Meet The New Citizen Promaster Geo Trekker
Citizen’s Promaster line has brought us professional toolwatches for 35 years. Today, I’ll look at one of the last additions, the Citizen Promaster Geo Trekker. It’s available in three colorways and was designed for pilots. However, I discovered this watch is equally suitable for general watch lovers like you and me.
Citizen Promaster Geo Trekker
A striking 46mm stainless steel case defines the design of the Citizen Promaster Geo Trekker, and the watch comes in three color variations — gray with white accents, black with yellow accents, and blue/green with white and red accents. The last version also has a gray IP coating on its exterior. What struck me immediately was that, despite the dial’s busyness in all three colorways, the watch is easy to read in diverse conditions. Although all three versions are attractive, the gray-dial one immediately spoke to me the most. So that’s the one I used for my hands-on experience, but the others are also shown in this article.
Promaster Geo Trekker functions
This watch’s functions include central ticking seconds, minutes, and hours, an AM/PM indicator, the day and date, a power reserve indicator, a UTC display, and a slide rule bezel. The Promaster Geo Trekker utilizes Citizen’s Eco-Drive technology. Therefore, any light source can power the movement, which doesn’t require battery changes. Once set to your time zone, it’s a watch that doesn’t need much attention to keep running accurately as power and time-setting are taken care of more or less automatically.
The slide rule
Let me start with the Promaster Geo Trekker’s slide rule. It’s easily the most complicated function and useless for most of us simultaneously. The funny thing is that there is no word about it in the watch’s official manual. The slide rule’s numerals aren’t even in the manual’s pictures. Anyway, Google is your friend, and through manuals of other Promaster Air models, like this one and this one, you can quickly learn how to calculate ground speed, flying distance, fuel consumption, unit conversion, and general calculations. You never know when that will come in handy.
Time, day, and date
Here, we have the main purpose of Promaster Geo Trekker. Once the watch has received a radio-controlled time signal, you only have to tell it which city or part of the world you are in. Then, the watch automatically shows the right time, day, and date. It even automatically considers eventual daylight saving time, although you can override this manually. Last, a sub-dial shows the time in a 24-hour format to determine if the time shown is AM or PM. There is no need for monthly and leap-year date correction until February 28th, 2100.
Bold pushers
It’s easy to reset your location via the crown and the pushers. Unscrewing the crown and pulling it one position out allows you to set the city by repeatedly pushing the upper pusher. Pulling the crown two positions out allows the lower pusher to set automatic or manual change of daylight saving. On the Promaster Geo Trekker’s US and UK websites, Citizen mentions “a bold set of chronograph pushers.” However, while these look like chronograph pushers, please realize that the watch has no chronograph function. These bold pushers are merely correctors exclusively for operating and setting the watch’s functions.
Displaying another time zone
The “world time” function of this Promaster Geo Trekker involves setting the watch to another city. The watch then shows the time in that city instead of the time in the city you are in. It’s impossible to simultaneously check the time in another city and display the time in your location. At 6 o’clock on the dial, a map-inspired Northern Hemisphere disc rotates counterclockwise. It shows UTC using a small triangle. The time of this rotating disc will intentionally always show UTC and can not be set separately to another (home) time. Of course, you can use the map on the disc to determine the approximate time in other parts of the world, but that will only be a rough indication.
Power reserve and time zone
In regular time-keeping mode (with the crown fully screwed in), it’s easy to check the power reserve and time-zone setting. A push of the upper pusher will make the little hand at 12 o’clock point to the gauge for the power reserve, indicating from 3 to 0. When the power reserve drops to 1 or 0, the hand will automatically show the battery level instead of the day of the week.
Checking the time-zone setting is also simple. It only requires pushing the lower button in regular time-keeping mode. Then, the large seconds hand will show the city corresponding to the displayed time, while the little hand at 12 o’clock points to “NO” or “OK” to indicate if the last time-signal reception was successful.
Bracelet, crystal, and water resistance
Besides the impressive specifications and functionality of Citizen’s H864 module, I want to mention a few other things that make this watch excellent. First, there’s the solid five-row stainless steel bracelet. It is heavy, feels properly made, and displays beautiful finishing. The links alternate between matte and polished, as does the clasp, which is matte with polished push buttons to open it. Inside the clasp, the bracelet can be finely adjusted in two positions. Sizing the bracelet requires removing friction pins (not screws) to take links out. A scratch-resistant, antireflective sapphire crystal is also something to love. It ensures a clear view of the dial without scratches, even if the watch sees action in the harsh conditions for which Citizen intended it. The Promaster Geo Trekker’s 20-bar water resistance is equally important in this light. However, Citizen doesn’t consider this suitable for scuba diving.
Conclusion and pricing
The Citizen Promaster Geo Trekker has proven to be a reliable and pleasant companion during the weeks I’ve been wearing it. Although a 46mm case is considered rather large nowadays, the watch hasn’t bothered me on my 18cm wrist. It was a pleasure to wear and use and quickly became a reliable daily companion. I must point out that I haven’t worn the watch on its metal bracelet for two reasons: I didn’t fancy sizing the bracelet of the sample watch, and the bracelet is a bit too flashy for my taste. Therefore, I wore it on a leather-lined 22mm canvas Sinn strap. The list price of the Citizen Promaster Geo Trekker is US$795 / £629 / €595. I think it is adequate for this technically sophisticated and well-made watch.
What do you think about this addition to Citizen’s Promaster series, and which colorway is your favorite? As always, please let us know in the comments below.
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