Swiss Watches
With its new Hublot King Power Red Devil automatic chronograph watch, which is designed together with the famous Manchester United soccer team, the young Swiss brand is not the first watchmaker to offer a chrono that would have its totalizer tailored for the duration of a game period, be it soccer or hokey. However, it seems to be the first to offer a watch with two centrally-positioned chronograph hands.
If you will take a closer look at the photos, you will notice that the watch comes equipped with usual for the chronograph of this type five hands that are placed rather unusually.
Two of them, the broad, covered with bright red Superluminova ones, are here to tell us hours and minutes.
The third one, which is confined to a claustrophobically small space of a sub-dial at 9 o’clock, is a subsidiary seconds hand.
And the last pair, which is also rotating around the central axis, serves to count elapsed minutes and seconds on the chronograph.
May seem a tad confusing at first, but, once you get familiar with the Hublot King Power Red Devil dial layout, you will easily distinguish the two.
The arrow-shaped red-tipped one points at the red 60-second scale, which is printed right on the sapphire crystal. Another one, the white-tipped and visibly shorter, points at the light-grey 45-minute track on the inner side of the chapter ring. See? No big deal!
By now you may have already noticed that the usual facetted hour markers are substituted for some suspiciously looking greenish stuff.
Yes, that’s right: this is the grass.
These are specially preserved, treated and lacquered pieces of blades of grass that used to grow at the legendary Manchester United’s Old Trafford football stadium in England.
And if you just for a moment doubt the authenticity of origin of the herb, I must assure you that each pricey timepiece is going to be accompanied by a certificate guaranteeing its genuineness, signed personally by Sir Alex Ferguson!
The watch itself is powered by the new HUB4245 automatic chronograph movement.
Boasting black galvanic coated micro-blasted and beveled bridges and mainplate, the movement features a very healthy power reserve of 72 hours, so you can always leave it in safe for the weekend without the need to reset and rewind the watch on Monday.
The impressive power reserve is achieved thanks to a reinforced mainspring and an oscillating weight with ceramic ball bearings that together insure higher efficiency of winding and releasing the energy.
The movement is placed inside a gargantuan 48 millimeter King Power case which is going to be available either in their signature King Gold gold-ceramic mix or in black micro-blasted ceramic (pictured.)
Both versions come as limited editions with the former restricted to only 250 pieces and the latter (probably more affordable) to whole 500 examples.
WWR Verdict
Originality 4.5/5
Build Quality: 5/5
Usability: 4/5
Overall Legibility: 3.5/5
Nighttime Legibility: 4.5/5
Value for Money: 3.5/5
Overall Rating: 4/5
See also: Hublot F1 King Power Ceramic Automatic Chronograph (Ref. 703.CI.1123.NR.FMO10)
Photos: Hublot
Hublot King Power Red Devil automatic chronograph wrist watch specification (Refs. 716.CI.1129.RX.MAN11 and 716.OM.1129.RX.MAN11)
Price: $27,000 (MSRP)
Movement: Automatic, Caliber HUB 4245, 28,800 vph, Swiss Made
Movement decoration: Bridges and the mainplate micro-blasted, bevelled and black galvanic coated
Functions: Hours, minutes, seconds, date, 45-minute chronograph
Power reserve: 72 hours
Case material: King Gold or Micro-blasted black ceramic
Bezel material: Micro-blasted black ceramic or circular satin-finished ceramic with black rubber moulding
Crown material: Stainless steel, black PVD with rubber insert
Case shape: Tonneau
Bezel shape: Round
Case size: 48.00 mm
Lug width: No data
Case height: No data
Dial: Sapphire
Numerals: Arabic
Hands: Luminous
Water resistance: 100 meters
Strap: Adjustable black rubber strap; Clasp Black PVD titanium deployant buckle
Crystal: Sapphire, antireflective on both sides
Case back: Sapphire