CAV511A.BA0902
Well, this has been a long time coming. My first hands-on experience with the CAV511A came way back in 2017 when I tried on a pre-owned piece in the Michael Jones store in Northampton. At the time the watch was priced at £2700 and while I gave it considerable thought, I eventually made the absolute school-boy error of buying a cheaper (GMT) version which I ended up only keeping for a year and then traded in against a couple of quartz pieces (one of which I only kept for a year!). It was a bad decision which kept on going wrong and this ultimately (and unfortunately) put me off Grand Carrera ownership for some considerable time...
My problems with the GMT I bought were mainly that at 43mm it was way too big for a three hander with a slim bezel... on the wrist it felt huge, and while I appreciated the build quality, it did feel a little bit 'grown up' for someone like me who was more likely to buy a bright yellow Aquaracer. But times change, and now well into my fifties I happened to chance upon my dream Grand Carrera, the 40.5mm blue dial, Japanese limited edition WAV511J which I took delivery of back in June.
That piece completely changed my outlook on watches, causing me a serious rethink and the gradual depletion of my (unnecessarily large) collection. Indeed I have sold at least ten watches this year (mostly the cheaper plastic 80s F1s that I'd been collecting), alongside all sorts of other clutter that's been kicking around the house for too long, all of which put me in the position of being able to look at potentially acquiring another more luxurious timepiece.
I will admit I did flirt with the idea of stretching considerably to fund a CBN2A1E Dato 45 160th Anniversary, even going as far as to secure a 10% discount from a local A.D., but ultimately I was uncomfortable spending that much money and so as always seems to happen when I go off at a tangent and then reset, I came back once again to the Grand Carrera chronograph. And the SLR, but that's a story for another day.
So... with the CBN2A1E emphatically dismissed (even though it is a stunning watch) I determined that my best course of action was to stop dilly-dallying and just buy the damned thing.
You know, I think one of the reasons I've been hesitating over this for so long is that these are so freely available. Which sounds silly, but with so many watches only available fleetingly, including older models which only show up at the least convenient times (like when you've just spent all your money) slapping down cold, hard cash on something that could always be easily found later just seemed... a little foolish.
So I found a CAV511A on Ramsdens website which looked in very good condition for £2500 and a similar watch on the Watchfinder website (the only one actually, they had four a few weeks ago!) priced at £2695. But given that Watchfnder serviced and polished my WAV511J for free a few weeks ago, and given that they offer a two year warranty on all their watches, I really wanted to buy from them.
So I emailed my contact at Watchfinder and they agreed to match the price of the Ramsdens watch, which meant I really didn't have a reason not to proceed, and here it is...
It's so weird to finally have one of these in my collection, but everything about it just screams quality. It's surprisingly weighty and to be honest that took a little getting used to, but after a day on the wrist I stopped noticing it really. While I will concede that the Grand Carrera chronograph isn't perhaps the most conventionally beautiful watch out there, I would absolutely say that of all my current watches, this is the one that looks and feels the most expensive.
And the funny thing about the Grand Carrera chronograph, and indeed my Calibre 6 GC is that they really aren't all that photogenic. These watches look so much nicer in person. And just like the Calibre 6, the classic 'head-on' shot isn't this watch's best angle. Much better to see it from an angle which shows of the sculpted subdial surrounds and deep, deep date window.
The watch seems to working perfectly and running at around +1sec a day, well within its chronometer spec. Once I got used to the weight it felt pretty comfortable too, despite not having any micro adjustment on the clasp. It does have a pair of half links so I took one of those out and added in one full link and after a morning it stopped feeling loose and settled down - note to myself to be patient when sizing watches in future!
It just looks like a really quality piece and I love the little hints of red on the dial, they really set it off nicely. The subdials are undoubtedly avant garde in their design, and probably not to everyone's taste, but the Geneva striping finish to them is impressive and luxurious.
I didn't realise the chrono pushers screwed down to be honest. Seems kinda dumb since you need to take the watch off to unscrew them before you can use them... but who am I kidding, I'm never going to use the chronograph, other than running it once a month to keep the oil moving around!
All in all I really couldn't be happier with it. I'm guessing Watchfinder must have refinished the watch because for a 13 year old watch it looks like new. Or it did until I scratched the polished edge of the clasp sizing the bracelet! Ugh.... makes me feel sick just thinking about it. Oh well, I gotta stop being so damned precious about these things, no point dying with a box full of pristine looking watches is there?
And so with this box finally ticked and some remaining cash in reserve, my attention turned to another long 'on the cards' watch, which also suddenly became available through Watchfinder. And fortuitously, just as I was deciding what I was comfortable offering them for it, they started their 'TAG Heuer' sale and dropped it by £300 - RESULT! More about that another day...
2017 ON THE WRIST POST:
No comments:
Post a Comment