Christopher Ward C9 5 DAY AUTOMATIC User guide

C9 5 DAY AUTOMATIC

O W N E R ’ S H A N D B O O K

Your Christopher Ward watch has been designed

and engineered by highly talented craftspeople

to ensure not only accurate and precise

timekeeping but also to bring a real pride of

ownership that only luxury items of the highest

quality can ever hope to deliver.

You have made an investment, a good one,

and the aim of this handbook is to help you

make the most of that investment during what

I hope will be a lifetime of ownership.

Christopher Ward

TIME ON YOUR SIDE...

INTRODUCTION

CONTENTS

C9 5 DAY AUTOMATIC 2–9

TECHNICAL INFORMATION 10–11

HOW TO OPERATE YOUR

C9 5 DAY AUTOMATIC 12–17

OUR WATCH CARE PROGRAMME 18–19

KEEPING IN TOUCH 20

C9 5 DAY AUTOMATIC

YOUR C9 5 DAY AUTOMATIC

Few watch brands create their own movement

and of those that do, only a handful add

something really original and important to

the world of watchmaking. Christopher Ward’s

in-house Calibre SH21, which powers

the C9 5 Day Automatic is one such movement.

Created by our master watchmaker, Johannes

Jahnke, our new calibre, which is a certied

chronometer by the Swiss Ofcial Chronometer

Testing Institute (COSC), can run under its own

steam, once fully wound, for 120 hours/5 days.

There is no compromise in the stability or robustness

of the movement which means the wearer can

be condent that their watch will withstand even

quite rugged conditions and require the minimum

of servicing.

The design of the watch follows the familiar modern

classic ethos of the C9 Collection. It has that

understated and timeless quality which requires

each element to be harmonious and brilliantly

executed so that the whole becomes greater than

the sum of the parts.

Every aspect of the watch exudes elegance

and high quality – from the sharpness of the

dial’s indexes to the subtle brilliance of the Bader

deployment that gives the perfect nishing touch

to the ne Italian leather strap or bracelet.

Our new in-house movement, which can be

gloriously viewed through the sapphire crystal

exhibition window in the case-back, has been

nished using a traditional, and difcult to

execute, hand-grinding technique so favoured

by English watchmakers of an earlier era.

As a relatively small, independent English watch

brand we have created an important addition

to the watchmaking cannon which will give its

owner a lifetime of undiluted pleasure as well as

precise and accurate timekeeping.

“ The launch of our rst in-house

movement, which is perhaps the

most important development for

a British watch brand for 50 years,

tops out our rst ten years perfectly.”

CHRIS WARD

C9 5 DAY AUTOMATIC

There are only a handful of brands selling accessibly

priced in-house movement watches and of those

that do, none is based in the UK. Whether you

like it or not, that makes the C9 5 Day Automatic,

its SH21 calibre, and its very accessible price point

interesting.

I rst talked to Chris Ward about whether he would

– or could – make an in-house movement a couple

of years ago. He’d invited me to write a piece for

his magazine on the Swiss competition commission’s

then-pending decision to withdraw supply of

movements and parts made by its subsidiaries to

third-party watch companies – companies that

include Christopher Ward.

Christopher Ward has always expressed a

spirit of independence and we like to see

that same spirit in the watch media. That’s why

we asked respected journalist Robin Swithinbank

to write the ﬁrst review of the C9 5 Day Automatic,

incorporating our ﬁrst in-house movement, SH21.

Robin Swithinbank is an

experienced watch journalist,

editor of Calibre magazine,

and a regular contributor to the

Financial Times, The Times and

specialist watch magazine QP.

THE C9 5 DAY AUTOMATIC

Review by Robin Swithinbank

Building your own watch movement, regardless

of who you are and how much cash you have to

throw around, is notoriously difcult. Even more

so if it’s your rst. The big boys sink tens of millions

into movement manufacturing, and don’t always

get it right. When you’re a smaller operator, the

risks are higher still, because as history has shown,

bankruptcy is only one dodgy gear train away.

As so many do, it’s safer to stick with calibres such

as the ETA 2824 – it’s inexpensive, reliable, easy

to service and looks alright through a case back.

In that light, SH21 is a brave step. A risk, you might

also say. It’s been on the table for four years,

and in the nal development phase for the last

18 months, which is not long by industry standards.

Not least when the calibre has a hefty 120-hour

power reserve and has been built with foresight,

so that in time it might carry modules that will

give a watch GMT, chronograph, power reserve

and perhaps jumping hour functions.

Take that then as a sign of how much trust

Christopher Ward places in its in-house

master watchmaker, the still impossibly young

Johannes Jahnke. At 31, Jahnke has already

C9 5 DAY AUTOMATIC

put his name to Christopher Ward’s C900 Single

Pusher Chronograph and Worldtimer, but the

SH21 is the rst calibre he’s taken from drawing

board to production.

Jahnke’s design is based on Baukastensystem

principles, a modular approach that takes its name

from the German word meaning ‘building blocks’.

In the most prosaic terms, the movement’s

164 parts are assembled in blocks that are then

brought together.

Johannes Jahnke,

Christopher Ward’s in-house

watchmaker and the man

responsible for Calibre SH21

and movements on such

innovative timepieces as

the C9 Big Day Date and

the C900 Single Pusher

Chronograph.

of a machine and the delicate hand of a

craftsman. First impressions can be deceiving –

lingering on it, it’s really rather charming.

Top side up, the design is increasingly distinctive,

the next chapter in the now familiar C9 story. The

new watch retains the clean, classical look of

other designs in the line, although its elongated

hour markers and spiky central hands create

artfully stark, graphic shapes that give

it a pleasingly modern twist. The message of

what lies beneath is communicated with

classic British understatement – only a note

at 6 o’clock hints at the sophistication of the

powerful automatic below.

Subtlety and understatement are of course

what has made the C9 collection so successful.

It’s Christopher Ward’s signature line, and given

the role played by its namesake – the ingenious

18th century British clockmaker John Harrison,

who solved the problem of establishing longitude

st sea – a tting home for the pioneering SH21.

C9 5 DAY AUTOMATIC

On the one hand, that means it’s very adaptable;

on the other, it means it’s not the skinniest. The

C9 5 Day Automatic is 13.45mm deep.

Not, as I understand it, that thinness is the point.

Rather, the point is to build a sturdy, tractor-like

base calibre that has all the resilience of a

Valjoux 7750, one of the world’s hardiest

mechanical movements.

Measuring 14 lignes across, SH21 is broad

shouldered, too. This creates space for a wider,

heavier balance wheel, which as horologists

will know delivers more stable and more

accurate performance. Christopher Ward

has been careful to prove the point by getting

the SH21 chronometer certied.

As for decoration, well there’s a story here, too.

Initially, SH21 has an industrial look – a description

more accessible brands often use to cheer up

cost-saving measures. But in this case, the

movement has a traditional handgrinding nish,

a ne grain achieved by combining the power

But for all its novelty and its genteel design, it’s

impossible to ignore the value quota in the

C9 5 Day Automatic. Given it’s price, it feels

remarkably well made, and ddling with the

crown, there’s no tolerance at all, a sign that

someone’s taken the time to engineer it properly.

The ve-day power reserve is frankly impressive,

and the hacking second function is a boon

given the retail price, too.

Much of the explanation for this lies in the

relationship between Christopher Ward and one

of its key suppliers, the young Swiss movement

manufacturer Synergies Horologères, founded by

industry veteran Jörg Bader seven years ago.

It was Bader who discovered Jahnke and backed

him as the one to innovate an avant-garde

in-house calibre. Likewise, it was Bader who

pushed the idea of working with multiple parts

manufacturers in order to deliver the best

value possible. Nine suppliers were used in

manufacturing SH21, and from what I could

glean, that kept investment in the calibre at a

fraction of industry norms.

C9 5 DAY AUTOMATIC

Refreshingly, Christopher Ward is making no

attempt to disguise the number of suppliers it

has used, nor the genesis of the movement itself.

The new calibre’s name alone makes the point –

it’s an acronym combining the initials of its

source and the 21st century.

In this Christopher Ward’s 10th-anniversary year,

SH21 hints at future ambitions. As Swatch Group

continues the process of cutting back supply of

ETA movements and Nivarox parts, and assuming

it remains viable, Christopher Ward’s set-up

may yet come into its own. At the moment,

SH21 will sit exclusively in Christopher Ward

watches, but, says the brand, with production

capacity open-ended, that might yet change.

Since Robin wrote this article, Christopher Ward and

Synergies Horologères announced they had merged

to form a uniquely vertical watch company.

“What gives you the

licence to do that?”

CEO of a major Swiss watch brand on

hearing about Calibre SH21,

Christopher Ward’s rst in-house movement.

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