I can think of many examples of different classes in technology - we have
classes of racecars, classes of yachts, etc. The problem is that our
technology has extended so far that you can't have a race where, as in the
earliest days, you just say "show up and whoever has the best (fastest) car
regardless of technology wins." You'd have cars with turbojets going 400
mph and the crashes would be awesome. Instead, the rulebooks for the
different classes of auto racing are a foot thick and make the COSC rules
simple by comparison.
As you say, they had no choice but to either bifurcate the standard or give
up on mechanical watches altogether. Don't think that they didn't seriously
consider the latter - remember that there was a mass extinction of Swiss
watch manufacturers at the time of the quartz introduction. Pure logic would
dictate that the mechanical watch would join the hand cranked adding machine
and the vacuum tube radio in the dustbin of history. This is what usually
happens when a superior technology arrives and most people thought this is
where the watch industry was headed. Basically the survival of the
mechanical chronometer (and perhaps the Swiss mechanical watch in general)
can be credited (for better or for worse) to one manufacturer: Rolex, who to
this day accounts for maybe 90% of the COSC certified watches sold. Whether
out of innate conservatism or brilliant marketing insight, they stuck with
the mechanical watch when all others thought that the handwriting was on the
wall. When the smoke cleared and they were still standing (not only standing
but thriving), others realized that maybe there was a still niche for
mechanical watches after all.
Although I'm not prepared to shell out for a worthless chronometer
certificate and less still for the premium that Rolex charges for its
watches, I'm glad that Rolex took the path that it did and that we can still
buy mechanical watches.
Of course you are right that the split standard means that a COSC mechanical
certificate no longer means that the watch you are buying is the "best" in
any absolute sense, only the best in a very constrained artificial category
(like best marathon time in a wheelchair). As someone else said, joining up
another thread, a true best and something worth of the modern title of
"chronometer" would be something like a wristwatch atomic watch (a true
independent timekeeper, not a RC watch which is a "slave clock"). But we
are used to making distinctions like this in the modern world if only
because the absolutes we have reached are so extreme and so useless at the
same time - while astronauts orbit at 20,000 mph, we still speak of the
"fastest plane".
Watch certificates (and even observatory trials) were always about bragging
rights and marketing driven, but they meant something too. In a day when it
was not unusual for lower grade mechanical watches to be off by 30 seconds
or more A DAY, there was a real need and advantage to owning a watch that
did 30 seconds a week (especially if your job was time critical, e.g RR
locomotive driver). Today, higher precision in a wristwatch is more or less
bragging rights only - what practical difference does it make if your
wristwatch does 30 seconds a year or 20? Though there are lots of
applications that depend on even higher precision (e.g. co-ordinating the
waveforms of the powergrid, where a fraction of 1/60th of a second puts you
out of phase) these are not handled by wristwatches. So you have a paradox -
watches became more precise and less critical at the same time. So now we
can glory in their magnificent "worthlessness". There is nothing wrong with
that - Faberge eggs are worthless too, as are Calder mobiles, etc.
Post by John S.Two different classes of watches??? I don't know about one technology
having more class than the other. What I don't understand is why a
certification for accuracy is measured by two different standards.
I think it is safe to say that the battery powered IC controlled watch
was a huge improvement in watch technology for most people. In a 10
year span watches went from being something you had to tend every
morning to something that just kept running. All of a sudden battery
powered watches priced at $20.00 had made the COSC standard for
accuracy obsolete. For a few dollars watches could be made to perform
sophisticated chronograph functions, track multiple time zones and
store a perpetual calendar. Sophisticated features once found only in
the most expensive watches became available to all.
COSC had to develop a split standard for watch accuracy because their
single standard measured in seconds per day was eclipsed by a
fundamental shift in watch technology. If they didn't set a low
standard for mechanical watches and a much higher one for eletronic
watches they faced the possibility of certifying virtually all watches
as chronometers. That wouldn't bode well for sales of expensive
mechanical watches.
Having a seconds per day standard for mechanical watches is useful as
a reminder of where watch accuracy once was. Sort of like driving a
1950 Buick to experience how driving once was. But the Buick of 55
years ago like the mechanical chronometer has been eclipsed by
fundamental shifts in technology.
I do enjoy my Omega Chronometer watch with the understanding it is a
bit of an anachronism.
Post by Frank AdamPost by John S.And that's why COSC had to splut the chronometer standard...a low one
for mechanical watches and a much higher one for quartz timed watches.
If they held mechanical watches to the accuracy attainable by quartz
movements then Rolex would not be able to call their timepieces
superlative chronometers or even plain old chronometers. And that
would hurt sales.
They are two different classes of watches. Was Sugar Ray Leonard not
quite as much of a champion as Ali ?