The 24 hour dial: A week with the Zodiac Aerospace Jet 758

The Zodiac Hermetic Aerospace Jet has long been a watch I desired, but I could never seem to make it happen. I was drawn to the glossy black dial and bright white 24 hour numerals, I loved everything about the watch except for the size. I had fallen into the trap of believing everything under 39 mm wasn’t big enough, as if any watch from the 34 mm category was just going to look silly on my 19.5 cm wrist. Wesley, my brother and partner in Hoursmiths has the golden wrist size for this particular size of watches and has always benefited from me buying watches under 36 mm as they usually ended up in his collection. So for me the down side of buying a watch for myself, but giving it to Wesley out weighed how cool I thought it was. This of course was before I started collecting vintage Tudor and started wearing 34 mm Oyster Cased watches and came to find out, it was all in my head and no one really cared what size watch I wore as long as it was cool. So when the opportunity arose for me to bring the Zodiac Aerospace Jet in for Hoursmiths I jumped at it, and from the moment it left service I fell in love with wearing such a unique piece. The movement in this watch is the manual wind Zodiac 72 which hacks, is easy to service and very reliable also in this particular watch runs around +10 seconds a day at which I can have no complaints. Winding the crown on this watch is pleasurable and has become a morning ritual before I put it on. The watch wears much bigger than advertised most likely because of it’s lug to lug of 40 mm and it’s profile of just 9.5 mm thick, it feels flat and stretched out across the wrist. Once placed on an early prototype of our Hoursmiths straps, I really felt like it completed the elegant vintage style of this robust tool watch from the 1970’s.

So on to the elephant in the room, living with a 24 hour dial and what was it’s original purpose. Zodiac started making the 24 Hermetic Aeronaut in the early 60’s as a water resistant everyday sport/pilot watch that was perfect if you were used to reading time in a 24 hour format. The watch naturally found it’s way onto wrists of pilots and most notably helicopter pilots in Vietnam who needed to be able to read strait military time and were not concerned with a second timezone feature. So what is it like to live with if none of this pertains to you? Well it takes a moment to get used to, because when you glance down at the dial the hand position will make you think it’s 6 pm already, but upon closer inspection it’s really only lunch and when someone asks you for the time you may have to correct your first response when you tell them that’s it’s 4:30, when it’s actually 8:30. You will get used to the dial in a day or so and you did get to tell people about the watch because you kept screwing up the time. That’s when you’ll find out how cool and unique your watch really is, because most people have never seen or even heard about a 24 hour dial and are usually more inclined to hear you explain it. It’s elegant without being fragile and finds it’s self at home with most daily activities. It fits in with a t-shirt and jeans or if you need to wear long sleeves at the office. It’s a great watch that you can wear whatever the occasion and it’s very comfortable on the wrist.

Everything feels like an occasion when you wear this watch from winding it in the morning to explaining the unique way in which it keeps time. It’s a refreshing change to the norm, this is a great watch to have in the rotation bringing something special in a beautiful design. I loved my week with this watch, from the design of the dial to telling time in a 24 hour format this watch will be missed. As I placed it back in the shop this evening I couldn’t help but wonder if we’ll see a reissue of this watch from Zodiac in the near future with the successes they’ve had recently I could see this as a nice addition to their current offerings. For now we’ll just have to enjoy these vintage pieces that are constantly getting harder to find as time passes. Although I’ll be sad to see it go when it finds it’s new owner, I’ll know the experience of owning a Zodiac Aerospace Jet will be appreciated and that’s really what Hoursmiths is about. This watch really made a connection with me, it has a certain charm that just makes it feel really special. Not every watch that comes through makes me want to add it to my personal collection, but this one did and I’ll more than likely search one out for myself in the near future and I can only hope it’s as good as this one.