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Jared,

The Citizen is only availaible in Japan, but could be ordered by mail
(I've got one).
Other high-end quartz which claim an accuracy of less than 20 sec a year
are Seiko "Grand Seiko", Longines VHP, Breitling Colt and Rolex
Oysterquartz. All of them are battery powered.
The battery life for the Citizen is 5 year so it is not to much a
hassle.
It is technically feasible to make these watch kinetic or solar powered,
but unfortunately there isn't a great interest amongst customer for
extreme accuracy, so manufacturer don't bother.
I've got also a Muhle Quartz marine chronometer (actually manufactured
by Hanseatic instruments) which keep 15s/year. It seems to be the last
marine chronometer currently available. The battery last one year but it
is very easy to change.

Regards

Pierre

Jared Sherman a ?crit:
>
> Pierre-
>  Very interesting. When I had asked Citizen about their Eco-Drive models (no
> battery, no winding, no need to open the watch, les need to service it,
> etc.) IIRC they only mentioned a more conventional 30 seconds per month.
> Perhaps they've been hiding that 5 second model from the US market--they
> should be bragging about it!
>
>  Back when my Accutron was still state of the art (pre-quartz) Bulova had
> developed one model for aircraft that consisted of three stacked "Type 214"
> movements, which mechanically averaged each other and drive one set of hands
> on the one dial. Once in a while they still come up on eBay, etc., as they
> were used on commercial airliners. For a while, they were the most accurate
> "civilian" time product on the planet, short of spending millions on an
> atomic clock. Then came quartz!
>
>  What I find very disappointing is the amount of routine maintenance that
> most watch companies claim their products need. Even Rolex will claim the
> watches should receive routine cleaning every 3(?) years, which makes it
> expensive to keep up the watches and certain that the rate of the watch will
> be changed. And even with their screw-down stem, Rolexes and other "good"
> water-resistant watches will leak unless the seals are regularly replaced.
> More nuisance value!
>
>  Some years ago when LEDs were new, someone introduced a fully potted sealed
> LED watch with solar cells and magnetic contacts instead of a "sealed" stem
> or buttons. I can't find reference to it, but know it existed--and the rate
> could also be adjusted by the user!
>
>  Of course any mechanical watch will suffer daily variation from gravity
> effects, etc. so for regularity an electronic watch with stepping motor or
> digital display in theory is most accurate, but then there's the battery
> problem. Seiko and Citizen's solutions for permanent (kinetic or solar)
> watches would seem to be the most accurate/reliable way to solve that
> problem as well, but they still come back to promising Timex accuracy...with
> routine seal replacement, etc. required on top of the pricing.
>
> I guess we've still got a way to go in what truly DURABLE accurate watches
> can be developed.  I'm content to leave my aging Accutron regulated at about
> 30 seconds per month. Well, 30-60 as the battery ages out every 18-24
> months, I could do better if I changed it annually without fail. That's
> good enough for most of what I do, and a backup for the GPS. And Timex.

   

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