Rugged luminous watches produced originally for military...

04 december 2004

Rugged luminous timepieces produced originally for military men are now a big hit with civilians as well.

By Wei Koh , Straits Times

ONE IS a coveted brand of luxury sports watch. The other manufactures low-cost but robust timepieces for the United States army.

On the surface, Officine Panerai and PLT Traser appear to have little in common. But both brands have their roots in creating luminous compounds that help soldiers to tell time in the depths of the ocean or in the dead of night.
As with Ray Ban sunglasses and Jeeps, Panerai and Traser have also successfully made the leap from the military world to civilian consumer culture.

It's a fact of modern warfare that a significant number of skirmishes and operations take place in the night. This has created a need for instruments such as watches and sighting equipment that emit a small amount of self-perpetuating light.
The Officine Panerai brand was founded in 1860 by Giovanni Panerai in Florence, Italy.

The watches cost from $6,000 to $30,000 each and are only available at The Hour Glass, Cortina and Sincere shops here.
In 1910, the Panerai family patented a luminous substance made from zinc sulphide and radium bromide called radiomir.
Radiomir was encased in glass tubes to increase its resistance to ageing and used to create luminous sights for naval guns for the Italian navy. In 1936, Panerai built the Radiomir watch for the navy's special torpedo group.

This watch featured cases and movements made by Rolex but with a special dial that used radiomir markers and hands.

Radiomir watches were used by commandos to calculate dive times while guiding underwater torpedoes towards their targets.
In 1949, Panerai received a patent for the luminor material, a tritium-based compound that replaced radiomir.

Panerai made slightly fewer than 300 watches. In 1992, facing a cut in the military's budget and in a bid to stay solvent, it issued limited runs to consumers.

Watch models were named after the luminous compound that made them famous - the Luminor and the Radiomir.

The hottest watch this year might well be the 45mm Radiomir Black Seal, which pays tribute to the first Panerai worn by Italy's commandos in the 1930s.

The watch - expected to hit Singapore by year-end and costing about $7,000 - is simple and unerringly masculine and glows like a traffic signal in the dark.

Singapore's Panerai brand manager Fabien Levrion says: 'We understand the DNA of our brand has to do with creating luminous, robust watches that are rooted in our military history.'

But while Panerai commemorates the military history of the past, yet another brand is steeped in contemporary military culture.

This brand is called Traser and it makes watches for some of the world's most elite fighting forces.

Since the creation of the luminous compound tritium, the US army has used watches painted with this radioactive substance.

On April 12, 1988, a security officer in the US, monitoring a huge cache of these watches, received a shocking Geiger counter reading. Apparently many watches were emitting up to 100 times the 50 dpm (decays per minute) radiation level considered safe.
The watches were quickly destroyed.

Mr Jim Bickman, the chief executive officer of American company Stocker and Yale which was contracted to supply these watches, was in a state of panic. But he found a solution - an extremely bright but safe light source made from tritium gas contained in small glass tubes.

These tubes were originally used in compass needles and for rifle sights for the M-16 carbine.

In 1989, he submitted his new watches with hands and markers incorporating these glass tubes for testing with the US army.

It was found that while these watches were many times brighter than previous models, no radioactivity could be measured on their surface.

And the manufacturer claims that this permanent light source or PLT is 100 times brighter than traditional tritium paint and maintains its intense luminosity without batteries or solar power.

Mr Bickman's company continued to evolve its design and in 1994 created the Navigator wristwatch which has since become standard equipment for US army rangers, army special forces and Navy SEALS, among others.

As with trench coats and dog tags, the Navigator watches were brought to the civilian market by military enthusiasts.

Between 1989 and 2000, one million of Mr Bickman's watches went to the armed forces and a further 500,000 were sold to civilians.

Today, these watches are sold under the Luminox and Traser brand names. Unlike Panerai, they are a lot more affordable, ranging in price from about $500 to $1,000 each.

Says Mr Yusoff Mohammad, an army officer: 'I never really liked wristwatches until I saw the Traser. For me, it oozes a sort of paramilitary cool.

'When I found out they are used by so many elite forces, I had to have one.' By Wei Koh , Straits Times