The Omega Bullhead was introduced in 1969 as part of the Chronostop range, it was marketed as drivers / rally watch and was nicknamed the "Bullhead" because of the configuration of the winding crown being located at 12 o'clock with the chronograph pushers on either side.
The calibre 930 was introduced in 1969 in both Omega Seamaster Bullhead and De-Ville models. The watch was produced by Omega SA watches as a twin register chronograph with date in stainless steel models and gold plated models. The movement was manual wind and was an evolution of the calibre 27 CHRO used as part of the wider Omega range but with date function [1]
The Omega Seamaster is a line of automatic winding chronometer and quartz watches that Omega has produced since 1948. The Seamaster is particularly popular among celebrities, with famous wearers including Prince William, Joe Biden, Jeremy Clarkson, Gabriel Holmes and Adam Savage. An Omega Seamaster typically has a stainless steel case and bracelet, screw-in crown and case-back, engraved with the Omega hippocampus logo, up to 1200-metre water resistant, luminescent hands, unidirectional bezel, blue, silver or black dial with orange accents, sapphire crystal (anti-reflective) and helium release valve.
Omega SA is a Swiss luxury watchmaker based in Biel/Bienne, Switzerland. Founded by Louis Brandt in La Chaux-de-Fonds in 1848, the company formally operated as the La Generale Watch Co. until incorporating the name Omega in 1903, becoming Louis Brandt et Frère - Omega Watch & Co.. In 1982, the company officially changed its name to Omega SA, which is currently a subsidiary of the Swiss Swatch Group. Omega opened its museum to the public in Biel/Bienne in January 1984.
A chronograph is a specific type of watch that is used as a stopwatch combined with a display watch. A basic chronograph has an independent sweep second hand; it can be started, stopped, and returned to zero by successive pressure on the stem. More complex chronographs use additional complications and can have multiple independent hands to measure seconds, minutes, hours and even tenths of a second. In addition, many modern chronographs use moveable bezels as tachymeters for rapid calculations of speed or distance. Louis Moinet invented the chronograph in 1816 for use in tracking astronomical objects. Chronographs were also used heavily in artillery fire in the mid to late 1800s. More modern uses of chronographs involve piloting airplanes, car racing, diving and submarine maneuvering.
The Omega Bullhead was marketed as a drivers / Rally watch as part of the chronostop range of watches and like others in the range was quirky in both design and colour configuration of the dial.
The movement was an evolution of Omega's 27 CHRO range and formed part of the wider 861 family of watches, developed from the 320 and 321 series. The movement was manual wind with date.
The 930 movement was only used in two models, both of which were stainless steel or gold plated. [2]
1) The Omega De-Ville calibre 930 with twin side-by-side chronograph in stainless steel or gold plated cases. The watch was marketed as a dress chronograph with silver, black or gold dial configurations. The winding crown was located at the traditional three o’clock position with over and under chronograph pushers.
2) The Omega Seamaster Bullhead calibre 930 with over and under chronograph function in stainless steel. The watch marketed as a sports / drivers watch as part of the chronostop range and featured and internal rotating bezel which could be adjusted through a crown at six o’clock. [3]
In metallurgy, stainless steel, also known as inox steel or inox from French inoxydable (inoxidizable), is a steel alloy, with a minimum of 10.5% chromium content by mass and a maximum of 1.2% carbon by mass.
The Bullhead has its nickname due to the main winding crown being located at 12 o’clock and the chronograph pushers being located either side. The watch was also unique in design as the case was much thicker at the top than the bottom meaning the watch sat higher on the wrist at 12 o’clock than it did at six o’clock.
The Bullhead variation of the calibre 930 movement was also produced branded by Bucherer and Lemania as well a Richard chronograph. There was also a non date variation produced by Lemania without the internal rotating bezel as well as a composite cased model produced by Tissot as part of their Sidereal range.
TissotSA is a Swiss luxury watchmaker. The company was founded in Le Locle, Switzerland by Charles-Félicien Tissot and his son, Charles-Émile Tissot, in 1853. Since 1983, Tissot SA has been a subsidiary of the Swiss Swatch Group.
The calibre 930 was relatively short lived and was not originally popular. At the time of introduction quartz watch technology such as the Omega Electroquartz was taking off and there was already a significantly established line of Omega chronographs which was complimented in the early 1970s by a range of automatic Omega Chronographs under calibre 1040, 1041 (the world's first chronometer chronograph used in the Omega Speedmaster 125) and 1045 as well as a range of electronic chronographs branded as Speedsonic and using a tuning fork movement with additional chronograph module.
The Omega Electroquartz was introduced in 1969 as the first production Swiss quartz watch. It was the collaboration of 20 Swiss watch companies and the movement was utilised by Rolex, Patek Phillipe and Omega SA amongst others. The Beta 21 movement used in the Electroquartz was accurate to 5 seconds per month, far better than any automatic or manual wind movement of the day.
The Bullhead variation of the calibre 930 is now a very desirable watch and highly sought after by collectors because of its relatively short lived life span (produced for one year only in 1969) and interesting case design and dial configuration.
The watch was reintroduced in to the Omega range in 2014 utilizing a new coaxial chronometer movement but remaining true to the original design.
A chronometer is a specific type of mechanical timepiece tested and certified to meet certain precision standards. In Switzerland, only timepieces certified by the Contrôle Officiel Suisse des Chronomètres (COSC) may use the word chronometer on them. Outside Switzerland, equivalent bodies have in the past certified timepieces to the same internationally recognised standards, although use of the term has not always been strictly controlled.
A watch is a timepiece intended to be carried or worn by a person. It is designed to keep working despite the motions caused by the person's activities. A wristwatch is designed to be worn around the wrist, attached by a watch strap or other type of bracelet. A pocket watch is designed for a person to carry in a pocket. The study of timekeeping is known as horology.
Seiko Holdings Corporation, commonly known as Seiko, is a Japanese holding company that has subsidiaries which manufactures and sells watches, clocks, electronic devices, semiconductors, jewelries, and optical products.
TAG Heuer S.A. is a Swiss luxury manufacturing company that designs, manufactures and markets watches and fashion accessories, as well as eyewear and mobile phones manufactured under license by other companies and carrying the Tag Heuer brand name.
ETA SA Manufacture Horlogère Suisse designs and manufactures quartz watches and both hand-wound and automatic-winding mechanical ébauches and movements. Commonly referred to as ETA, the company is headquartered in Grenchen, Switzerland and is a wholly owned subsidiary of The Swatch Group Ltd.
Omega Speedmaster is a line of chronograph wristwatches produced by Omega SA. While chronographs have been around since the late 1800s, Omega first introduced this line of chronographs in 1957. Since then, many different chronograph movements have been marketed under the Speedmaster name. The manual winding Speedmaster Professional or "Moonwatch" is the best-known and longest-produced; it was worn during the first American spacewalk as part of NASA's Gemini 4 mission and was the first watch worn by an astronaut walking on the Moon during the Apollo 11 mission. The Speedmaster Professional remains one of several watches qualified by NASA for spaceflight and is still the only one so qualified for EVA. The Speedmaster line also includes other models, including analog-digital and automatic mechanical watches.
The Rolex Cosmograph Daytona is a mechanical chronograph wristwatch. It has been manufactured by Rolex since 1963 in three distinct generations ; the second series was introduced in 1988, and the third in 2000. While cosmetically similar, the second series introduced a self-winding movement, and the third series brought manufacture of the movement in-house to Rolex.
The Rolex Oyster Perpetual Submariner is a line of sports watches designed for diving manufactured by Rolex, known for their resistance to water and corrosion. The first Submariner was introduced to the public in 1954 at the Basel Watch Fair. The Rolex Submariner is considered "a classic among wristwatches", manufactured by one of the most widely recognized luxury brands in the world. Due to its popularity there are many homage watches by well-established watchmakers as well as illegal counterfeits. The Rolex Submariner is part of Rolex's Oyster Perpetual line.
Double chronograph is a watch that includes two separate stopwatch mechanisms in order to estimate two separate events of different durations. It is often confused with the flyback chronograph.
A diving watch, also commonly referred to as a diver's or dive watch, is a watch designed for underwater diving that features, as a minimum, a water resistance greater than 1.0 MPa (10 atm), the equivalent of 100 m (330 ft). The typical diver's watch will have a water resistance of around 200 to 300 m, though modern technology allows the creation of diving watches that can go much deeper. A true contemporary diver's watch is in accordance with the ISO 6425 standard, which defines test standards and features for watches suitable for diving with underwater breathing apparatus in depths of 100 m (330 ft) or more. Watches conforming to ISO 6425 are marked with the word DIVER'S to distinguish ISO 6425 conformant diving watches from watches that might not be suitable for actual scuba diving.
The TAG Heuer Monaco is a series of automatic chronograph wristwatch originally introduced by Heuer in 1969 in honour of the Monaco Grand Prix. The Monaco was revolutionary for being the first automatic as well as the first square cased chronograph. The Hollywood film star Steve McQueen used the watch to accessorize his character in the 1971 film Le Mans. In the decades after his death the use of film stills has made the watch synonymous with McQueen. Although it was discontinued in the mid-1970s, the Monaco was reissued with a new design in 1998 and was reintroduced again with an entirely new mechanisms in 2003 in response to McQueen's increasing popularity.
The Flying Officer chronograph wristwatch (1939–present), designed and manufactured in La Chaux-de-Fonds, Switzerland by Gallet & Co., was commissioned by Senator Harry S. Truman from Missouri in 1939 for pilots and navigators of the United States Army Air Forces.
The Omega Marine Chronometer was the first quartz wristwatch ever to be awarded certified status as a marine chronometer. The watch was made by Omega SA and developed by John Othenin-Girard and is one of the most accurate non thermo-compensated production watches ever made, keeping time to within 1 second per month
The Omega Chrono-Quartz was the world’s first digital/ analogue chronograph. It was invented by Omega SA. The watch launched at the 1976 Montreal Olympic Games and was Omega's flagship chronograph at that time. The watch is noteworthy as it was the first chronograph wristwatch in the world to combine analogue display for the time functions and a digital display for the chronograph function, each working independently of one another but running on the same quartz resonator. (32 kHz)
The Omega 28.9 Chronograph was Omega's first small wrist chronograph. Introduced in 1932 as the Lemania caliber CH13, production continued until 1943. Lemania was acquired by the same mother company as Omega, SSIH, in 1932. Watches based on this movement paved the way for Omega to become one of the most successful manufacturers of Swiss made wrist chronographs.
The Omega Seamaster Planet Ocean is an automatic professional Swiss made luxury diving watch designed and manufactured by Omega SA since 2005. It belongs to the Seamaster line and has been characterized, since the beginning of its production, by a 600m/2000ft water resistance, a helium release valve, and the chronometer certification. Throughout its history, many authoritative international sources have often mentioned it as one of the greatest dive watches of all time.
Memovox refers to a model series of mechanical wristwatches with alarm function of the Swiss watch manufacturer Jaeger-LeCoultre.