The new Girard-Perregaux Minute Repeater Tri-Axial Tourbillon is a technical triumph for the house

In a time when brands are dusting off heritage collections and creating vintage-inspired watches, Girard-Perregaux is, well, no different. The Laureato collection launched in 2016 was, after all, the resurrection of an iconic watch for the house. But the year 2018 sees the brand highlighting a different part of its horological heritage—that of musical complications.

Some may remember Girard-Perregaux’s series of three grand complication watches, called the “Opera”, produced during the late 1990s to 2010. Opera One was a minute repeater with a Westminster chime on four gongs; Opera Two was based on Opera One, with an added perpetual calendar; while Opera Three featured a perpetual calendar and a movement that allowed the wearer to play Mozart’s A Little Night Music and Tchaikovsky’s No Great Love on demand. All three were limited edition and highly coveted. A logical step might then be to reissue or revamp the Opera watches, but Girard-Perregaux has chosen to do otherwise, reaching deeply into its technical hatbox and coming up with a new musical wonder, the Minute Repeater Tri-Axial Tourbillon.

(Related: 8 Things You Need To Know About The Girard-Perregaux 1966 WW.TC)

 

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Above The resonance of the Girard-Perregaux Minute Repeater Tri-Axial Tourbillon’s grade 5 titanium case makes for crystal clear chimes

As the name suggests, the watch features a minute repeater with a tourbillon that rotates on three different axes. The tri‑axial tourbillon is rare in other brands and was only recently launched in 2014 by Girard‑Perregaux, but neither complication is newfangled. The interesting part of this watch lies in the technical execution of these two complications.

First, the tri-axial tourbillon. Like its predecessors, this tourbillon does a full rotation at different rates on each of its three axes—two minutes, one minute and 30 seconds—allowing the balance wheel to occupy a maximum number of points around an imaginary sphere. A tourbillon was first invented for upright pocket watches to tackle the effects of gravity on the escapement system, which would make the time less accurate. A tourbillon would correct this by mounting the escapement and balance wheel in a rotating cage, which would then not have gravity pull upon it at a specific place for long periods of time. A multi-axis tourbillon would presumably compound this effect and reduce the effect of gravity even further—of course, it is also much more difficult to construct than the average tourbillon. Its efficacy in increasing the accuracy of wristwatches is debatable, but it is largely agreed that the tri-axial tourbillon is a technical triumph and beautiful to lay your eyes on.

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Above The structure of Girard-Perregaux's tri-axial tourbillon

For the minute repeater, on the other hand, Girard-Perregaux has premiered quite a few innovations to its construction. For one, the case of the Minute Repeater Tri‑Axial Tourbillon measures a whopping 48mm in diameter and 21.3mm in thickness, and is crafted from grade 5 titanium. Titanium, along with steel, has better resonance than other more precious materials, which makes it an exceptional choice for a minute repeater. Furthermore, the structure of the movement, Ref GP09560-0001, has been constructed to highlight the chimes of the minute repeater. A conventional minute repeater would have the hammers and gongs placed on the back of the movement, but Girard-Perregaux has repositioned them to the front, so that the sound produced by the gongs can radiate outwards towards the wearer, rather than be partially muffled by the wrist. Moreover, the movement also fits perfectly within the case, with no wiggle room. This all‑around contact between movement and case allows for optimal sound wave propagation.

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Above Assembling a multi-axis tourbillon is no mean feat, especially one that features a total of 140 parts and weighs just 1.24g

The Girard-Perregaux Minute Repeater Tri-Axial Tourbillon has definite points of technical interest, but these salient details would be useless without mentioning the incredible depth and beauty of the movement, and the crystal clarity of the minute repeater chimes. Concave sapphire crystals allow you to see deeply into the movement, whose combination of shadow depth and transparency of the tri-axial tourbillon make for a visual feast for horophiles. And finally, the chime of the minute repeater is one of the clearest and loudest we have heard in a long time. And that, more than anything else, will make this watch a ringing success. 

(Related: Bulgari Launches The World's Thinnest Minute Repeater)

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