Watches possess incredible functions and characteristics, but to truly understand the details of your timepiece, it's important to know the essential watch terms.
The jargon surrounding timepieces is as complex as the complications that power them. For those new to the world of watchmaking, it can be intimidating when aficionados knock around expressions like "caliber," "frequency," and "complication. Therefore, before you start ticking around your local jewelry store to purchase a new timepiece, invest some time to understand the fundamental key terminologies—consider our simple glossary below as your reference point.
THE WATCH BODY: FUNCTIONALITY FUSED WITH STYLE
Whether for design or functionality, even the most miniature components of a timepiece serve a purpose. The subsequent terms act as a primary introduction and highlight basic-key expressions relating to the exterior mechanics of watches.
The Bezel: A metal ring—produced in ceramic, steel, silver, or gold—encircles the watch and holds the crystal in place above the dial. Oftentimes a bezel is found on dive watches, where it rotates and contains a scale for time or other measurements. However, some bezels are motionless and are purely decorative.
The Case: More than just a charming appearance, it is the vessel that protects the movement. The watch case comes in an array of contours: round, square, oval, tonneau, and rectangular.
The Caseback: The reverse side of a watch case that is removable to access the inside of the watch. Some timepieces have an exhibition case back that is transparent—often made in sapphire crystal—to allow you to see the movement. The backsides typically bear some engraving noting the brand, water resistance, and other embellishments.
The Crown: A tiny-rigid knob on the side of the watch case; can be employed to adjust the time, date and; wind your mechanical timepiece to keep it running.
The Crystal: Made from either synthetic sapphire, acrylic, or glass, it is a transparent, protective layering that cloaks the watch face. Synthetic sapphire is more expensive to manufacture, albeit it is considerably more scratch-resistant than the latter.
The Gasket: A miniature rubber ring to create an air-tight seal around the case back, crystal, and crown, defending the timepiece against water exposure during everyday wear—and should be examined every few years to maintain water resistance.
Watch Movements: Peer into the Heart
The heart of a timepiece is the inner mechanism that holds time and powers the functions. There are two archetypes of movements: Mechanical—an automatic or hand-wound caliber, and quartz—a battery-powered movement.
An Automatic Movement: Rather than rotating the crown, an automatic timepiece winds by the action of the wearer's wrist—a movement preferred by many for its security of use, self-winding through kinetic energy when worn.
A Caliber: A synonym for movement. Oftentimes used when a manufacturer denotes a specific model name. These movements are developed in-house by master watchmakers.
A Manual Movement: A timepiece that entails constant winding to keep the time by winding the crown to stiffen the mainspring. Most hand-wound wristwatches hold a power reserve of up to 36-48 hours before needing to be rewound.
A Quartz Movement: A movement that employs a battery as its primary power source by sending an electric current through the quartz crystal. These extremely accurate timepieces either have traditional dial configurations or have a digital display.
COMPLICATIONS: COMPLEX CAPABILITIES
Beyond telling the time, timekeepers house intricate and diverse complications that add more functionality to a watch. Most traditional functions include a chronograph, calendar display, a day-date indicator—that of which, more often than not, come bundled together—is typically sought after by the everyday watch-wearer. The day-date complication, which combines the day of the week to the date, is often set using the crown; swizzling it in one direction manipulates the day, while the other route modifies the date.
Timepieces display the date in various ways. The most common is through an aperture on the dial; although, more affluent timepiece brands reveal the date towards the edge of the dial. The day indication will sometimes spell out the day, while others are abbreviated.
The Alarm: The alarm function occurs on manual, automatic, and quartz-powered movements; that can be set individually of the main-time to remind the wearer of an event, for example. Automatic timepieces will wind through the motion of the wrist, while mechanical wristwatches need manual winding.
An Auxiliary Dial: Referred to as a subdial. Timepieces can have up to four auxiliary dials, commonly found on timekeepers with chronograph, alarm, or dual time-zone functions, although it is not mutually exclusive to these watch styles.
The Aperture: Complications, such as the day, date, month, and moon-phase functions, require an aperture—a window on the dial—to display this information.
A Chronograph: A timepiece with a stopwatch built into its movement that begets an independent sweep second hand and a minute sub-dial. Chronographscan be started, stopped, and returned to zero by consecutive force on the pusher. Timepieces with a double push chronograph function can measure interrupted time—they can start, stop, resume from their current location, and stop again.
The GMT Complication: (Greenwich Mean Time): A function for travelers: this complication enables your wristwatch to present the time from another time zone; there can be two movements in your timepiece—both indicating a different region—or, alternatively, employing a 24-hour hand, set autonomously from the rest of the sundial; for easy readability instantaneously.
The Jumping Hour: A complication that illustrates the hours in an aperture that immediately changes every 60 minutes.
The Minute Repeater: A prevalent complication for pocket watches during the 18th and 19th centuries was a function that chimes a particular time when a lever on the case side is animated.
The Power Reserve Indicator: A function that measures the remaining power in the timepiece activated through the tightness of the mainspring and display. Several watches have a power reserve of up to 10 days, in which the indicator displays days, not hours—a complication exclusively found in mechanical tickers.
A Moonphase Complication: Incipiently, it remained fundamentally used by sailors to measure tides; moreover, it has become a traditional and aesthetically alluring function that exhibits full, half, quarter, or new moon phases on the dial.
FIND YOUR NEXT TIMEPIECE AT BHINDI JEWELERS
Now that you have read over our watch glossary, why not test out your knowledge with the watch experts at Bhindi Jewelers? Our friendly associates will guide you through our massive designer watch selection from the top-rated brands in the industry. Learn more about how these fascinating watches tick, and pick one out that meets your every need.