90th Auction

2014/11/15

Lot 107

International Watch Co., Schaffhausen "Ingenieur Automatic 500.000 A/M", Case No. 2439733, Cal. 37590, 34 mm, circa 1990
A gentleman's rare, antimagnetic automatic wristwatch with date - with original box, operating instructions and papers
Case: steel, screw back, IWC steel bracelet with deployant clasp. Dial: black, applied indexes, centre seconds, date indication, luminous baton hands. Movm.: rotorwind movement, decorated, gilt, 5 adj., 21 jewels, Glucydur balance, shock protection for balance, fine adjusting device.
Ingenieur Automatic 500.000 A/M
The Ingenieur 500,000 A/m stands for one of the most glorious failures in IWC’s later history, and a failure she was in at least a commercial sense. During the early eighties, IWC had developed two exceptional amagnetic movements based on the ETA calibre 2892, the Porsche compass watch (ref. 3551 with calibre 37541 and 37542) and the “Minentaucheruhr” for the German Bundeswehr (ref. 3519 with cal. 3755AM). Now, IWC planned to commercialise the acquired technical know-how by developing an even more resistant calibre for a new leader model of their “Ingenieur” line. The goal was not to shield the movement against magnetic fields in a soft iron Faraday’s cage as in the previous models, but to make the movement itself amagnetic.
The expectations were even surpassed when the new calibre 35790 set a new world record surviving a field of 3.9 million A/m. These astonishing results were achieved by a set of technical innovations, including using rubies as rotor ball-bearings, a special amagnetic material for pallet fork and roller, as well as a new alloy (niobium-zirconium) for the balance spring. Only 2700 examples have been produced.
Source: http://www.moeb.ch/Ingenieur/10d_500000Am.html, as of 09/25/2011.

Sold

estimated
2.6003.200 €
Price realized
2.500 €