No, I’m not a professional pilot - that’s actually part of the problem. As a private pilot I typically fly airplanes with either old or absent high tech navigational equipment. And the old stuff has been known to quit working from time to time, including the middle of a flight.
So… by flying at a constant speed on a constant heading for a fixed amount of time I can arrive where I want to be, provided I know my starting point and have done all my various calculations correctly. But you need accuracy to make that work. Which is why I use a calculator for the math part, double check my answers, carefully trim the airplane to maintain a constant speed, and, yes, want an accurate watch.
At the speeds and distances I fly I don’t need Ultimate Precision, but if I was flying faster or father I would - if your cruise speed covers a mile every 10 seconds or so it doesn’t take that long to get lost. - One minute of error per hour (your watch’s “minute” is actually either 59 seconds or 61 seconds) sets you off by six miles. Multiply that by, say, a four hour flight and you’re 24 miles off course… and maybe you can’t see the airport you were aiming for.
I’m usually poking along at 2 miles per minute, and don’t stay up longer than 2 hours… so with such a watch I’d be off a “mere” four miles. Not usually a problem for a visual pilot such as myself, although it potentially could be if the visibility drops en route. For a pilot on an instrument approach, a four-mile error in their position in space can be fatal – which is why they use other means to confirm their position whenever possible. It is, however, conceivable that they could find themselves in a position where they’re back to time-speed-distance calculations with just their airspeed and watch to guide them - in which you want the most accurate airspeed gauge and watch you can get.
You’re correct that, in one sense, it doesn’t matter if the plane arrives at 05:37:17 or 05:37:49… but the 32 second discrepancy could make a crucial difference if the time piece used for navigational purposes is inaccurate.
Wow, Broomstick, I didn’t realize pilots still used that method (dead reconing, right). Cool.
Me? I’m getting a GPS for my car. While I’m somewhat adventuresome, I do love gadgets.
Dead reckoning is still common. When I learned to fly in the 80’s, there was no GPS readily available to the average pilot, so it was dead reckoning or learning to fly the ADF and VOR (which isn’t available everywhere). And of course, if you’re flying a homebuilt or an old Taylorcraft or something, there may not even be an electrical system in it, let alone a VOR or ADF receciver.
Even today, dead reckoning is an essential skill. Gadgets break. Plus, situational awareness is very valuable. I remember the first time I flew with a GPS - It didn’t have a map, just lat/lon coordinates, distance to destination, and how far off track you were. So here I am, flying along, getting lazy, chatting with my passenger. Hell, I was dead on track, 170 miles from my destination. Everything was cool.
Then the GPS died. Lost sat lock for some reason, and didn’t get it back. Suddenly I sit straight, look out the window, and have NO IDEA where I am. Of course, I had my map in my lap, so it wasn’t a big deal to measure back 170 miles from my destination along my flight plan and then look for landmarks. Recovered my bearings in a few minutes, and all was fine.
But I’ve heard of too many pilots with map-based GPS units not even bothering with paper charts any more. After all, the entire chart is in the GPS, right? Until it goes out… In a small plane without redundant navigation systems, this can be a big deal.
So keep your dead reckoning skills current, carry current sectionals and a good watch.
IFR = I Follow Roads, I Follow Rivers, I Follow Railways… I’ll pretty much follow anything that leads in the direction I’m going!
Actually, the way pilots dead reckon is to plot a course on a map, and then look at what landmarks it crosses. Then you simply look for those landmarks. Road and river crossings are common (“The little bend in the river should be a half mile to my right when I cross it”) Lakes are also excellent here in Canada, because there are a zillion of them, and each one has a distinctive shape.
Well, my dad got one for his 25th anniversary from my mom. I guess he’s had it ten years now. Now about my dad. He has to be the most careless guy when it come to posessions. He misplaces his glasses on a constant basis and is very terrible with small things like that, constantly breaking them, etc. He swears by the qualitiy, as the glass hasn’t got a single scratch on it, which isn’t due to any kind of special care by him.
I see it in two ways. Jewelery, and quality. Obviously there is the jewelry appeal. That goes without saying. But then there is the quality. I think of it like this. There is a certain level of quality that goes for nearly everything mechanical like watches, cars, etc. The higher the quality it is, the more expensive, but this isn’t a linear scale, but rather exponential. To get 25 percent better quality in a car, you probably have to pay twice as much. You could use an upgrade from a toyota camry to a BMW as an example here. But to get a similar upgrade in quality of build, etc, you’ll probably have to pay four times as much on a BMW to get something 25 percent better.
Rolexes cost, I guess 4,000 dollars? Sure the quality is higher than a 100 dollar fossil, but obviously not 40 times better. But some people do value that extra quality that much. While the price is 40 times higher, most of the value comes in the form of it being a symbol, but then there is some improvement in quality that some people appreciate. My dad has never been one for jewelry, but he really appreciates the quality.
I’ll stick with my Omega Speedmaster, although I do like the Seamaster as well. Maybe I’ll wait for when I win the Lotto.
My uncle was a Marine aviator in WWII and a private pilot after the war. He needed a good watch (he had a Rolex, a gift from my aunt, who liberated in from the lost and found in the theatre where she worked) because he said the clocks in half of the military planes he ever flew in were stolen, even in combat zones. Almost guaranteed if they were in transit and having their planes serviced at a strange field. The clocks in the civilian planes he flew in had more often or not, been damaged by the vibration, heat/cold and humidity, or they needed a cleaning, that they were always out of synch, if not simply broken. So a good watch was very important to have - if nothing else, to double check the clock in the plane.
My uncle liked the Rolex, but it was no great big deal to him - I doubt he would have saved up money to buy it. He did have an old Benrus that he got at a Hellzapoppin Olsen and Johnson show on Broadway. That was the watch he wore when he put on his suit.
Wouldn’t a cheap black plastic digital with a stopwatch, a countdown alarm and a currency converter perform all of those functions for a 20th of the price? C’mon, admit it - you like cool watches because they’re, well, cool. No shame in that - not what I’d spend my money on, but you probably wouldn’t buy a 1972 Triumph GT6 {far less reliable and totally out-performed by any rice-rocket you care to mention} and I would. If you like it, you like it: no need to justify it.
Is it true the FAA used to specify that a watch or clock with a ‘sweep second hand’ must be used for IFR flight, and that technically digital watches were not allowed?
There are problems with digital watches - the obvious being that batteries fail, often at the worst time. Some of them you can’t read through polarized glasses. The buttons can be very small to manipulate in turbulence. Plus, having hour and minute hands and a rotating bezel means you can use your watch to figure out a direction if need be. Self-winding watches never have battery failures.
But yeah, it’s true. Most of this is rationalization to have a watch you really don’t ‘need’. But isn’t this true for most professionals? Why do professional mechanics buy expensive Snap-On tools when they could buy Craftsman from Sears with a lifetime warranty? Because they like the intangibles, the feeling of quality, the confidence inspired by truly fine materials, the service…
I think the best analogy is to high-priced cars. A BMW 5 series won’t get you to work any better than a Ford Focus. In fact, in a lot of measures it’s worse: harder to park, burns more gas, maybe not even as ‘fun’ to drive. Yet, people will pay five times more for the Beemer. What do they see in it? Mostly, the intangibles. Supple leather on the seats. Real aluminum trim and fine woods. A precision engine that doesn’t vibrate much and produces gobs of power. Even little things like switches that have a precision feel instead of a sloppy, grinding action. Instrument faces that are elegantly designed and executed. Air conditioning that senses your temperature and adjusts itself accordingly. Etc.
None of it necessary. All of it small incremental improvements over the basic role of the vehicle.
I like the Mercedes analogy someone posted earlier. Rolexes are like Mercedes Benzes because zillions of people have them, they’re pretty un-hip, they are in the price range of most middle-class buyers, people for whom material objects are ‘status symbols’ buy them for the brand, and they don’t really do anything than can’t be done more cost-effectively than something else.
Regarding Sam’s post, the ‘intangible’ for me is that it’s a mechanical watch. With my Seiko Sports 100 Chronograph, I’m always watching the little second hand to see if the battery needs to be replaced. None of those worries with my Rolexes or Seiko Bell-Matics! And I like the idea of a mechanical watch. I just think it’s neat to think of all of those tiny parts working in concert.
Second that! I never cared for the look of a Rolex but something about some Tag Heuer models always drew my eye. They make them in quartz and mechanical versions and I opted for the mechanical one for the same reasons you state above… all those tiny moving part moving in concert! I’ve had my TAG S/EL watch for about 10 years and it has always run about 5 minutes fast every month. I could have had it adjusted under warranty but I fell in love with the ritual of adjusting it back to the correct time on the first day of every month. I expect to pass the watch on to my son one day and I hope he will enjoy the ritual as much as I have and think of me each time he does it.
Rolex is everything about marketing, and very little else. first, the watch itself is a very old design-the Presidential model is essentially the same design as the one they made in 1930. Second, the movements are machine made-they are not polished and gilded like a patek philippe, or Omega. Many high-end watches have glass backs, so you can see the highly decorated movement inside…this is not done with Rolex, because their movements look…cheap! That said, Rolexes are basic, reliable watches…but not worth anything NEAR their purchase price.
My favorite watch:…keep graet time, and a classic look!
I don’t look at really high-end watches, so I don’t know how many of them have glass backs. I have seen a lot of cheap-ass watches with glass backs though. It’s a gimmick. Besides, who wears his watch backside-up?
They do have artificial diamonds that are almost indistinguishable from mined diamonds. The only way you can tell the difference is that the “fakes” (which aren’t fakes really, they’re real diamonds, it’s just that they’re made of superheated carbon so they develop much faster than naturals) are more perfect than the mined ones, because they’re created in a standardized process. And only a jeweler can really tell the difference; it’s not like telling apart dimestore jewelry and the real thing.
And the diamond industry is advertising against them. Because obviously, that engagement ring doesn’t mean anything unless it’s been harvested by a slave with whip marks down his back. Diamonds are forever.
