Breitling Navitimer Jupiter Pilot Ref. 80975, ca. 1992

Identity

Breitling Navitimer Jupiter Pilot, Ref. 80975, ca. 1992. Quartz chronograph movement with alarm, Breitling calibre 59, three registers and date window. Steel case, 42 mm diameter, screwed caseback with six screws engraved with the winged logo and the Navitimer and Quartz markings. Bidirectional rotating bezel graduated to three hundred and sixty degrees and carrying the cardinal points, circular slide rule on the flange. Black dial with three cream registers at 9, 3 and 6, date window at 4, applied baton indexes and luminous hands, red central alarm hand. Mineral crystal. Black stitched leather strap, original monogrammed Breitling pin buckle.

Horological context

Founded in 1884 at Saint-Imier by Léon Breitling, the maison devoted itself from the outset to short-time counters, and in 1934 signed the two-pusher chronograph that became universal. The Navitimer was developed in 1952 and appeared in 1954. Its rotating bezel carries a circular slide rule inherited from the E6B flight computer of the 1930s: it solves distance, flight time, speed and fuel consumption. The first examples were reserved for members of the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association, who bought them directly for eighty-seven dollars fifty. The Ref. 806 appeared in 1956, driven by the manual-winding Venus 178 calibre and produced until the early 1970s; in 1964 the Twin Jet logo replaced the AOPA wings and the notched bezel definitively succeeded the beaded one. In the early 1980s the Navitimer moved to quartz under the Jupiter name, delivered notably to several Middle Eastern air forces. The Jupiter Pilot succeeded it in 1988: the same case and the same rotating bezel, but a quartz chronograph with three registers and a date window, produced until 1994. The line remains in the catalogue.

Character

The dial is a reverse panda: black ground, cream registers. The luminous fill on the indexes and hands has taken exactly the tone of the registers, so that the whole dial plays on two values only, and the alarm hand is the single thing that enters it in colour. The rotating bezel layers two readings, three hundred and sixty degrees of heading on the outside and the slide rule on the flange.

Serviced. Exceptional condition. Delivered with its Breitling certificate of origin dated 1992, its instruction booklet, the Contre-Temps box and the Contre-Temps 24-month warranty certificate.