An F. P. Journe Linesport Chronographe Monopoussoir Rattrapante, In Platinum
One of the most underrated rattrapante chronographs in the world is also one of the most beautiful.
There are three complications which are considered to represent the ultimate achievements in complicated watchmaking (and no, the tourbillon isn’t one of them). These are the perpetual calendar, the minute repeater, and the rattrapante, or split seconds, chronograph. It is easy to understand why the perpetual calendar and the repeater are two of the three – they both perform obviously rather miraculous feats for minute mechanical devices and both appeal to our instinctive belief that the more parts a complication has, the more worthy it is of respect. The rattrapante chronograph can have a high parts count but generally they do not have the somewhat Rube Goldberg-esque appeal of their calendrical and chiming counterparts, and the fact that the complication has been successfully industrialized (by, among others, IWC) makes it hard to convince anyone that their first impression of the rattrapante – that it is basically just a chronograph that’s had a shave and put on a tie – is mistaken. Journe’s Linesport Monopusher Rattrapante is a case in point.
Before going through the finer points of the watch, a quick look at the complication might shed some light on why, historically, the rattrapante has been considered a high complication. The rattrapante chronograph has two chronograph seconds hands, one superimposed above the other, so that they look at a glance like just one hand. When you start a rattrapante, the two seconds hands begin running together. If while the chrono is running, you then push the “split” button, one of the two seconds hands stops, while the other continues to run. You can then stop that seconds hand by pushing the start/stop button. In this way you can read off two elapsed time intervals. If you have split the seconds hand and have not stopped the hand continuing to run, you can push the split button a second time, and the stopped split hand will jump forward to join the running hand.
The underlying mechanism is so clever you wonder how anyone managed to think of it at all.
The diagram on the left shows the split seconds mechanism. The wheel E carries the split hand on its axis. The cam G is on the axis of the other, constantly running chronograph hand. Normally the two rotate together and they are mechanically linked by the ruby roller H, which sits in the notch at the top of the heart cam G.
Pushing the split button pulls around the column wheel C. This allows the pincers, K, to fall onto the serrated outer surface of the wheel E, under the pressure of the springs F, stopping the split hand. The running seconds hand and therefore the cam G continue to rotate, with the ruby roller H riding up and down the edge of the cam.
Pressing the split button again brings the column wheel around another notch. This lifts the pincers K off the wheel E. The ruby roller, under the pressure of the very fine spring J, drops back onto the notch in the heart cam and the two hands run together.
So there’s a lot going on. The parts count is not incredibly high but each one of these parts, in a classic traditional rattrapante, has to be made very exactly. The split seconds hand runs on a long, hollow pivot, with the running seconds hand on a pivot inside it and the alignment has to be absolutely perfect or the whole thing won’t work. The tension of the springs has to be very carefully calibrated, especially the spring J, which has to exert enough pressure on the cam G to allow the split seconds hand to jump smartly back into alignment with the running seconds hand, but not exert so much pressure that there is excessive drag, which would reduce balance amplitude and therefore, affect precision (in a bad way). The two seconds hands have to be as thin as possible so as to keep the inertia that has to be overcome at reset to a minimum (this is true of conventional chronographs as well) and they have to be perfectly aligned so that they look like a single hand – De Carle’s description of servicing a rattrapante chronograph devotes several paragraphs to describing how a misaligned hand must be very carefully stroked into place. The rattrapante is not quite as bafflingly complex as a repeater or grande sonnerie, but it is demanding enough in terms of craftsmanship and care to more than earn its place with the repeater and perpetual calendar and in fact, the classic definition of a true grand complication watch is that it will have a rattrapante chrono, along with a perpetual calendar and repeater.
The Linesport Rattrapante Chronograph is considered a monopusher chronograph, as it has just one pusher for start, stop, and reset, at 4:00 – the pusher at 2:00 is the split button. In a really traditional rattrapante, the start/stop/reset button is set into the crown, creating more of a visual impression of monopusher construction but in the case of the Linesport Rattrapante the total number of pushers is still the same.
The Linesport Rattrapante debuted in 2018 and it is based on the rattrapante which Journe created as a unique piece for the 2017 edition of Only Watch. That watch ended up hammering (with the auction officiated by Christie’s) for CHF 1.15 million, which at the time was a record for a Journe watch at auction. There are many similarities between the two watches but there are some interesting differences as well.
Journe had maintained when the Only Watch unique piece was released, that the movement would not be duplicated in a production watch and true to his word, one of the most noticeable differences at a glance, is the addition of a big date display to the Linesport production model.
As you might expect from François Paul this is a proper big date display, with two separate disks for the ones and tens digits (we have all gotten a little blasé about the big date complication, but it is worth remembering that when it debuted in the Lange 1 in 1994 it was not just a big date, but a pretty big deal – the complication added 66 additional components to the base caliber).
This version of the Linesport Chronograph is in platinum, which gives this 44mm x 12.1mm chronograph a very pleasing heft on the wrist. While we’re on the dial side, one of the things I’ve always liked about this watch, are the typfaces used for the Roman numerals on the tachymeter bezel, chronograph seconds track, and hour markers. The typeface for the tachymeter has a very Deco flavor but it doesn’t hit you over the head with it, and it contrasts nicely with the very classic Arabics on the seconds track. And check out that number 7 hour marker – that little tail on the head of the 7 is completely unecessary but it is a very cool variation on the tiny downstroke you see on the head of the number 7 in a lot of standard typefaces.
The bumpers on the bracelet links are a little divising among Journe fans however I kind of like them, at least in this context – they soften the effect of all that platinum, as does the matte finish on the platinum links.
Journe Caliber 1518
The movement used in the Only Watch unique piece was designated caliber 1517 and its younger brother is the caliber 1518 – naturally, designed and produced entirely in house.
I think this is one of the most beautiful movements Journe has ever made (it’s one of my top two favorites, up there with the caliber 1510 in the Chronomètre Optimum). You’ll notice right away that there are two column wheels – the one at the top in the picture above is for chronograph start/stop/reset, and the smaller one at about the 7:00 position is the split button. The jaws, or clamps, for stopping the split hand wheel are clearly visible, along with the split wheel at the center of the movement. If you look closely you can see that the clamps are being held off the wheel in the picture, and that the arm holding the (hidden) ruby roller is being held in the notch on the chronograph seconds cam.
Other than the big date, the other technical difference between calibers 1517 and 1518 is the chronograph engagement system. As SJX points out in his technical analysis of the differences between the movements, the 1517 made use of a traditional lateral clutch system, which however was flipped left-to-right from the standard traditional construction. This meant that if the chronograph hand jumped when it was started – always a possibility with a traditional lateral clutch, as the intermediate/clutch wheel teeth and chronograph wheel teeth may not mesh exactly – it would jump backwards. In order to simplify the movement construction and also to address this issue, the Linesport Rattrapante uses a tilting pinion system. In this system, a sort of short cylinder with two separate sets of gear teeth on it – one at the top and one at the bottom – acts as the clutch. The tilting pinion is driven by a chronograph driving wheel, and when the chronograph is activated the pinion actually tilts slightly into position to engage it with the chronograph train. Although traditionalists don’t consider it as “nice” as a traditional lateral clutch, it is a perfectly respectable and very robust system.
Journe has a bit of a history with this coupling system as well, thanks to its compactness and robust reliability. All the way back in 1989, THA – Techniques Horlogeres Appliques – the complications specialist company he’d started with Denis Flageolet and Vianney Halter – used the tilting pinion system in the caliber 045MC, which was designed for Cartier and used in the Cartier Tortue Monopoussoir – part of the original Collection Privée Cartier Paris collection.
I think the calibers 1517/18 are just gorgeous. The contrast between the gold plates and bridges and the polished steelwork is a beautiful one – Daniels preferred it to conventional rhodium plating in his watches, feeling that it offered the sort of sober dignity you see in classic English gold gilt-plated movements and for that matter, in the watchmaking of Abraham Louis Breguet., and I think with good reason. It also lets you see the active parts of the chronograph and split-seconds systems with great clarity.
Well, there you have it – an exceedingly elevated and aristocratic take on the rattrapante chronograph, and in an interesting configuration with which Journe has a history going back thirty five years. There is a little bit of a tendency with chronographs to work from a fairly small set of standard playbooks but I think the Journe Linesport Chronographe Monopoussoir Rattrapante offers not only something really different, but something with its own special character and expression of Journe’s ingenuity as a watchmaker as well. And, despite its elevated construction and luxurious materials, it’s an easily elegant candidate for a very sophisticated daily driver as well.