Orient Place

Orient Place

Sunday 15 March 2020

Orient's World Time and GMT Watches




World time watches are intended to allow one to check the time in different parts of the world. Orient's fascination with world timers goes back many decades, to some of the brand's oldest designs, like the world diver and SK.

At first, these were very simple devices, using a 24-hour bezel to allow one to check the time against a layout of world cities manually. Later on, smarter options popped up, like the "FE" line up, where caliber 46P operated a 24 hour hand (which still had to be checked manually against a world cities bezel).

However, in the early 2000s, Orient began introducing more useful movements and traveler watches. Today we will be looking at these proper world time and GMT watches.

The following table contains the different movements produced by Orient that included a functional 24-hour disk or hand. For each caliber, you can get an indication of the movement code (that is also part of specific watch references) and the sub-brand in which it was used: "regular" Orient, Orient Star, or Royal Orient.

Caliber

Code

Launch Year

Used in

Jewels

Hack-ing

Hand Wind

Seconds Indicator

Date Indicator

24 Hour

46L

FB

2003

ROYAL/ STAR

 21

yes

yes

center seconds

pointer @ 9:00

Disk

46T

FL

2003

ROYAL

23

yes

yes

sub seconds @ 9:00

pointer @ 6:00

Disk

46K

FA

2003

ORIENT/ STAR

21

no

no

center seconds

pointer @ 6:00

Disk

46H

EY

2007

ORIENT

23

no

no

sub seconds @ 6:00

pointer @ 9:00

Disk

48H

FZ

2008

STAR

 23

yes

no

sub seconds @ 6:00

pointer @ 9:00

Disk

40P

DJ

2010

STAR

22

yes

yes

center seconds

window @ 3:00

Hand

48K

DH

2012

ORIENT

21

yes

yes

center seconds

subdial @ 6:00

Disk

40H

JC

2013

STAR

24

yes

yes

subdial @ 6:00

subdial @ 9:00

Disk


The earlier movements (before caliber 40P of 2010) used a 24 hours disk that was synchronized with the time; however – as opposed to the simple 24-hour hand of caliber 46P – the wearer would be able to adjust the disk to a specific time zone, in half-hour intervals. This way, you could use the central hour as your local time, and the disk to check the time in other places. The typical design would also have a world city bezel that could be aligned with the disk so that you could tell the time in every city.

Here are some photos from a 2003 catalog, showing these early world timers:




A GMT watch would typically differ from a world timer in that it shows one additional time zone, allowing a much clearer observation of the time in that time zone compared to world timers.

Orient's first true GMT watch was introduced in 2010, featuring an adjustable 24-hour hand, in the shape of caliber 40P. The beautiful watch housing this movement became an instant classic, and received the much-inspired nickname "Star Seeker". Over time, a number of different watches used this caliber:

·         References WZ0011DJ (shown at the top of this post) and WZ0021DJ, the original star seeker GMTs with black and white dials respectively, with an internal rotating 24 hour bezel, a steel bracelet and a "cyclops" over the date window.
·         Ref. WZ0031DJ, with a black dial and leather strap.
·         WZ0041DJ and WZ0051DJ, introduced in 2011 with black and white dials respectively, were very similar to the 2010 release, however without the cyclops.
·         WZ0061DJ and WZ0071DJ, introduced in 2014, featured a simpler design and let go of the internal rotating bezel. The first featured a black dial, while the latter had a beautiful blue dial, both on a steel bracelet.
·         And then last but not least, came the limited edition WZ0081DJ, similar to the 2014 release, and featuring a fantastic grey dial and brown leather strap.



In-between the "DJ" models, Orient also presented a new line of world timer style of watches, the "JC" line-up. References WZ0011JC, WZ0021JC, and WZ0031JC featured black, blue, and white (or rather, ivory) dials, respectively. More variants were later introduced in 2017.


Since 2017, Orient did not introduce new World Timer or GMT models. Isn't it time for a new, caliber F6-based GMT watch from Orient? Many fans of the brand would surely love one! For now, we'll have to wait and see.


Some of the data in the table of movements was taken from Dan's (watchmandan.com) very useful list of movements. Photos of the 2003 catalog were taken from the archive of Yeoman Seiko's fantastic old blog. Other photos are from official Orient publications.


12 comments:

  1. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  2. Great article as always. I felt that the only problem of the star seeker and gmt is its lug width of 21 mm. Hopefully if and when orient star releases a new one it will be 20 mm. And recently i was wondering and actually searched the internet for any news on a new launch of orient star gmt...i definitely feel its about time esp after its air diver release...do keep us posted...

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    1. Indeed. 20mm would be nice (or 22mm)... We'll definitely keep following the news stream from Orient and hope that a new GMT is only a matter of time (pun not intended)

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    2. Good one sir....i am currently thinking about getting the WZ0081DJ, but the 21 mm is holding me back as i am not a fan of leather straps and hoping a new gmt will come out sooner than later...really appreciate you keeping all of us in the loop as its not easy to get updates on orient stars

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  3. Thanks for such a good article. Thanks to you, we can expand our knowledge about Orient Star watches. I am a fan of Orient Star and I own two GMT models. They are wonderful and thanks to this article I fell in love with another model :) Regards




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    1. Thanks! I've seen your wonderful watches on FB... wondering what this next model is going to be?...

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    2. May i ask which ones you have? I have one star seeker (all black including the casing) - hence the and pain of 21 mm and world time WZ0031JC - one of my favourite in the rotation...it has the same look and feel of the cream chronograph..

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    3. I have a WZ0091FA ... easy one as it's got a 20mm lug width :) Still, I would not avoid a good watch just because it has an odd lug width. I've plenty of odd-lugged Orients and Seikos and never had a real problem finding decent straps, both brands and hand-made.

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  4. Really love the blue one but those are hard to find nowadays

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    1. Hard but not impossible. If you follow closely on eBay, Yahoo Auctions and the likes, you may find a specific model sooner rather than later.

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  5. This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

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  6. I think Orient star's higher line should be all with F7/8 movements and all with interesting complications like the actual moonphase, skeleton or new retrograde, gmt, ultra thin, ultra dedo diver watches...

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