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Durability, Accuracy and Longevity. Which watch would survive apocalypse?

9K views 69 replies 51 participants last post by  Zweig 
#1 ·
Hi all,

Setting aside all considerations of style, I'm curious which watch this community would recommend as the most durable, accurate and maintenance-free. Basically a watch that gets the time set, once, and then never needs to be touched again. Or phrased another way, a thousand years after nuclear apocalypse wipes out the human race, alien visitors should find the watch still intact and working among the ruins.

Quartz watches are out, as they require battery replacement (unless they have an alternate power source). Mechanicals are Ok (in the above scenario, when the post-apocalyptic alien picks it up and shakes it a bit it will start ticking), but the movement would need to be able to perform well without maintenance.

Anti-magnetic properties are highly prized (in this apocalyptic scenario the nukes also generated an EMP), as is high water resistance (the watch might have been blasted into the ocean) and naturally shock resistance.

The best I've found so far is the Seamaster 300 with its 15,000 gauss magnetic resistance and high water resistance. Are there tougher, more over-engineered watches out there?
 
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#14 ·
Ball, Sinn?

Did people actually read the OP? 1000 years hence - after a nuclear war.

No mechanical timepiece is gonna be ticking after a nice gentle shake. Unless someone shoved it in a sealed waterproof plastic container, placed in a temp controlled room - and even then, the lubrication oils are gonna be pure solidified gunk.

Although they say this is supposed to be engineered to 10,000 years....



Clock of The Long Now. An interesting concept...
 
#15 ·
From countless threads about the same subject : a Rolex is the best Apocalypse watch because you can trade it for food, water, services...
 
#18 ·
Sometimes i think I'm spending too much time on here and then I read post like this one and realize, I'm good.
 
#20 ·
Nah, Seiko kinetic, diver--I would likely use my SUN023, though I'm not sure about the anti-magnetism.
 
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#23 ·
1. Build a Faraday cage.
2. Put a solar powered quartz in it.
3. Stop trying to justify buying an expensive mechanical with the "well if zombies and mutants and vampires..." argument because that's by far the dumbest reason to buy a nice watch.

Really, a mechanical is not going to last long without service. The forces exerted by the mainspring ensure that parts will wear out much faster than on a quartz, and unlike a quartz, a mechanical's timekeeping ability is affected by how well its kept up.
 
#25 ·
I think I'll settle for being a few minutes off every day when I wake up and climb out of my half destroyed home to go scavenging for food. And if we are talking about nukes, then every watch would survive or fail depending on the proximity.
 
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#40 ·
I could see a few of us doing something stupid like trading away a month's worth of canned goods to keep a watch going in a situation where it was useless. Let's not forget what the "I" stands for in WIS . . . ;-)
 
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