What is an automatic self-winding watch?
The first watches were handwound mechanicals. Then in the late sixties and early seventies manufacturers in Japan and Europe – at pretty much the same time – started to manufacture self-winding automatics. Interestingly the first automatic watch was the invention of a British watch repairer named John Harwood in 1923 but for some reason it took around 40 years for the automatic watch to reach commercial production. Automatic watches are as the name suggests, nothing more than mechanical watches that do not need to be manually wound on a daily basis. A half-rotor mechanism moves with your body motion winding the watch automatically by using your kinetic energy. A typical ETA-2824 Movement as used in the Marathon SAR Are automatic watches better? I always explain that it is not so much a question of better, it’s a question of personal preference and a deciding factor is often how often you wear it. Although it is estimated that over 80% of watches sold these days are quartz I always poin
