Yema Updates The Super Popular Navygraf Marine Nationale With Slimmer Case And CMM.10 Movement; Junghans' Yellow FORM A; Nivada's Purple Ghost Pac-Man; And A Limited Edition Breitling Chronomat

Hey friends, welcome back to It’s About Time. Yema might be the most active watch brand of this year, with incremental updates galore. Also, I never thought orange and purple would work as good as it does on the Nivada Grenchen.

Do me a favor, check out the thing in red just below and help me make a decision:

In this issue:

• Yema Brings The CMM.10 Calibre To Their Increasingly Popular Navygraf Marine Nationale

• Junghans Updates Their Modern FORM A Chronoscope With A Sunshine Yellow Colorway

• Nivada Grenchen And Exquisite Timepieces Release A Purple Ghost Pac-Man Depthmaster

• Breitling Helps Watches Of Switzerland Celebrate Centenary With 42mm Chronomat In Titanium

Today’s reading time: 7 minutes and 55 seconds

👂What’s new

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Yema Brings The CMM.10 Calibre To Their Increasingly Popular Navygraf Marine Nationale

I can’t even begin to tell you how many people were confused when I told them that Yema, the french brand, was not an upstart microbrand. While a lot of watch fans have learned of Yema from their major moves over the past 10 years, they have been making watches since the 1940s. In the 1950s, they were among the first brands that made a diver with 100 meters of water resistance. In the 60s, Yema was the biggest watch exporter in France, selling more than 500,000 watches per year. Twenty years later, they nearly dissapeared thanks to the quartz crisis. In the past decade or so they’ve been making their way back and they’re on track to their former glory. And a significant part of that comeback plan was the development of their own movements. Now they’re updating one of their most successful watches of all time, the Navygraf Marine Nationale, first developed in the 70s for the French Navy. Over the years they made several Navygraf Marine Nationale models, and this latest one gets a sleeker case, modern dial and two very nice bezels, along with the CMM.10 movement.

The Navygraf has always been the skin-diver variant of the more hardcore Superman diver, and has thus had a sleeker case. But the use of the proprietary movement has allowed Yema to shrink it down even more. The new Navygraf Marine Nationale gets a completely redesigned case that measures 39mm wide, 46mm from lug to lug, but most impressively, the thickness is just 11mm thick, including a 2.2mm double-domed sapphire crystal. That’s not that thin, you might think, and I would agree. But the thing is… This watch has 300 meters of water resistance, and that’s extremely thin for such a high water resistance. I can think of maybe one or two watches with such a high water resistance that are thinner, and one is a Blancpain Bathyscaphe 38mm, which will run you 8x the price of this. Surrounding the double dome crystal is a heavily fluted bezel with 60 minute markings on the sapphire insert. You can chose between a blue insert with lumed markings or, much cooler, a white insert that is completely lumed.

The dial, identical on the two versions, has also been significantly updated from the old three-hand version of the Navygraf Marine Nationale. Gone are the exclamation point” markers of the original Navygraf in favor of alternating circular, rectangular and triangular shapes for the hour markers. The base of the dial is blue, offset by the yellow Navygraf name and seconds hand. The rest of the hardware is white and filled with lume.

Inside, a major update. While Yema has been on a roll adding their CMM.20 micro-rotor movement to a lot of their watches, the CMM.10 automatic is their bread and butter. Designed by watchmaker Olivier Mory, this time-only movement has an anti-magnetic Glucydur balance wheel, is regulated to chronometric precision (but without actual certification), beats at 28,800bph and has a modern 70 hour power reserve. The watch comes on either a stainless steel bracelet with a diver’s extension or a strap that we have come to call a “marine nationale”, a fabric strap that hooks together like fastners on a parachute.

The new Yema Navygraf Marine National CMM.10 is available for purchase now — but with deliveries scheduled for September — and priced at €1,690 on the bracelet and €1,590 on the strap. See more on the Yema website.

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Junghans Updates Their Modern FORM A Chronoscope With A Sunshine Yellow Colorway

I wrote about the new Meister Chronoscope from Junghans last week and I noted how the brand is best known for its Bauhaus-inspired Max Bill, but they also made quite a few models outside of this range. Models that would surprise you with their avant-garde approach or use of colors, all while keeping true to the Bauhaus design school. One of these watches is the FORM A Chronoscope, a hyper-modern take on a chronograph that plays with shapes and colors in a very refreshing way. Their laters version come just in time to grab one for the last few days of summer holidays, with bright yellow details on an all black watch.

The case of the watch is very Junghans in its execution. It measures 42mm wide and 13.7mm thick. AS you can see in the picture above, the entire stainless steel gets a black PVD coat. The entire case and bezel also has a polished look, making the black really stand out. It’s supposed to be a sports watch, with its chronograph function, but just don’t go diving with it, as the water resistance is limited to 50 meters.

But the water resistance won’t matter at all, because this is all about good looks. The dial is all black, with a very aggressive concave dish to it. Running up that slope are long and thin bright yellow hour makers. The same color can be found on the baton hands, while the rest of the dial details are very stealthy, with grey chrono sub-dials. The tri-compax layout has a 30-minute timer at 12 o’clock, 12-hour timer at 6 and small seconds at 9, while at 3 o’clock you’ll find the day and date indicator.

Inside is the J880.1 automatic movement, which is essentially a ETA 7750 with a custom rotor. It beats at 4Hz and has a 48 hour power reserve. You can see the movement through the glass caseback, but only so, as the case is illustrated by artist Richard Macneil artwork of Times Square and its iconic yellow cabs. The watch comes on either a yellow or black leather strap.

According to Junghans, the new yellow FORM A Chronoscope goes on sale in August, at a price of €1,990. See more on the Junghans website.

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Nivada Grenchen And Exquisite Timepieces Release A Purple Ghost Pac-Man Depthmaster

Nivada Grenchen has a perfect plan for their releases. Just flip through their impossibly huge catalogue, recreate the best watches and then iterate on them. I love that approach in general, but I particularly love it with Nivada as they have had some pretty amazing watches over the years. And one of my favorites is surely the Depthmaster, which was once the first waterproof diving watch to withstand 1,000 meters, way back in 1965. It was also very well known for their super-unique numerals that we get on the modern reissues as well and call the Pac-Man dial for its resemblance to the video game character. Now, Nivada Grenchen has teamed up with watch retailer Exquisite Timepieces for a very limited edition of the Dethmaster, one that gets a purple color scheme.

The Depthmaster has a very recognisable cushion shaped case that’s actually smaller than you would expect when seeing it in pictures - 39mm wide, 13mm thick and with a lug-to-lug of 47mm. The case is made out of stainless steel with heavily brushed surfaces and a chunky all-metal bezel with minute graduations for the first 15 minutes. Out back is a stainless steel caseback and since you can go down to 1,000 meters, there’s also a helium escape valve on the left side of the case. On top is a sapphire crystal.

The dial still has the indices at 3, 6, 9 and 12 o’clock feature the famous stylised Art Deco numerals that look so much like Pac-Man characters. The numerals and indices are raised from the surface, with a thin silver border, and painted purple. The same color can be found on the hands, while the central seconds hand is bright orange. This complements the gradient base of the dial, fading from a black on the outside to a grey in the centre. A nice touch is that all the purple parts are also lumed, without giving away the fact that they are lumed.

Inside is the Soprod P024 automatic, yet another clone of the ETA 2824-2. You know the spec then - a beat rate of 28,800vph and a 38 hour power reserve. The watch comes on a black tropic rubber strap.

The new Nivada Grenchen x Exquisite Timepieces Depthmaster 'Purple Ghost' is available now from Exquisite Timepieces and limited to just 50 pieces. Price is set at $1,185. See more on the Exquisite Timepieces website.

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Breitling Helps Watches Of Switzerland Celebrate Centenary With 42mm Chronomat In Titanium

While they are a UK based retailer, Watches of Switzerland has spread to the EU, but particularly to the United States, making them one of the largest watch retailers in the world. And they’ve been around for a while. In fact, they have been celebrating their 100th anniversary this entire year. It’s a bit shocking to hear such a large number. Their latest release to commemorate this big birthday is a collaboration with Breitling, the 42mm wide Chronomat B01 Titanium.

Starting of with the case, it comes in the 42mm Chronomat B01 version, meaning that it measures 42mm wide, a hefty 15.1mm thick and has a 50.5mm lug-to-lug. This is a chunky watch in the best tradition of chunky Breitling pieces. But the chunkiness won’t be translated into heft, as this piece doesn’t use stainless steel or gold, but rather out of titanium, which will surely help with the gigantic size. On the back is an open caseback with the words ‘WOS 1924 – 2024’ engraved into it, along with a model number for the limited edition. Water resistance is 200 meters.

The dial is also special on the limited, but only so much. Surrounding a deep green sunray-brushed base is an anthracite inner bezel, tachymeter scale and subdials, contrasting with an olive green dial. Hour markers are applied, lume filled, as are the simple hands. The central chronograph hand has a Breitling B as the counterweigh, but other than that there are no superfluous links to it being a Swatches of Switzerland limited edition.

Inside is the Breitling Caliber B01 automatic chronograph movement, COSC certified and beating at 28,800vph with a power reserve of 70-hours. It’s also as decorated as a Breitling gets with Geneva stripes on its uppermost bridge and a gold-finished rotor. The watch can be had on the collection’s signature Rouleaux bracelet in matching titanium or a black rubber strap. The bracelet is incredibly expensive (no, really, hang around to see what they want for it), but it transforms the watch into something really beautiful.

The new Watches of Switzerland Breitling 42mm Chronomat B01 is limited to 100 pieces and priced at £9,850. See more on the Watches of Switzerland website.

🫳On hand

Our selection of the best reviews we stumble upon

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A review of the Timex x Ghostly Navi

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Hands-On With The New Black-Dial Omega Seamaster Aqua Terra Models

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A review of Kari Voutilainen's 20th Anniversary Tourbillon

⚙️Watch Worthy

A look at an off beat, less known watch you might actually like

Does the forgotten Genta designed Credor Locomotive have magical powers

The beautifully finished case is combined with a spectacular dial. As Henry explained, this backdrop features 1,600 radial lines that look stunning in real life. They work together incredibly well with the color of the dial. Credor might claim that it’s a black dial, but it changes color in different lighting, going from black to dark gray to almost a dark brown.

Read the whole review on Fratello

⏲️Wait a minute

A bunch of links that might or might not have something to do with watches. One thing’s for sure - they’re interesting

• Al Cantello, a star of the U.S. track and field team, arranged a covert meeting between a government agent and a Ukrainian long jumper. Why? Well, because at the 1960 Olympics, American athletes recruited by the CIA tried to convince their Soviet peers to defect.

• This is extremely disturbing. It seems that there is a significant number of people who have a mysterious neurological condition makes faces look grotesque — essentially making them see monsters at every step. What does this tell us about our brains?

• Why did a radical British professor become a cheer-leader for Pol Pot? And why was he murdered on the very day he'd met the brutal dictator? Andrew Anthony on the extraordinary life and death of Malcolm Caldwell.

👀Watch this

One video you have to watch today

Comedy is a tricky thing as it is so often an extremely personal thing what we find funny. But there are some universal truths to comedy. Eddie Murphy Raw was a brilliant special is one truth. Whether he made you laugh or not, it’s a truth that Andy Kaufman was a genius comic. And it’s a truth that to be a comedian like Kaufman takes an incredible amount of self control. And this is exactly what we got to see in this standup set from Michael Malamud. Kill Tony just might be the most impressive comedy revue show on the planet. And to be the best to have ever stood on that stage says a lot.

💵Pre-loved precision

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