Baltany field chronograph notes

I recently read of this watch and thought (after watching a few reviews) to see how it felt on my wrist (because that's the only way to actually know). I wasn't disappointed too much, mostly I think its excellent (and its growing on me).

Wots good

Well for starters, I like the understated and simple pragmatic appearance. The VK67 movement is excellent, well regarded and reliable, I applaud its use here because I hate having a 3 dial chronograph where one of the dials does nothing more than show you what the hour hand is already showing you.  

The AR coated Sapphire Crystal is perfect, adds nothing flashy and indeed is perfect because it makes for clear unimpeded view of the face. I frankly don't give a tinkers toss about Sapphire vs Hardlex because I don't give a toss about the occasional scratch, however that AR coating on the inner surface really just makes the watch all about the dial (the crystal that covers it just about vanishes).

As you can see above its a 3 sub-dial chronograph with screw down crown and pushers. People like to go on about how this makes for an improvement in water resistance but actually what I am attracted to most about this design is that you don't accidentally start or stop the chrono. Wound out for use they present a nice button to press.

Wound back down they stop accidental movement. Unlike some other movements I've had (my Pagani comes to mind) the feel and action of the pushers is good and definite.

So while there are a couple of points which I feel are totally absent from mention in most reviews, I'll also run through the basics here too. But I won't cover stuff which is adequatly covered in most of the very positive reviews.

When unboxing I found a very nice padded case and an actual filled out, dated and stamped warranty card.

The supplied NATO is actually what I call good, meaning that its thin, flexible, soft (not coarse) and has nice hardware.

Its black, despite how it looks in the lighting here.

The watch is a nice and neat (but busy) dial which is helped by the fantastic domed sapphire crystal which has AR coating on the back side. 

I happen to prefer to my watch on a leather strap (sourced from the design school of NATO straps) for "daily wear" and only put it onto a NATO (actual milspec is only nylon) when doing yard work or the like.

My wrist is about 6.5" and you can see the ends of the lugs come close to extending beyond my wrist (but don't quite). I measure the width of my wrist at a shade over 50mm and so when I wear a watch like my Seiko SRPE (with just over 44mm lug to lug) I'm more comfortable with that being the maximum size I like to wear.

The Baltany is also nicely weighted at just over 55.3g (no strap, with spring bars). This is also very close to  my Seiko (which is a mechanical and an automatic so it must include a weight for the winding rotor) which weighs just over 59.6g. I'd call them near enough to equal.

Hand placement

This is pretty good in my view, although not perfect on the chronograph seconds, the critical ones are entirely sufficient. Shown  below is the chrono stopped at just shy 54 seconds

Its bloody hard to read this by eye as even the non-magnified image is going to be bigger than it looks at wrist distance when you're also doing something (like driving) and can't just stare at it to be sure. I guess being myopic helps (but I'm long sighted so it doesn't).

This is where things stop being so nice.

Wots not so good

The dial is a bit busy and the lume is shit. The large sword hands obscure the ability to read the Chrono more often than I'd anticipate. 

Its not the watches fault, but why the hell did Seiko make the minute counter 60 minutes per rotation rather than 30? 30 Min would mean it would be much easier to read the chronograph minutes (having twice the space per minute). C'mon fellas ... there's a reason why Omega and Seagull did that.

Next I'm going to say finishing. Now this needs defining a bit, because to most reviewers on YouTube (notice I'm not on YouTube here) the term "finishing" only seems to refer to if a surface is brushed or polished. To me finishing means that edges are not sharp (meaning feeling like "that's sharper than a my cutlery knife") this is done by some amount of bevelling or chamfering. Lets take a look at what to the naked eye (meaning no macro lens) this edge (red arrows) appears as a "sharp" delineation ...

and in the blue elipse there is some sort of chamfer making it easier to put a strap in and it not rub against the watch case (damaging my leather strap, which happened). Note also the complexity of the curves in making the case and the lugs? Difficult to do. Note that even my Pagani had a go (rather rough) of making a chamfer for the strap (full blog post on that here)

Now lets compare that to the case of the Baltany

Hard, flat and sharp, much cheaper to machine. Indeed from the side here you can see that the curve on the lugs actually lifts the watch off the table. This is both good and bad. Its good because it puts the strap attachment place more in line with the curve of the strap so that its not clamping your watch onto your arm with pressure (this is more exacerbated with a smaller wrist) but its bad because it brings the lugs much closer to you (and can poke into you with a simple single pass strap).

Lets look at 2 other watches I have the Seiko and the Pagani Design Speedmaster homage

You can compare with other watches you have, but aside from wrist rolls and faffing about with words like "how the light plays off the watch" (and I'm like FFS, haven't you ever seen a Christmas Tree decoration ball?) I've not seen any direct mention of this issue.

The careful eye will observe that I've actually used a diamond file on the edge of the Pagani and put a small bevel on it, because it was about sharp enough to cut. The careful eye will also notice that my Seiko has some evidence of the (almost daily) wear its had since 2020.

Straps are tight, due to a lack of thought about the lug drill location. Its so tight  you can barely thread a NATO in. The spring bar visible here is 1.8mm in thickness ...

... and another spring bar will not pass through between it and the case, meaning its impossible to fit in a "luxury" NATO strap without removing the spring bars.

Further because that edge is so sharp there it shaved the polish off my strap (and I had to remove the normal spring bar to enable me to release my strap without more damage.

This is the only watch I have which is like this.

Getting back to the chamfer I spoke of, its present also on knobs, this means its actually part of good. You can see its presence on the edges of the grip for the screw down covers on the chronograph pushers and its also present on the crown too. 

More than I can say for the Pagani which was also just a straight cut without any chamfer.

So the crown finish and the grips on the screw down locks on the pushers are good.

As you can see here on a crown there are cuts in to give grip (the red line) and then a chamfer to make it not so sharp. 

I call that part of "finishing".

Going back to the above macro of my watch, you may also notice a strange discolouration around the knobs, yes that's visible with the magnifying glass, but again its nothing you'd spot by eye (probably).

I'll update this in the morning with the view of the Lume (which I expect will be good). 

Bottom line

If I knew this and had access to sharp eyed reviews I perhaps wouldn't have bought this watch, instead for little less money I'd buy a Seiko (who makes that VK67 movement BTW) or a Pulsar (a sub brand of Seiko) and probably be able to get to try it on in a shop before. 

Instead almost every review on YouTube spouted the same stuff (almost like a bunch of AI's copying each other).

Still the thing which really stands out on this watch is the effect that the AR coated Sapphire crystal has on visibility. Its fantastic. 

Would that really tip my hand if I knew all this then? Dunno.

This underscores my experience of Chinese watches. You can get something you can't otherwise easily get, from China on Ali (such as an ST19xx movement in a fully mechanical watch or a cheap homage of a much more expensive watch) and at a good price. But if you just believe every YouTuber out there you can get suckered into thinking that quality of finish you have come to expect (even in a cheap Seiko) just isn't there..

Live and Learn I say.

Still, no harm done, because the difference would be only a few bucks and all I bought was a chinese case and assembly and got a Sapphire crystal thrown in for a few bucks.

Wearing for a week

Its interesting, the dial looks like it'll be easy to read, but in many cases isn't. For instance:

• its often the case that I can't see the chrono sub dials because the hands are so thick (interestingly the original Omega never suffers from this, nor the Phylida (if only that was a proper 3 dial chrono not a 2 dial chrono with a useless hour hand added) either
• in lower light you need to get some reflections off that chrono seconds hand because the little red tip is nigh impossible to find fast (and when driving and timing things you don't want to stare at it)
• really, who the hell thought dividing an itty bitty sub dial into 60 seconds rather than 30 seconds would be smart. You have to be TOTALLY sure that you're seeing 15 not 14 or 16 minutes
• the lack of quick change on the minute counter is not just a feature its a must because at 30seconds or so then guessing the measured minutes is pretty much a coin flip (not least because the hands are not placed with scientific instrument precision)

Watch feels nice on and the above mentioned lug design really does (IMO) make it more comfortable on the smaller wrist (mine's 6.5").

Time keeping accuracy of the watch is of course everything you'd expect from a Seiko VK movement, 2 seconds a week.

Does Pagani have AR on the inside surface of their crystal?

I recently bought a couple of Chinese Speedmaster "Homage" watches on Aliexpress. I started out with the Pagani PD-1701 (review here) and for various reasons had a try of the (more expensive) Phylida (comparison and review here) because it had the desirable ST1902 chronograph hand wound movement in it. The reasons are in those reviews.

However it became obvious to me that something was different in the visual of the Phylida watch as it had a more milky looking view to the face than the much higher contrast (black is black) version on the Pagani. I considered this for a while (see that comparison) and wasn't certain. However now I'm pretty certain that its that the PD-1701 actually has AR on the back of the crystal (best place for it if you ask me).

Basically AR coatings (Anti Reflective) reduce reflections from the surface and increase the transmission of light and thus increase contrast (white is whiter and black looks blacker). The source of reflections is because of the boundary (air to sapphire or indeed sapphire to air). So with an AR coating on the back side of the watch we get less reflections from our side back to us because of that other boundary being not reflective.

I recommend that you watch this video to explain it with demonstrating it.

(yes I flogged the thumbnail from it for use here).

I believe this explains why the PD-1701 only has the one reflection and the Phylida two. This would mean that the sellers of Pagani on Aliexpress don't know that whoever is making them has slipped in a change from just Sapphire to AR coated Sapphire or they don't know why they should sell this feature up.

Either way the face looks much nicer on the PD than on the Phylida. This only makes more more enthusiastic to replace the Phylida Sapphire crystal with an Acrylic (Hesalite) one and see what that looks like.

I'd be interested to hear alternative theories, but without taking the watch out of the case and inspecting the PD-1701 I can't really know.

Phylida and Pagani Speedmaster chronometer homages

Recently I bought the Pagani PD1701 Speedmaster "homage" (because copy sounds so cheap) and wrote that up over here. I mention this because I'll be basically comparing the Phylida to the Pagani in this blog post. Now, because I bought the Pagani first it becomes the 'benchmark' against which the Phylida is compared. I don't think it matters which one came first (any more than the chicken or the egg). Others may or may not agree with my preferences, so I try not to call anything "bad".

So, first a "cell phone" picture of it on.

Its important to say cell phone because they are usually a bit "wider angle" and "wide angle in close" is a recipe for background relative distortions (meaning making the watch look more pronounced than it is).

Up front my summary position is:

• I prefer a mechanical mechanism for a "occasional wear" watch because no flat battery (well, ok the spring is the battery, but recharge is quick and fast). 
• the accuracy of assembly (and including the dial hand placement) is superior to the Pagani
• I prefer the 30 second minute counter (even if it does reduce the maximum time of the timing run without counting) because its easier (clearer) to see which minute we are on
• I really like the "quick change" of the minute counter (vs the pure simple gear mechanical method of the Seiko VK63 movement in the Pagani.
• I like the hour markers on the Phylida (as long as a photocopy of the Omega isn't on your short list) 
• The Pagani has better dial contrast (black is blacker, has better (more legible) hands on the main dial, but crappier ones on the sub dials.

Arrival and unboxing

The Phylida came in a heavy duty plastic post satchel and was wrapped nicely in a pneumatic ribbed bag. There was some sign of damage to the parcel because one of the ribs had popped.

This resulted in a dent along the top of the box

Happily I don't give a shit about the box but instead care about the watch, which was of course well embedded in foam, in a fcuking box ... which is what the box is fcuking for! (Packaging and box protecting has gone too far IMO)

The watch (and bracelet) was well wrapped to prevent any "chaffing" along the way.

Comparing

So, lets look at them side by side.

Some things stand out here right away, but probably first impressions made by me is that the contrast of the Pagani dial is a better and the hands are better. The contrast is no doubt due  to the crystal that Pagani has fitted. However the Tachymeter on the bezel is more contrasty and this is due to the fact that the Phylida is anodised metal and the Pagani is infilled high polished ceramic. Depending on the light you can't even read the Pagani because of reflections, but its seldom a problem when (and yes I have) actually checking speeds of things. Mainly because once the chronometer is stopped you can always just orient the watch to see it. Thus I'm going to say I prefer the bezel on the Phylida.

For what its worth the Pagani gets the 225 marker in the right spot, the Phylida doesn't (so when timing race vehicles or aircraft be aware of the 225 error ;-)

The sub dials are in a different position, with the Phylida being closer to the intention of the Omega (except that bottom pointless hour dial). The graduations of the minute counter (being 30 minutes per revolution) are clearer and easier to read in practice (some more on that in the video below) Some differences in the lugs are also apparent and also the shape of the crystal shows "internal reflections" show up more easily on that crystal. Further, the more milky appearance of the crystal suggests either 1) its not sapphire but acrylic (hesalite), as used in the genuine "Moon Watch", or 2) perhaps the Pagani does indeed have an AR coating on the inside of the sapphire crystal.

I'd need to pull the movements to find out or buy a measuring tool for determining what the Phylida has.

Looking edge on at the lugs we can see both watches are very close (like 0.2mm) in thickness.

However the lug profile is clearly different and the spring bar sits about 0.5mm lower on the Phylida. Next thing that'll stand out (which basically no reviewer I've yet watched on YouTube has ever mentioned) is that the bezel is quite differently proportioned to the one on the Pagani. Where the taper down to the case starts much sooner / higher on the  Phylida. 

To answer the question I used paint to select a section and copy and move it over to the other watch. This shows that the Phylida bezel is perhaps 0.3mm thicker on the bezel, but the top of the crystal is at the same peak elevation (meaning watch is the same thickness).

Note also that the Phylida case does not have the (poorly done, probably by hand) chamfer which makes inserting a strap a nicer experience. Yes, the Phylida case puts mild but visible scrape marks on the thicker leather straps I have (careful insertion and pulling away from the watch "into the spring bar" can mitigate that). What you can't see here is that the chamfer is not even on each side of the Pagani (leading me to suspect hand done). 

Actually the Pagani case finishing is what I'd call "visually finished"; meaning it looks good but in the hand and on the wrist feels sharp. Looking around it carefully, you'll soon notice that if its not "obvious" then its not finished there. Corners and edges were sharp to the touch and places where you may not look (behind the pushers) are rough on the Pagani. 

Weights of the watches are also different, with the Phylida coming in at 76.8g and the Pagani only 65.8g (watch only). This bit over 10g makes the Phylida noticeably heavier on the wrist at the end of the day.  However in some ways the Pagani feels less comfortable, and I suspect the sharp angles on the feature back (but I'm not sure).

Accuracy of the Phylida is (for now) something like +3 seconds per day; which for my requirements is perfectly adequate.

The accuracy is important to think about because the Pagani is a screw down crown, which I'm sure will lead to some (new?) owners ruining the threads (sure see that a lot on Reddit) by misuse. No matter what though, it will (no matter what) wear out over time. Depending if it is the the tube thread or the crown thread which fails, you may just be disposing of the watch. The Phylida (because its crown wound and not an automatic) does not have a screw down crown so this is not a problem.

The 'reserve' of the charge (lol) on the Phylida is not bad either, the ST1902 claims 40 hours and I've exactly run it for 40 hours and it was still running. Hand winding is ok, although I might be tempted by a bigger diameter crown (although it'll need a taper because of the close fit of the case).

True to the form of the watch being "celebrated" the Phylida is a manual wind no date complication Chronograph. This means that when I want to wear it, I can pull it out of the box, wind it, set the time (in either direction) and just put it on. No other fiddling with dates or whatnot.

You'll notice I haven't mentioned Lume ... both are poor. The Phylida however at least has quite shinny applied markers so you can see where they are if there is any ambient light.

Rather than just wite more, I thought I'd put together a bit of a show and tell together; which may hold details that I didn't intentionally photograph (but you can see) in the video.

Video

So with all this said I think its time to do a bit more show and tell where probably 14 minutes of presentation can clarify a few more things (and maybe you'll notice more there that I might not have said here too).

In the above video you may notice some niceties of the Phylida; such as the applied markers, better graduations on the sub dials, better hand on the sub dials and maybe a better fit for your needs. Actually when watching the video, keep an eye out for the cased finishing behind the pushers. Basically on the Pagani finishing is where all the corners were cut (or weren't cut and polished).

On the subject of the differences I'd ask this: is anyone else going to notice?

Probably not, but if my purpose is to examine them, and I notice it, then I need to report that because I noticed.

The case

Not having access to an Omega I have looked for angles which will help me to understand which case is closer to the Omega. I felt that there was something wrong about the lugs and the bezel. Eventually I found a good angle on a Hodinkee page (here) and so did some shots of my two watches from a similar angle to attempt and overlay.

Pagani then Phylida

Then overlaying on the Hodinkee image shows clearly what is what in terms of the lugs shape and style.

While neither are quite right I feel that the Pagani gets the case "righter"; but that Phylida seems to get the Bezel righter by dint of it not being so shiny (and there was no ceramic on the original Omega watch).

Lastly another short video where we can see more clearly the styling differences. 

Again I prefer the Pagani for its

• case lugs, 
• bezel style, 
• main hand choice 
• better crystal (if we aren't going to get an acrylic dome as Omega offer) with AR coating on the inside

However the Phylida has 

• the best usage of the sub dial  (with the ST1901 giving a better 30minute sub dial being so much easier to read) 
• the best assembly (and attention to details there) 
• and finishing (no sharp corners on the lugs or rough as guts crown).

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

In a Nutshell

It all depends on what you want. If you aren't the sort to really care about the chronograph movement, if you'd rather just have a no fuss watch which does not need to be wound (so is always going, except when the battery is flat). If you want the most time accurate piece that looks good at a glance as an every day watch. If money matters most then without any doubt in my mind get the Pagani, its better value for money.

However, if you appreciate 

1. a mechanical chronograph, 
2. accuracy of hand placement, 
3. button feel on the chronometer, 
4. finishing on the case

... then get the Phylida. I'm now wondering if I'll change the crystal and buy some lumibrite and fix the quite bad lume; and maybe change the hands (because I prefer the PD-1701 hands) ...

Ultimately no matter if you prefer the Quartz convenience in the Pagani or the Classical Mechanical hand wound calibre the good news is that in a day where everyone else seems to be sinking thousands into brands which cost thousands and then more per service than these cost to buy we have amazing choices of nice watches which cost very little.

Its clear when looking around at this magnification that (compared to stuff in watches which cost tens of thousands of dollars) finishing of the brass and even the steel is a bit 'iffy'; but we need to see that its a movement that costs hundreds of dollars not thousands of dollars. For instance an Omega mechanical movement service starts at about AU$1370.

So with any luck I'll get ten years out of this and I'm willing to bet I can get it serviced (assuming replacement is too high) for less than $500 ... heck I'm pretty confident I can find some youtube videos showing how ..

Win Win

Conclusion

I don't know which one I'll keep. 

I'm keeping both because I realize that the Pagani is the better daily life watch and reminds me of the Omega.  The Phylida is a great mechanical chronograph watch, it's and while it's not close enough to the Omega,  it's interesting in its own right and a worthy addition to my box. 

HTH 

Lancet sizes - INR vs Blood Glucose sampling

For whatever reason people seem to find themselves asking for advice about getting enough blood, one of the problems is often as simple as not using the right lance. The right lances are supplied with the Roche CoaguChek system.

Note the words CoaguChek, not Accu-Chek ... those are for blood glucose testing and the blood drop size difference is significant. I don't have Accu-Chek, but I do happen to have a different brand which is designed for blood glucose testing called Contour.

The key point is gauge (or diameter). Lets take a look at what I mean. I'm sorry, that magnification is not identical, but the table that follows shows this:

CoaguChek

Contour

to back this up lets look at the measurements I took with my calliper

more than double the thickness...

The point of the exercise is to lance to a minimum depth necessary to get a sufficient sample of blood.; not to create a bigger wound. A bigger diameter wound channel is better for bleeding than a smaller diameter. 

Lastly make sure you're lancing on the side of the finger (as the manual suggests) to avoid harder thicker skin on the hand and to minimise cumulative nerve damage from lancing the same point.

HTH