VIRTUAL POCKET WATCH MUSEUM DAY 17, cal 58 half hunter Niello

Quote: nothing fancy, just a good proper workhorse".

Well, there is a saying "Beauty and the Beast" and the pocket watch I will
share with you today to compliment Tonny's opulent ( amply or plentifully
provided or fashioned often to the point of ostentation ) example of a
Cal.58 is at the other end of the spectrum. A true beast of a workhorse -
nothing fancy, certainly not overdressed, rather simply build to do the job.

The Watch

This watch was sold on the 19th of August 1921 to Revello in Montevideo,
Uruguay.

As a point of interest, and more visible here on my picture above is the
actual lever used when setting the time. This can be seen protruding out the
case between the 4 and 5 hour markers. These watches are known as Lever
Set and unlike most other IWC 's which were either PIN SET or Crown set,
these Calibre 58 movements are not set by depressing a pin or pulling out the
winding crown. Lever -setting was a feature of higher quality (often
railroad-grade) pocket watches that was intended to prevent them from
being accidentally reset to an incorrect time.

The case too, is simple.

The Movement

The movement here, as is Tonny's example is very plain bearing little sign of
any attempt to adorn the plates and bridges with any engravings, perlage or
geneve striping.

BUT HERE IS SOMETHING REALLY INTERESTING. So I need to do a side by side to
show you.

Here below is my Cal. 58 on the left and Tonny's C.58 on the right.

SPOT THE DIFFERENCE

Now, I know for sure that my movement is Cal. 58 HC release of this calibre,
and the IWC documentation reflects this.

But Tonny's watch is of an older generation (significantly older) - so, what
gives here? How did we go from the 1898 catalog image of a Cal. 58 Savonette
to the 1920 version?

Oh, and in case you think Tonny's is not real....this marriage wwatch
(sacrilage) below is also a Cal. 58 Sav.

Beautiful case decorations Tonny, I love lever set watches.

I can't wait to see what detective MarkL has in store with his watch......

Very nice explanation and examples of cal.58, gentlemen.

Adrian,

(alwaysiwc).

I guess that the nomenclature of the IWC movements is a tough subject that I
did not want to bring up once again.

The absolute expert on this is Ralph Ehrismann. The calibre order as we know
it today was only made up in 1921, more than 50 years after IWC had been
founded. Before that numerous names were used to describe an IWC movement. A
few examples : Calibre 'Boston', 'Elgin', 'Schaffhouse', 'calibre a pilliers'
etc. In the reference book Toelke and King, not less than 4 in house produced
IWC calibres were classified as Elgin III. In 1921 these 4 received a proper
calibre nr. : cal. 47, 48, 49 and 50. These calibres are in fact all
foreruners of calibre 52. On auction sites they are still offered as Elgin III
or 52, while they are forerunners of 52 and have nothing to do with Elgin.
IWC experimented with the concept of the three quarter plate movements and
from 1890 onwards it became clear that calibre 52/53 would become the ultimate
winner. However, some of the earlier models remained in production for a long
time, as Mark's watch proves.

Ralph Ehrismann, David Seyffer and myself wrote an article on the topic that
has been published In Horological Journal, August 2014.

Regards,

Adrian,

(alwaysiwc).

And there you have it folks !

Adrian, many thanks for agreeing to "come out of hiding" and raise the
discussion again as you have done here. From this, we all learn and it's
exactly this knowledge that draws me to the deep heritage of IWC and these
pocket watches.

Dear Tonny

Thany you for posting this exceptional watch, the calibre 58 the savonett
sister of the caliber Schaffhausen. The lepine version of the caliber
Schaffhausen ist the c.55. Why the "pair" is c.55/c.58 is a miracle. Normally
the movement pairs have consecutive numbers. c.52/c.53; c.32/c33; c.97/c.98
and many others.

Your pictures show an exceptional movement in an exceptional case. very nice.

I only have "few" pocket watches (1st of april -> some) in my collection; but
exceptional pieces as the showare are rare.

Here a sister of the c.58, the c.62 Unitas.It ist basically the same movement
(later version with a different shape of the plate) but with an additional
small plate (called "porte chaton")

Kind regards watch77

Many of us by now probably know/are aware, that the H designation shown
in the earlier manuals and as sometime found back on the actual movements,
designate the physical height in _mm _of the specific Calibre.

Can you please explain to us what the circled OF & the HC stand for
?

I am not 100 % sure, but note that the description is in English.

Therefore OF could mean Open Face for Lepine and HC Hunter Case for Savonette.

The height of the calibre in mm. is normally printed as H6 or H6,5 .

For calibre 52/53 there were 8 models and 2 forerunners.

In the classification of 1921 they are depicted as follows :

Cal. Elgin III, forerunner ( 1886-1888, old classification)

Cal 'IWC' forerunner (1888-1893, old classification)

Cal. 52 Model 1890, H7 (old classifiation)

Cal.52 Model 1893, H7

Cal.52 Model 1904, H6,5

Cal.52 Model 1904 , H6

Cal.52 Model 1907, H6

Cal.52 Model 1907, a Tirette ( pull crown)

Cal.52 Model 1907, H5,2

Cal.52 S.C. modification centre seconds.

Over time, the movements became slimmer, demanded by fashion.

Regards,

Adrian,

(alwaysiwc).

I'm 100% sure Adrian: OF is Open Face = Lepine, HC is Hunter Case =
Savonnette.

By the way:

(a) The calibre designation 52/53/54, 55/56(58), 57/58(56), 63/64, 65/66,
71/72 was introduced in the mid 1890s. For about a decade the legders show
alternating the old names like Schaffhausen, IWC and Lutetia or the respective
calibre numbers. From about 1905 onwards only the numbers were used. In about
1921 someone in the service department has drawn up that calibre list with 17
Jones Calibres, 9 Seeland Calibres, the early Rauschenbach calibres 28 to 51
and the well known Calibres 52 subsequent. But in fact regarding the younger
calibres he wrote only down, what was daily usage for nearly 30 years and the
value of the list is in the numbering of the old calibres produced prior to
1890.

(b) Add the Cal. 52 H5, the Cal. 73/74/77 H4, the Cal. 97/98 H 4 and the Cal.
95 H3 to your list of heights (I'm not sure about the height of the different
ladies calibres).

Th. Koenig

Indeed valuable information.

For those new to the forum, I share here a particulary nice example of a Cal.
57 H5 movement (see red circled H5)

We dont often see Cal. 57 which are nickel plated and finished with Cote de
Geneve stripping like this one.

This watch was sold on the 22nd of November 1927 to Beyer in Zurich.