Thanks to Vermot’s actions, Zenith was able to resume production of El Primero in the 1980s without having to redevelop tooling, first for Ebel – which would use El Primero for some of its models. Evening after evening, he secretly stored the presses (150 of them), the technical plans, the cams and the cutting tools in his secret hiding place. When Charles Vermot, a specialist in chronograph movements, got wind that the production of mechanical movements at Zenith was about to stop, he decided to take action and hid the essential components of the high-frequency movement. Aiming to market quartz watches exclusively, the Chicago-based company decided to stop the production of all mechanical movements, including that of the El Primero calibre. Zenith was sold to an American company called the Zenith Radio Corporation.
The 1970s could have signalled the end of this movement… As new, accurate quartz watches gained popularity, the Swiss watch industry was plunged into a deep crisis. The El Primero came with several interesting solutions, such as an integrated automatic mechanism, a column-wheel/horizontal clutch architecture, and an emphasis on precision with its 5Hz frequency. Unlike the Chrono-Matic/Calibre 11, which was a mix of an existing 3-hand movement and a chronograph plate, Zenith’s movement was designed from scratch. Watchmakers embarked on a genuine race to develop the first self-winding chronograph.Īmong them was Seiko with the calibre 6139, a consortium uniting Heuer, Breitling, Hamilton-Buren and chronograph specialist Dubois-Depraz with the Chrono-Matic/Calibre 11 and finally, there was Zenith with the El Primero movement – which appears to have been the first to be unveiled to the public during a press conference in January 1969. During the mid-1960s the time was ripe for the chronograph to modernise itself with the practicality and comfort of automatic winding. The Zenith El Primero, a movement first and foremostįifty years ago, in 1969, three brands/joint ventures revolutionised the watchmaking industry by launching – almost simultaneously – the first automatic chronograph movements. Today, another of the inaugural 1969 El Primero watches will be reissued, the reference A384 – and its availability is bound to please aficionados. To celebrate the half-century of this iconic movement, Zenith has already released several great pieces, all based on the reference A386 – in steel as part of a special revival box, or in gold with 3 limited edition watches.
1969 marked the introduction of the Zenith El Primero, part of the first automatic chronographs launched on the market.
This year, as you’ve probably noticed, is the 50th anniversary of two important milestones for the watchmaking industry: the Moon Landing and the launch of the first automatic chronographs.
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