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Breitling has been in an identity crisis for 70 years. My 1951 Breitling looks like most of the watches of the time, except has a little more panache with its 6 o'clock seconds subdial. Keeps time like an atomic clock.
When the 1960s came, so did the space race and the drive to compete in the super-complex navigational timepieces. That's where the Navitimer and Cosmonaute fought it out after Breitling's patent of the Cosmonaute name.
In the 1970s, Breitling was all askew with having failed to beat Omega in the space race, while trying to keep up with Rolex in the fashion and sports watch hybrid race. The Navitimer just proved to be a little too complex, when the Chronomat eased its way into the range of products. The Astromat-Chronograph, one of 700 pieces that were made from old bits and pieces and specially numbered as "collectible" pieces moved that on into the 1990s after the Navitimer's heyday. Then came the J-class for yachting--how many of us do that?--on that nice bullet bracelet with a simple uni-directional bezel and four directional markers, typically in gold, so they could say 18K and SS.
After a half dozen of these transitional pieces, including the UTM module that fit only a 22 and 18 mm specially-made strap after the original rubber dried out and cracked, I went back to the good old manual-wind 1951.
The new gigantic Hublot-like monstrosities that Breitling have been making have pushed me to some other aeronautic flieger-type marques (I won't name the brands, but there are several nice German outfits with spectacular kits). That's my ho-hum. WmcP
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