IWC Aquatimer Boesch
Boesch Motorboote from Kilchberg (Lake Zurich) creates reddishbrown mahogany boats since 1920. Boesch boats are famous for their quick starts, especially useful for water-ski matches. To celebrate its 80th birthday, IWC created the Aquatimer Chronograph Boesch, limited to 300 timepieces. Which is, compared to most other limited editions in this segment, really limited. The caseback of this watch has a mahogany inlay with a marine screw propeller and the dial shows the Boesch logo below the date window.
Watch-Site, one of my blog sponsors, has this IWC Aquatimer Chronograph Boesch in stock and was so kind to let me do a review on this time piece. The pictures below do represent the actual watch for sale.
After removing the white carton box, printed ‘Boesch’ and the usual ‘IWC Schaffhausen’ logos, a black box appears. This big black IWC presentation box has the mahogany ‘deck’, as shown in the pictures below. Unfortunately, you won’t use the box much I guess 😉 The boxes are a bit bigger than the one of the regular IWC models. Below the mahogany deck (you can lift it out) are the booklets, warranty card and IWC polishing cloth.
This watch (ref. IWC 3782), is waterresistant to 120 meters (12 bar), has a screw-down crown, a slightly domed sapphire crystal and is a whopping 44mm in diameter. The movement is IWC caliber 79320, which is based on the proven Valjoux/ETA 7750 movement. This movement is known for its ‘wobble’, this is caused by the rotor that has one free spinning direction. Most mechanical watch afficinados love the fact that they can feel the free spin of their mechanical watch on their wrist. The finish of the movement is up to IWC’s high standards.
As written above, the case back of this watch has the mahogany inlay with a propeller. A welcome surprise, because most watches seem to have display backs (or see-through case backs), even some of the diver’s watches. Luckily, IWC takes this serious enough with the Aquatimer with a water resistance of 12 bar. As you can see on the picture below (don’t mind the IWC protection sticker, which is still on it), it looks amazing and reminds us of the Jacques Cousteau diver that IWC introduced in 2004.
One of the most stunning things about this watch in my opinion, is the color of the dial and rubber strap. It has a very subtle brownish color, which I didn’t see at first when unpacking the watch with little light. The rubber strap has the same brown color and features the brand’s name on each side. IWC uses the same system for adding and removing straps as they normally do. You’ll have to press the push pin before removing the strap (or link in case of a bracelet). It is a safe additional locking system in comparison to the regular push pins (e.g. Omega) or screws (like Rolex).
As you can see, the crown and the push buttons for the chronograph are big and therefore easy to operate. To set the time and / or date, the crown needs to be unscrewed first. One click is for correcting the date, one more is for setting the time.
The finish of IWC’s watch cases is superb! There is nothing negative I can comment on their craftmanship with respect to their watch cases. The combination of satin finish and the small number of polished elements looks so incredibly fine. Kudos to IWC for this.
Watch-Site offers this watch (BNIB) for 6500 Euro and comes with correct filled-in warranty card, booklets, polishing cloth and boxes. Visit https://www.watch-site.nl/watch_detail.php?photo=34 for high-res pictures that show a lot of detail.
