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Brian M. Afuang

Jaeger-LeCoultre Plays It Loud

Maison’s Master Grande Tradition Repetition Minutes Perpetuelle chimes in

ITS name alone is sonorous; Master Grande Tradition Repetition Minutes Perpetuelle. It also declares quite clearly what complications this watch packs, namely a minute repeater and a perpetual calendar. And, not unexpected at all, it comes from no other maison but Jaeger-LeCoultre — widely regarded as the “watchmaker of watchmakers.”

At the Salon International de la Haute Horlogerie earlier this year Jaeger-LeCoultre’s Master Grande Tradition Gyrotourbillon Westminster Perpetuel emerged as among the show’s horologic sensations. The brand follows this up now with the Grande Tradition Repetition Minutes Perpetuelle. This new piece raises Jaeger-LeCoultre’s mastery of chiming watches to a new level.

Not exactly an insignificant development, this, considering Jaeger-LeCoultre counts more than 200 chiming-watch calibres in its past and present portfolio. Consider, for instance, one of its minute repeaters whose gongs press against the watch’s crystal itself.

Jaeger-LeCoultre
Jaeger-LeCoultre

For its part, what the Grande Tradition Repetition Minutes Perpetuelle does is mimic the notes produced by antique pocket watch sonneries. The watch does this via a pair of gongs joined at the base. Unlike in conventional minute repeaters in which the gongs lie flat in overlapping coils, those in the Grande Tradition Repetition Minutes Perpetuelle wrap around the periphery of the movement — Jaeger-LeCoultre’s cal. 950. The gongs wrap around nearly the entire lower part of the movement before arcing upwards. These then wrap around a second time, traversing about 80% of the upper part of the movement’s periphery.

Now what all this wrapping around and arcing upward do is create a really large surface; the gongs maximize the available space on the periphery of the movement both at the bottom and on top. This translates into louder chimes, further amplified because the gongs are so near to a chunk of the watch case’s surface.

Of course, the articulated “trebuchet” hammers, which strike the gongs as strongly and with the least interference from recoil as possible, play their part in the concerto, too.      

But volume is one thing, mellifluousness is another. So Jaeger-LeCoultre made the lower-pitched gong take a helical path from its heel to its tip. Its single direction makes it vibrate with full bass notes. The higher-pitched gong switches direction, folding back on itself like the tines of a tuning fork. This, in turn, produces crisper treble notes. Clever stuff.

Jaeger-LeCoultre
Jaeger-LeCoultre

The Grande Tradition Repetition Minutes Perpetuelle’s minute repeater is just as ingenious. The cal. 950 is self-winding, an oddity by itself among haute horlogerie pieces; complicated movements are usually handwound so that a rotor would not block the prized mechanical bits. But Jaeger-LeCoultre is no stranger to automatic minute repeaters. Its Master Ultra Thin Minute Repeater Flying Tourbillon and Rendez-Vous Ivy Minute Repeater are two examples.

In the Grande Tradition Repetition Minutes Perpetuelle’s cal. 950, the rotor is placed in between the mechanisms for the perpetual calendar and the minute repeater. This means these prestigious complications remain in full view. Certainly an added bonus for a perpetual calendar piece is the convenience of having a movement that winds itself.

Jaeger-LeCoultre

Incidentally, the cal. 950 stores power good for 38 hours, which is fair enough for a ticker which displays the day, date, month, moonphase and year along with the hours and minutes, let alone play the chimes of a minute repeater.

Despite the complications and a winding rotor, the Grande Tradition Repetition Minutes Perpetuelle is relative svelte; it measures 43 millimeters across and is 13.72 millimeters thick. Two dial renditions are available, both made of solid white gold. The first is silver-grained, the other a deep blue one with a translucent guilloche enamel coat handcrafted at Jaeger-LeCoultre’s Atelier des Metiers Rares. Both versions are limited to 30 pieces each.

Both, too, play beautiful music.

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