In the days before electric lighting, working hours were determined by the length of the day. Candlelight made for tired eyes and people’s schedules largely followed that of the sun. Theaters and train cars were dark in the era before ours, when bright smartphone screens are both a help and a nuisance. It was in this earlier age that the repeater watch was created so a man could check the time in the dark.
In the beginning, repeater pocket watches — which grew from their forebears, chiming clocks — only chimed the most recent hour that passed. So whether the time is 10:00 or 10:52, an hour repeater would still chime 10 times. As watchmaking advanced, repeaters got more precise and more configurations appeared, from quarter repeaters, which chimed the hours and the quarter hours, to five-minute repeaters, which would chime the hour followed by the number of five minute intervals after the hour in two different tones. The most precise repeater, as you might imagine, is the minute repeater, which sonically tells the exact time down to the minute.
Repeaters are not alarms, nor do they chime on their own, which would quickly become tiresome. Instead they operate on demand when the wearer wants to check the time, in which case he pulls a spring-loaded slider on the side of the watch case to activate it.
Adding a sonic element to a watch movement is not easy, much less one that “knows” the time.
By the early 1900s, artificial lighting rendered the repeater largely obsolete. But the charm of the complication has never lost its appeal, and it is one of the most enduring and beloved ones. Due to the skill required to design and build them, they have always commanded premium prices and have historically been the province of wealthy collectors. The big names in haute horology, including Patek Philippe, Audemars Piguet and Breguet have built some of the most legendary repeater watches, which remain rare but prized by watch collectors.
Adding a sonic element to a watch movement is not easy, much less one that “knows” the time. Space is one issue; in a wristwatch case, it requires shoehorning the synchronizing, striking and separate winding elements alongside the rest of the watch movement. And then there’s the matter of tuning the acoustics to not only be loud, but to have a clear and pleasing sound in multiple tones to differentiate minutes from hours.
A repeater mechanism is wound separately from the timekeeping components of the watch. The required tension to sound the gongs is not as great as that for the watch’s mainspring, which is keeping constant time, so “arming” the repeater is accomplished by tensioning the spring that powers the chiming mechanism. This is done by pushing the slide on the side of the watch case, which tensions the chiming spring in the same way that pulling a toy race car backwards gives it the power to move forward when released.
Once this slider is released, two hammers are activated, striking the gongs to read out the time. The gongs are thin strips of metal arranged around the perimeter of the case; in order to achieve different tones for the hours, quarter hours and minutes, they differ in thickness and shape.
The hammers are small, pivoting levers, typically mounted on opposing sides of the bottom of the watch movement. One strikes one of the gongs while the other strikes the second, and the sequence of the striking is what tells the unique time of day. Usually a lower tone indicates hours while a higher tone is for the minutes, and the quarter hour is a quick sequence of high and low tones.
In this way, the two gongs can be used to indicate three distinctive time measurements. As an example, at 3:00, the lower toned gong will be struck three times in succession: “dong dong dong”. At 3:04, the higher pitched gong will be called into action, resulting in, “dong dong dong; ding ding ding ding”. But at 3:31, the full sequence of the chimes is actuated, and you hear, “dong dong dong; ding-dong ding-dong ding.” In this way, the wearer needs only listen and pay attention to this sequence to tell the time. (11:59 becomes quite the lengthy symphony.)
Repeaters occupy a special place in the hearts of watch enthusiasts and, despite the obsolescence of this complication, it has enjoyed a bit of a renaissance of late.
The chiming part of the movement keeps track of the time using tiny gears called the “snails”, which are small semi-circular cams that have precisely-cut steps in their outer radius that determine how many times the hammer strikes. There is one snail dedicated to the hours, one to the quarter hours and one to the minutes, with the hour snail having 12 steps, the quarter hour snail three steps, and the minute snail, 14. These snails are geared to the timekeeping mechanism of the watch movement, and constantly in synch with the current time.
The snails coordinate the number of times the gongs are struck, but the actual act of striking is controlled by racks, levers and cams that pivot the spring-loaded hammers. The entire sequence of events is something to behold, but many repeater watches have solid case backs to enhance acoustics — though the magic of modern watchmaking and materials science has seen the introduction of glass case backs that allow the owner to observe the performance (which is entirely ironic, given the raison d’être of the repeater in the first place).
Repeaters occupy a special place in the hearts of watch enthusiasts and, despite the obsolescence of this complication, it has enjoyed a bit of a renaissance of late, giving those of us living in a bright world a chance to still “hear the time.” Here are five of of our favorite modern repeaters.
Bulgari Octo Finissimo Minute Repeater
The Octo Finissimo has become one of Bulgari’s flagship watches, and it’s been the vehicle for high complications like tourbillons before. Here, it has a 40mm rose gold case and unassuming presence, but inside is some truly stunning horology. The cutout indices on the dial hint at the movement below, but they’re also said to aid sound transmission of the chimes. A lot more of the movement is visible from the case back, where you can watch the hammers go to work on the gongs. Despite its complicated movement, the watch remains remarkably thin at just 6.90mm.
Case Material: Rose Gold
Diameter: 40mm
Price: $170,000
Audemars Piguet Royal Oak Minute Repeater Supersonnerie
One would be remiss to not include an Audemars Piguet in any discussion of repeater watches. After all, AP was the undisputed master of the chiming watch in the 19th century, building the mechanisms not only for its own timepieces but also for those of many other brands, including A. Lange & Söhne. The Royal Oak is AP’s most famous collection, and while this iteration maintains the iconic sport watch design, it takes on a different character as a rare (20 examples each in titanium and platinum), ultra high-end complication hiding in plain sight.
Case Material: Titanium or Platinum
Diameter: 42mm
Price: $321,700 (titanium); $386,600 (platinum)
A. Lange & Söhne Zeitwerk Minute Repeater
In an ironic nod to German repeater history, the Zeitwerk Minute Repeater pays tribute to Dresden’s Semper Opera House clock, which aimed to keep people from disrupting performances with…their repeaters (akin to cell phones in movie theaters today). The large digital time display is directly inspired by that clock, which was built by Johann Gutkaes, the mentor to Lange’s namesake founder, in 1841. The chiming watch is actually a “decimal” repeater, meaning it chimes the 10-minute intervals instead of the quarter hours as part of its sequence, showing how the German masters always do things just a little bit differently.
Case Material: White Gold
Diameter: 44.2mm
Price: ~$507,000
Roger Dubuis Excalibur Diabolus In Machina
Roger Dubuis makes a lot of large, brash, skeletonized, tourbillon-equipped sport watches in its Excalibur collection, and this particular example fits right in among them. Even if many of the brand’s watches appear designed to stand our from afar, a closer look reveals the highest level of finishing and craftsmanship, and some serious horology going on. Case in point is this Excalibur Diabolus In Machina with minute repeater and flying tourbillon, turning the classical image of the chiming watch on its head. Oh, and this might be a good example of a truly useful modern minute repeater since the dial’s legibility is somewhat sacrificed for its attention-grabbing looks.
Case Material: CarTech Micro-Melt BioDur CCMTM
Diameter: 45mm
Price: $571,000
Jaquet Droz Tropical Bird Repeater
In the 1700s, the Swiss watchmaker Jaquet Droz was well known for his mechanical automata, such as a small figure that could write a name, or a crawling caterpillar. The Bird Repeater carries on that tradition on the wrist, with a stunning visual element that accompanies the chiming of the time. The dial, which is hand-painted and engraved, features three-dimensional birds that, when the repeater chimes, flit their wings or open their tail while other elements of the tropical scene similarly come to life. If this display fails to mesmerize, the incredibly complex movement that drives all of this is visible at the back.
Case Material: White Gold
Diameter: 47mm
Price: $661,500
Patek Philippe 5078G Minute Repeater
Legend has it that former Patek CEO Philippe Stern never let a repeater leave the manufacture until he personally listened to its chiming in the quiet of his office. When he passed the reigns over to his son, Thierry, the tradition continued, and the Sterns must have good ears because Patek repeaters are some of the sweetest sounding in the business. The simple form of the 5078G, with its black enamel dial and tasteful arabesque patterning does nothing to distract from its aural perfection, tempting its owner to make it chime again and again.
Case Material: White Gold
Diameter: 38mm
Price: Upon Request
