BUYING EXPERIENCE: TAG Heuer Masterpieces Catalogue

 

This is one that I 'forgot about'... I won this on eBay just before Christmas and once I'd opened it I put it away safely in my 'TAG' cupboard and promptly forgot all about it! Which is quite appalling since this is a really nice hardback catalogue showing off TAG Heuer's haute horlogerie pieces using very dramatic black backgrounds and copper foil text. It looks suitably 'high-end' in the flesh, but it really doesn't work very well in a scanner (as I found out when I tried to scan the pages for David at Calibre 11). 

These pictures are taken from the eBay listing, and as you can see there is a little 'wear' here and there... but even so it's in fairly good condition and it's well worth the £14.50 I paid for it I think! The seller had it up for £20 IIRC but accepted my offer... and despatched it promptly and well packed. Seems like an absolute bargain to me, I'd certainly never come across another one like it before and I was most pleased to see my favourite (and completely unobtainable) TAG Heuer 'masterpiece' on page 16: the very striking 'Carrera Microtimer Flying 1000'. Unfortunately the seller didn't post a photo of that one...

This Mikrogirder 1/10,000th is nice too, but at £110,000 it's also completely out of the question (unless my Euromillions numbers come up of course). Still it's nice to dream... but I think I would still take the Flying 1000, that black and green colour combination is one I've always really liked and since I never got around to buying the black/green Aquaracer 500M Calibre 16 when Bicester Village had them, maybe I should hold out for the real deal. :)

Containing photos and specs for pretty much all the haute horlogerie pieces that I can think of off the top of my head, this is one of the most intriguing TAG Heuer catalogues available and if you can find a copy you should definitely pick it up. When (maybe 'if' since they didn't come out all that well) David publishes the scans I sent him on the Calibre 11 catalogue page, I will add a link to it here.

SPOTLIGHT ON: Monaco V4 Titanium

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Okay, with an asking price of £50,000 there is absolutely no way I am ever going to be able to afford this astonishing piece of haute horlogerie, but that doesn't mean I shouldn't drool over it. It looks to me like the case is similar to the Monaco 24, so I bet it would sit on the wrist just as elegantly as that model does, but with the added attraction of a skeletonised and belt driven movement.

Whereas most automatic watches are wound by a rotor which moves back and forth as you move your wrist, the Monaco V4 uses a weight trapped in a channel riding on ball bearings to 'charge' the movement. This is known as a 'linear' rather than the more common 'oscillating' mass and TAG Heuer are reportedly the first watch company to master this technology. 

Really this is beyond cool, and though it isn't currently listed on the official TAG Heuer website there is (or maybe was) also a V4T version with a 'tourbillon' as well. Okay, research done, the V4T was a limited edition of fifty pieces made to commemorate the tenth anniversary of the V4 model. Check it out in the official TAG Heuer promotional video below.