Watch Glossary: A to L

1

In quartz watches with a charging system (Kinetic, Kinetic Direct Drive, Eco-Drive, Tough Solar, Solar,...), this refers to the rechargeable battery that such a charging system incorporates in place of conventional batteries or button cells. They are usually made from a lithium-ion polymer (Li-ion), and, as is the case with the latest Seiko Kinetic accumulators, from a lithium-titanium-ion polymer. Although they don't require replacement, as with all batteries their efficiency decreases, requiring more time to charge from empty to full and reducing the runtime once fully charged and left unused. The estimated average life of the most modern accumulators is around 8 to 12 years, with the actual useful life usually exceeding that figure. Their replacement cost has dropped noticeably in recent years, although official technical services are required to carry out a full service on the caliber with every replacement, which increases the cost of that maintenance.

Even though the accumulator doesn't need replacing, it's important to note that any machine needs a certain amount of maintenance if we want to use it reliably and with peace of mind, so a water-resistant watch, especially diver's watches, should undergo a gasket-and-water-resistance service at a minimum frequency of every 4 years (every 2 years is recommended) — a much shorter interval than the average life of these accumulators.

2

3

Said of a watch that uses only and exclusively hands or discs (such as the date disc) to display the value of all its functions. Even though there are ANA-DIGI watches or a combination of analog and digital means to show the time and its functions, if it isn't fully analog it isn't an analog watch. So you could say the classification is "binary" (or digital) :)

Analog-digital or Ana-Digi

7

Fixed lug

Said of a watch whose spring bars are part of the case. It needs special straps that are fitted by gluing a tab for that purpose, and NATO-style straps, which are very easy to fit on these watches, are common on this type of piece

Lug

A watch is called "automatic" when it is a self-winding mechanical watch. These watches are traditional mechanical watches and can almost always be wound using the crown, as with manual-winding mechanical watches, with the difference that they incorporate an automatic winding system that, by means of an oscillating weight and a set of clutch and rotor components, winds the watch automatically as the wearer moves.

This system is the most popular for mechanical wristwatches since it offers a number of advantages over manual-winding mechanical watches. Firstly, the convenience of not having to remember or constantly keep track of the mainspring's charge level, and secondly, these watches include a clutch system that makes it impossible to overwind. On manual-wind watches it isn't advisable to wind the mainspring all the way to its limit, and this is a common cause of watch breakage, but on automatic watches this is impossible even if we wind it manually.

The system was invented by Mr. Harwood in the United Kingdom, patented in 1923, and was initially manufactured with the help of the Swiss watch company Fortis, being released to the public in 1928. More than 30,000 watches — a remarkable feat for the time — were put up for sale under the Harwood brand before Mr. Harwood's company closed in 1931 due to problems following the Great Depression of 1929, after which Fortis took over the manufacture and development of this technology.

Later on, Rolex significantly improved Harwood's system, increasing the power reserve from 12 to 35 hours (similar to most power reserves today), among other improvements.

Another notable company that later improved the system was Eterna, which introduced a ball-bearing system.

The automatic winding system using an oscillating weight is also used, with obvious differences, in self-winding quartz watches (for example, Seiko's KINETIC), although in these cases the movement of the oscillating weight is used, via a small dynamo, to generate the electrical current needed to charge the capacitor or rechargeable battery that powers the watch's quartz circuitry.

Although the date function (or day of the month) is a fairly common function, that doesn't make it any less practical. But some watches are able to indicate, in addition to the day of the month, the day of the week, the month of the year, and even the current year.

When a watch has date and day of the week, it's said to have a "double calendar." If it also shows the month of the year, it's a "triple calendar." And when the year is added to that, the watch has a "complete calendar" (full calendar).

A complication in a watch is any function in addition to displaying the basic time. Complications are usually discussed in the context of mechanical watches, although the concept can be extended to quartz watches, including digital ones.

Although the number of complications a watch can have is extensive, the most common are: chronograph, date and calendar, retrograde hands, second time zone and GMT hand, moon phases, tide calendar, timer, alarm, compass, thermometer, barometer, altimeter, Bluetooth synchronization,... with the most complex in mechanical watchmaking being perpetual calendars, the tourbillon, and flyback and split-seconds (rattrapante) chronographs.

The strap is the alternative to the bracelet. It's an element for securing the watch to the wrist made up of two parts: the upper part, where the buckle is usually located, which attaches to the lugs on the case near the 12 o'clock side of the watch, and the longer, lower part with holes for the buckle, which attaches near the 6 o'clock side of the watch. The strap is usually anchored to the case between the lugs by spring-loaded bars called spring bars, which are inserted through the strap's tube and are secured to the case by fitting the bar's pins into the holes in the watch case.

The materials straps are made from can vary widely, the most common being leather (calfskin, buffalo, lizard, crocodile, alligator, snake, shark,...) as well as rubber (and other plastic materials) and nylon or other fabrics (in NATO-style straps), and even denim or silk.

There are many types of leather, some quite original, such as stingray leather, eel skin, ostrich-leg leather, kangaroo leather, ostrich leather,... Nowadays even salmon skin and other scaled fish skins have been tanned for this purpose, although all "exotic" leathers are difficult to source. Consumers should understand that in many cases the use of these leathers reflects responsible sourcing, making additional use of the animal to minimize waste.

Another type of strap somewhere between traditional leather straps and bracelets are Milanese mesh straps, which are also two-part straps made up of a mesh, usually steel, that resembles a woven fabric. They are flexible and sturdy, more durable than leather and also somewhat heavier, but with the same comfort.

Another important element of straps, one that defines them, is the type of clasp, the most common being the classic buckle, although butterfly-style or deployment clasps are also available, combining the lightness and comfortable feel of the strap with the practicality of a snug, adjustable closure.

A watch's crystal is the window through which we can view the dial and enjoy all its functions, with the role of protecting it from scratches, knocks, water, dust, and other foreign elements.

Based on the material used, watch crystals can be divided into 4 basic types:

Plexiglass (acrylic) crystal: These are crystals made from a synthetic plastic material, and are therefore lightweight but fragile and soft. They scratch easily but, on the other hand, can be polished relatively easily and are inexpensive to replace. They have fallen out of use, but were widely used in the past, typically in Asian watches or in Swiss watchmaking during its crisis period of the 1970s–1980s, or in much earlier eras.

Mineral crystal: These are hard, tough crystals, and although they can be scratched, today they are very hard-wearing. They are the most widely used.

Sapphire crystal: These are crystals made from synthetic sapphire. They are extremely scratch-resistant thanks to having, like natural sapphire, a hardness of 9 on the Mohs scale, making them virtually scratchproof. On the other hand, sapphire crystals reflect a lot of light, so they are typically found with anti-reflective coatings, sometimes applied in layers to maximize the effect and achieve unprecedented transparency, at times even greater than that of traditional mineral crystal.

Hybrids: Mineral crystals with a sapphire-crystal coating can be found on the market, as can crystals made in layers alternating sapphire-crystal layers with mineral crystal and anti-reflective coatings, but these are rarer and their practicality compared to real sapphire is limited. One example is the K1 crystal fitted on some Swiss Military watches, or the FusionFlame used on some INVICTA models. This latter case is heavily criticized, since it's fitted on watches with a fairly high price tag and, no matter how much the brand insists otherwise, it will always be of lesser quality than sapphire crystal, the sole motivation being that manufacturing it for extra-large watch crystals is cheaper, even though the watch is not considered a budget watch. Little justification beyond the brand's profit margin.

The chronograph function is one of the most popular, being almost essential on any sports watch. A chronograph is a watch or timekeeping tool used to record or measure the time elapsed during a given interval. It has start, stop, and reset actuators, usually in the form of pushers, and may include other functions such as flyback or split-seconds (rattrapante), lap counter, average speed calculation, or lap-count memory, among others. Its counters can measure with a precision ranging from a second to thousandths of a second, seconds, minutes, and hours. Results can be displayed either in analog or digital form. Chronographs are used mainly in speed-based sports such as car racing, horse racing, or athletics events,... as well as in swimming and other activities that require precise time recording.

Watches with a chronograph function usually indicate seconds using the central seconds hand (leaving the watch's running-seconds hand on a subdial, known as the "small seconds"), and can then have 1 or 2 subdials to indicate minutes, hours, and/or tenths of a second. It's important that, if we notice the chronograph function has been activated accidentally, we stop this function and reset the chronograph to zero. The chronograph function uses quite a lot of battery power, and so the battery will run out sooner if this function is left running for a long time.

It's important not to confuse the chronograph function with chronometer certification, since the popular misuse of this second term by salespeople who are imprecise with language has led to the widespread misuse of the word "chronometer" to refer to what are actually chronographs.

A chronometer is a watch or timekeeping instrument that has undergone precision certification testing carried out by an independent body, usually the C.O.S.C. (Contrôle Officiel Suisse des Chronomètres), and, of course, has passed it.

Many brands carry out precision tests on all or some of their watches, as may be the case with Grand Seiko, but the only independent certification is the one carried out by the Swiss institute, and it is therefore the only body of prestige in this field.

The C.O.S.C. holds competitions every year to award prizes for precision in various watch categories, and any manufacturer can submit their watches to the competition, regardless of origin.

C.O.S.C. certification is not exclusive to Swiss watchmaking, but it rarely receives watches for certification outside of Swiss brands or some Grand Seiko models.

C.O.S.C. certification is also not exclusive to mechanical watchmaking. The C.O.S.C. also runs tests for quartz watches, although these tests are more demanding in terms of precision. A mechanical watch with C.O.S.C. certification maintains an accuracy of -4/+6 seconds per day, while a quartz watch must have an accuracy of ±0.07 seconds per day at a temperature of 23°C, which is remarkable.

Note: It is said that the certification SEIKO grants to every watch that leaves its factories under the Grand Seiko brand is able to pass C.O.S.C. tests, since Seiko itself is more demanding than the Swiss institute for this high-end collection of watches, and some of its models have even won awards in the precision competition that the C.O.S.C. organizes every year.

As opposed to analog watches, "digital" refers, in watchmaking, to those watches that display their functions, or some of them, by means of an LCD screen or an array of LED lights, and are therefore governed by digital electronics.

Although there are also watches that combine digital functions with analog functions, and all quartz watches incorporate a certain amount of electronics to a greater or lesser degree, ANA-DIGI watches are considered by Joyería Sendra to be digital watches in terms of the technology used in their movements.

This French term applies to movements that are unfinished by the original manufacturer and are modified and/or completed by third parties. By extension, it can be applied to brands that "assemble" all or a significant part of the components made by other manufacturers to complete the finished watch. It is therefore the opposite of an in-house manufacture.

Most brands operate under this model of production, since the process becomes more efficient by specializing industrial processes across a fair distribution of responsibilities.

Even so, brands that manufacture most of their components "in-house" or on their own premises are considered "manufacture brands," which grants them great prestige among the most discerning consumers, with Seiko being one of the few, if not the only, brand that manufactures every component of all its watches, including crystals and luminous paint. This was the case at least until recently, though the author of this entry cannot say with certainty whether any manufacturer has since changed its policies, and assumes that this has not happened.

The Swatch Group's decision to gradually limit the supply of calibers and spare parts to other companies is pushing many brands to begin developing in order to become manufacture brands themselves, as is the case with the prestigious Breitling, which until now used ETA movements, finished, modified, and decorated in its own facilities, but which were not manufacture movements; or Panerai's most famous caliber, which was a modified ETA Unitas caliber originally intended for pocket watches.

This decision, highly controversial and involving lengthy legal disputes along the way, was motivated by the fact that many brands were not being transparent about this, with Tag Heuer as an example, calling a modified ETA 2824 the "Caliber 5." By giving it its own name — "Caliber 5," no less — it creates the false impression, for a customer unfamiliar with the subject, of being an in-house manufacture movement, without giving the Swatch Group the recognition it deserves. Some would say this is the equivalent of doing research without citing sources and passing it off as one's own.

Citizen's trade name for the world's most popular proprietary solar-charging system, which encompasses a good number of patents available only on their watches bearing this label. All Citizen Eco-Drive watches have this system, thanks to which there's no need to replace the battery — an accumulator in this case — although over time the accumulator may lose some charging capacity, but never below what's needed to operate without issue.

The Eco-Drive system, although it received criticism in its early days during the 1990s, since it was marketed as being "trouble-free" and yet did end up having some issues, these were reasonable teething problems given how new the system was at the time. After numerous revisions, with patents along the way, the Eco-Drive system has ended up being an affordable, reliable way of improving sustainability in watchmaking with a solar-charging system that avoids wasting valuable resources, from the manufacturing process through the watch's useful life, extending its service life by significantly lengthening the intervals at which the quartz watch requires any maintenance at all, with such reliability that almost every quartz watch coming out of Citizen's factories has this system, relegating traditional battery-powered quartz to an entry-level range of the brand, always priced under €100 and sold only in specific markets.

The Eco-Drive is a very popular and sought-after system for the practicality of never running out of battery, not having to travel to the nearest watch shop to replace it, not having to deal with less-than-professional watchmakers, the hassle of gasket changes,...

A warranty is nothing more than the seller's commitment to provide a product or service free of manufacturing defects. This warranty is required by law to last 2 years throughout Europe, and manufacturers usually extend it to 1 year for international warranties.

It should be noted that the warranty must be provided by the seller, but in turn the distributor or manufacturer must provide it to authorized dealers. When we buy a watch from an unauthorized dealer, we're at the mercy of that dealer's service, since the manufacturer is likely to offer no warranty at all — a clear example being Amazon, except for products sold by authorized sellers, although most suppliers disavow this type of sale since it adds nothing to the brands' value chain, losing all the purchasing experience and contact with committed professionals.

Manufacturers usually provide a far superior warranty service, since their aim is that, in the event a customer has to go through the hassle of sending a watch in for warranty repair, it doesn't happen again, and, along the way, to gather statistics and analyze recurring problems in order to fix them at the manufacturing stage, with the goal of achieving a sustainable business model. This is unworkable without a proper in-house technical service for managing repairs and warranties.

Global Positioning System. GPS is a global positioning system designed and provided by the US Department of Defense, with the much more precise Galileo system deployed by the European Union. GPS operation is based on the precision of atomic clocks and their synchronization across a global network of satellites. Once this is achieved, a device with GPS reception on the ground can determine its location by triangulating the signal emitted by the GPS satellites at intervals synchronized with atomic precision. It is this synchronization and precision that makes possible spatial triangulation accurate to within a few meters of error.

In watchmaking, the GPS system can be used for simple time synchronization, as is the case with the CITIZEN Satellite Wave, Seiko Astron, or CASIO MT-G and MT-R, although there are also electronic watches that, using a smartphone's GPS along with smartphone and tablet apps, can log our route and time and even automatically post it to social media — these are functions that require devices other than the watch itself.

Although "telling the time" usually refers to the hour and minutes of the current day, an hour is the twenty-fourth part of the duration of a mean solar day. Its use is generally civil, an hour being made up of 60 minutes, or 3,600 seconds.

Since 1967, atomic instruments have been used for the precise measurement of time, requiring occasional adjustments through the use of leap seconds to compensate for the effects of the earth's rotation and revolution.

In older definitions, the Egyptians divided daylight hours into 12, meaning that summer hours were longer than winter ones. Later, 12 hours were also added for counting nighttime hours, both being measured with sundials or water clocks. With the first mechanical clocks, it was necessary to adjust the clock's speed according to the day by adjusting the length of the pendulum, since at first clocks had to be adapted to these long-abandoned conventions.

On watches, this is called an illuminator function when the watch has some type of active lighting, usually one or more LEDs.

Another lighting method, available only on watches with some kind of LCD screen, is backlighting, by which the back of the screen is lit, allowing for a clear, shadow-free reading.

Another added feature found on some watches with lighting, widely used in Casio's G-SHOCK range, is the automatic illuminator, by which the light activates automatically with the wrist motion needed to read the dial, made possible thanks to a special motion sensor.

This usually refers to the markers placed on the dial to indicate the position of the hours and/or minutes.

They can be classified as follows:

• Arabic: When the numerals are Arabic numbers (1, 2, 3,...). These are the clearest and most obvious markers. Highly sought after on everyday watches.
• Roman: When the numerals are Roman numerals (I, II, III,...). These are the most classic and elegant markers, with Cartier and Seiko being masters of the craft.
• Simple: When the numerals are indicated with simple markers (batons or dots) instead of numbers. These are the most popular and stylish markers, especially on sports watches.

This classification can also be complemented by how elaborate the markers are, ranging from markers printed directly onto the dial on more affordable watches, to lavishly decorated markers in metal and enamel, attached to the dial by feet that may be glued on (for entry-to-mid-range watches) or soldered and firmly anchored to the dial.

Some of the most popular are luminous markers, which are usually coated with a luminous paint that charges by absorbing photons and then gradually releases them through a chemiluminescence effect. It becomes less noticeable as the night wears on and starts to brighten again just before dawn, since its efficiency decreases over time and the ambient light makes it less perceptible.

Another, less widespread type of luminous element is tritium gas. It consists of small glass tubes filled with radioactive tritium gas and a luminescent material, such that the tritium's own radioactivity excites that luminescent compound and is able to sustain this property for many years even without exposure to light. Despite the radioactivity of the tritium, these watches meet all safety standards, but they still have both their supporters and their detractors.

In watchmaking, this refers to a brand of Japanese manufacture. The main Japanese brands are Seiko, Citizen, and Casio, which together make up more than 90% of Japanese watchmaking, with another notable brand being Orient, which is now manufactured at Seiko's facilities.

It should be noted that nowadays not all Japanese production takes place in Japan itself, with the more affordable ranges of these brands being manufactured in other locations ranging from China to Taiwan or Malaysia. Even so, a watch is considered Japanese if its caliber or movement was manufactured in Japan.

On watches, the system by which the hour markers and hands light up in the dark.

This is usually a chemical paint that, after charging during daylight hours, releases part of the stored energy as light on the markers and hands, allowing the time to be read in total darkness.

Swiss watches usually use Luminova and SuperLuminova™ paint from the Swiss manufacturer RC TRITEC (though it's a license of Japanese technology), and it's available in the ISO 3157 and ISO/DIS 17514 color standards.

On Japanese watches, Seiko uses its own NeoBrite paint, and Casio its well-known Neon display

Since it's an expensive paint, it's usually used only on the markers and hands, possibly just the tips, though there are also some watches with an entirely luminous dial, on which the time is read precisely because neither the markers nor the hands have this paint, or have it in a different color.

It's also a trend for some brands, such as LumiNOX, to use tritium tubes — a safe and stable but radioactive material — in gas form to enhance the luminous properties of their watches. These tubes contain small, safe amounts of tritium gas and are coated on the inside with a luminous paint that emits light steadily over the years, regardless of whether the watch has been exposed to sunlight or not. This is because the faint radioactivity of the tritium is what excites the luminous paint applied to the inside of the tube.