WI2110.FC6009
As often seems to happen, researching a particular model for a 'History of' post leads me to getting enthusiastic about that model and ending up on eBay poring over the available produce. So it was with this simple, but lovely WI2110 which is an 'S/EL Leather' rather than an 'S/EL', the important distinction being that the case was reworked to accept regular straps without the need for the metal end link. Now in the past I was a bit dismissive of these sub-genre 'S/ELs', it's possible that I may even have said rude things about them on this blog and/or the Calibre11 forum, but actually they are quite nice!
But honestly it was the selection of straps that really piqued my interest, all 'S/EL Leather' watches (fullsize, midsize or ladies) are available in a choice of eight different colours: black, brown, red, garnet red, dark green, turquoise, navy blue and royal blue (TAG Heuer call the last one 'light blue' but it's more of a mid or royal blue to my eyes).
I found this one for sale on eBay from Japan, and a seller that I've used three or four times now called 'Spirit*Age'. Once again I can't fault them, good delivery, well packaged and you get what the listing says, albeit the pictures suggested this watch came on a (less than thrilling) black strap, but in actual fact it's the dark green version - which I was not at all unhappy about. In fact I had already ordered a red strap for this before it arrived, but I had debated whether to go for the dark green instead, so actually I was well happy!
The watch is in great condition all round with just a few light scratches to the brushed bezel, but nothing really nasty. The strap is a little bit creased in a couple of places, but nowhere near the end of its life and the clasp is surprisingly crisp as well, which was a little bit of a concern. The dial looks great and while the tritium lume on the hour markers is pretty dead (I should imagine this watch is 20-25 years old) the hands still have some glow to them.
Originally I was looking for a WI1110, which is a quartz piece with a silver dial, but there doesn't seem to be an awful lot of 'S/EL Leather' pieces for sale in the UK and the ones that are seem rather expensive, the best I could do was a navy blue dial on a blue strap for about £500, and that seemed rather a lot to me, especially as it wouldn't offer much flexibility when it came to choosing different straps.
But I came across this one as a Buy It Now for £315 (plus £20 carriage) and I thought to myself, if I find a quartz with a silver dial (or a white dial) there's every chance that it could be dearer, so why not just scoop this up now - and that's what I did. Maybe this will be the start of a move towards buying older automatic watches in the future, or maybe just an aberration - it will probably depend on how accurate it is I guess. The seller claimed +15-20 seconds a day, which is fine for me because I would only wear it one day at a time anyway.
It feels quite nice to wind, not that I have a vast amount of experience which winding watches. Obviously it's not as buttery smooth as the Heuer 01, but it doesn't feel in any way rough and the rotor isn't unduly loud like a Heuer 02 (for example). You can hear it if you spin it quickly but in normal use I don't think you can hear it at all.
This one is 37mm, which is a reasonable size even for my slightly larger than average wrist - I'm well used to this size as many of my 80/90s watches fall into this range and it feels just about right for the style of watch. Actually I think these smaller watches look better on straps sometimes, but to be honest I think you get used to anything if you wear it long enough. It's about 9mm thick, which I'm pretty sure is the same as my red dial quartz S/EL, so it sits nicely on the wrist.
Admittedly, this isn't perhaps the most 'exciting' watch in my collection, but I appreciate its understated simplicity and so far I'm enjoying wearing it (even if its only been a few hours so far). Now that I see it on this rather stylish dark green strap I'm wondering if maybe the red strap is a bit 'much', but I've ordered it now so I might as well give it a go.
Link to Catawiki auction where a WI2110 on a red strap sold for 815 Euros five years ago!
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