Close Up: TAG Heuer 2013 Carrera Calibre 1887 Chronograph Jack Heuer Edition

Today we’re taking a close up look at TAG Heuer’s 2013 Carrera Calibre 1887 Jack Heuer Edition Chronograph. Unveiled this year at BaselWorld, this timepiece celebrates the Swiss manufacture’s most iconic creation: the Carrera. Designed in 1963 by Jack Heuer, the Carrera was first sports chronograph designed specifically for professional drivers and sports-car enthusiasts. With the 50 year anniversary of the timepiece arriving this year, TAG Heuer released a reinvented version of the Carrera featuring an in-house manufactured movement based on Edouard Heuer’s oscillating pinion of 1887.

The Calibre 1887 is an integrated column-wheel watch movement that vibrates 28,800 times per hour and has a 50-hour power reserve. Among it’s 320 components, is an audaciously re-engineered version of its inspiration, the brand’s 1887-patented oscillating pinion, along with a matching blue column wheel. The oscillating pinion, patented in 1887 by Edouard Heuer, works in tandem with the column wheel, in much the same way as an automobile transmission. The column wheel, which coordinates the start, stop and return-to-zero functions of the chronograph hand, functions like a gearbox. The oscillating pinion works like a clutch.

The case of this timepiece was based on the Carrera Mikrogirder 10’000, which won the prestigious “Aiguille d’or” at the Grand Prix d’Horlogerie de Genève; an asymmetrical case rising slightly at an angle at the top, where the crown and chronograph pushers are located. The hand-brushed bezel is black titanium carbide steel, the cage titanium, with a tachymetre and pulsometre on the dial. The caseback features Jack Heuer’s coat of arms and signature, while the 39-jewel Calibre 1887 movement can be glimpsed through the sapphire crystal.

Photos courtesy TAG Heuer.