H. Moser & Cie: Endeavour Concept Minute Repeater Tourbillon

For the Endeavour Concept Minute Repeater Tourbillon, H. Moser & Cie. presents one of the most traditional watch complications and combines it with a magnificent flying tourbillon. Two shaped chimes and the minute repeater hammers are resplendent against a dial featuring the newest colour in the H. Moser & Cie. catalogue, Electric Blue, intertwining with the tourbillon at 6 o’clock. To develop this marvel of ingenuity, H. Moser & Cie. drew on the expertise of Timeless SA, a specialist in minute repeaters. Together, the two manufactures created a brand-new design, showcasing the beauty of the complication by positioning the chimes and the hammers on the dial side.

In creating the movement and the case, significant effort has gone into ensuring the diameter and thickness retain their elegant proportions. The sliding bolt, fitted on a Teflon runner to ensure it slides perfectly smoothly, is built into the main plate to save space. The case middle has been widened to the maximum in order to accommodate the movement while allowing enough space to create a soundbox. This amplifies the chiming of hours, quarter-hours and minutes by two gongs, onto which fall two hammers that are raised based on information provided by different feeler-spindles.

The geometry of the case has been meticulously designed, developed and adapted to maximise the properties of titanium and enhance its impact, amplifying the resonance chamber whilst allowing the essential walls to form part of the resonance. Titanium has a high elastic modulus, which means that this material deforms very little under stress and is consequently more rigid; its low density ensures that it is also lightweight, and it retains the vibratory energy from sound well, rather than allowing it to dissipate thanks to its low damping effect. While ensuring the functioning of the minute repeater mechanism was already a complex technical feat, it also required perfect understanding of the subject to achieve a beautiful sound that combines amplitude, a certain length and a pure note.

The one-minute flying tourbillon at 6 o’clock is certainly eye-catching. Visible behind a skeletonised bridge, it is fitted to a ball bearing that improves the accuracy and chronometry. Resolutely contemporary, an icon for our modern times, the tourbillon appears to float weightlessly on the Electric Blue dial stripped of both logo and indices. (Limited to 20 pieces, price CHF 330.000)