TAG Heuer has made a quantum leap with its Calibre 360 registering 360,000 pulses an hour
THE FASTER THE heart of the watch beats, the more accurate it is supposed to be. Until recently, the best the industry could do was 36,000 vibrations per hour, first attained by Zenith's El Primero in 1969.
TAG Heuer made a quantum leap this year with its Calibre 360, which beats at a consistent 360,000 beats per hour and can measure and display time to
1/100th of a second in a movement the size of a wristwatch.
TAG Heuer's president and chief executive Jean-Christophe Babin admitted the ability to measure time to 1/100th of a second was nothing new. It was proven possible back in 1916, but the movement had to be the size of a stopwatch. The challenge was to make it much more accurate at 360,000 beats per hour and small enough to be a wrist chronograph.
The feat began four years ago when TAG Heuer assembled a team of watchmakers, engineers, physicists and mathematicians to embark on a mission that was then considered unlikely.
