What-a-Watch: Breitling Spatiographe

FOR SALE AT: www.watchbrokerage.com 


Here is one of my all time favorites. I was lucky to buy it complete with box and paperwork and in great condition. I really love this watch. The Montbrillant models are great, but the Spatiographe version is even better because the movement was specially adapted for Breitling to display a digital ten-minute counter.

The ten-minute counter can be found at the 9 o'clock position. It displays elapsed time in whole -and half-minute increments: First, 1/2 minute shows up, and then 1 minute, 1 1/2 and so on, up to 10 minutes. After ten minutes, it starts over again and continues counting ten-minute increments for up to 3 hours. At the 3 o'clock position, there is a running-seconds register.

The Spatiographe was produced between 1997 and 2002. Only one case number was used, reference 36030. Before the case number is a letter: A for steel or H for the solid gold case. Later case numbers are followed by a ".1" suffix. It is unsure why the extra digit was added—perhaps Breitling ran out of serial numbers and started over.

The Spatiographe is clearly from the Navitimer series. It measures 41,5mm in diameter and has a mineral crystal. The best part is, of course, the movement. Breitling developed the Cal. 36 automatic movement specifically for this model. It is based on the ETA 2892-A2 with a special module that no other brand was permitted to use.

There only a few variations of the Spatiographe. The first run consisted of two different dial colors, a black dial (see previous photo) with steel hands and a white dial with gold hands. In 2002, a different dial was introduced. This second dial style was also black with steel hands and white with gold hands: Both came in steel cases. There were, however, a few exceptions for this second version: Fifty limited-edition Spatiographes were sold with solid gold cases.

The earlier version seems nicer. Interestingly, though Breitling is well-known for their chronometer-grade chronographs, the Caliber 36 was never COSC certified. This movement did share the Navitimer calculator disc, though. The outer bezel can be rotated to make calculations in combination with the inner bezel. Breitling's included instruction booklets show how it is done. This watch is nonetheless probably more interesting for collectors than use in navigation!