevertheless in most half hunters there is a small second as you also show in the previous series.
There is not one reason to doubt the expertise of Ralph E. so I think he is right in assuming that this is a fairly unique half hunter savonette and I guess it was meant to be a half hunter from the start as the small second is lacking. The fact that the archives suggests that 300 of those watches should be around does not mean so much. There are more planned series documented in the archives but which never have been built.
Kind regards,
Adrian,
(alwaysiwc).

I did not make myself totally clear, I do believe that this watch was originally made as a half-hunter, but with a movement originally designed to be in an open-face case.

Henrik

Absolutely agree Henrik.
Already from the start IWC strived to make watches from which movement parts or even complete movements could be exchanged between different models or Lepines which could become Savonettes and the way around.
Kind regards,
Adrian,
(alwaysiwc).

The Lepine c.69 was an smaller and flatter movement the c.66 (H7 1903 or H6.5 1906), the correct option to build a (half) hunter.

But there was no Sav. version of the c.69 16" H5 (built 1897-1906) The possible flatter movement the c.74 was released 8 years later 1913.

I normally am very sceptic (see some other posts) for odd configurations of watches (sidewinder etc.)

But this time I am more than 95% shure this watch was originally built as ultra flat half huter. I am mostly shure there could also be few numbers of hunter watches built with the c.69.

regards

watch77

Hello Ralph,
But is it not so that the difference between a hunter and a half hunter or to phrase it otherwise savonette and half savonette is only the centric hole in the middle of the lid that covers the watch crystal ?
I mean, the structure and configuration of the movement and the position of the crown is not different between a savonette and a half savonette or am I wrong?
Kind regards,
Adrian,
(alwaysiwc).

Yes, hunter and half hunter watches, uses the same movement, a hunter movement (Savonette).

The difference between the Lepine (open face) and the Savononette (hunter, and half hunter) is the only position of the second hand.
For Lepine it is opposite the winding crown (straight line between crown and seconds hand), for the Savonette, looking from the front normally the second hand is in a right angle to the right of the line crown to centre (like most of the every wrist watches with no centre but small seconds).
This seems to be a very simple difference but in the for the c.52 in beginning it was +/- mirroring the movement, after 1904 it was just a +/- a rotation of the movement (just exchanging crown and barrel)

Regards

watch77

Half hunters is indeed a very interesting motif for a collection of IWC pocket watches.
Collectors of IWC vintage watches with their diverse interests, help keep a record of IWC history. Well done Hans. Thanks for sharing.