i got a new watch that i thought was interesting enough to share on here.
it's the Mondaine Stop2Go. it replicates the behavior of the clocks in Swiss Railway Stations. all of the clocks are synchronized from a central timekeeping location, so in order to stay together, the second hand makes the full rotation in only 58 seconds, then pauses until it receives the electronic signal to advance the minute hand. at that point, the second hand resumes moving. the watch mimics this with a quartz movement with two motors. one for the seconds and one for the minute and hour hands. adding to the appeal (for me) is that the seconds hand is sweeping, rather than the usual one tick per second of most quartz movements.
i love this quirky feature. also, the ridiculous legibility.
one other unique aspect is the lighting at night. to avoid breaking up the clean appearance, they applied the lume to the back of the minute and hour hands. the light reflecting off the face charges the lume, and in the dark, it glows, and makes the hands appear in silhouette.
here's a photo and a short video of it in action, and then a lume shot from elsewhere, as my iphone isn't up to the job.
the movement in action