In-Depth: The Rolex Sky-Dweller (Live Pics, Specs, & Official Pricing)



The most hotly anticipated watch of Basel World 2012 was to be the new sport watch from Rolex. You see, the internets were abuzz with the fact that Rolex had registered the name "Sky-Dweller" weeks before its unveiling, and countless so-called "experts" chimed in with their prediction of what it would look like, and what it would be. The general consensus was that it would be a brand new sport watch, kind of a super pilot's watch to the GMT-Master's "every day" pilot's watch, just as the Sea-Dweller is the beefier version of the Submariner. They were wrong.


A GMT function is one thing, Rolex has been doing that since the 1950s (though this is an entirely new implementation), but perhaps the most un-Rolex trait of this new Rolex was that it featured a real complication. Of course, the annual calendar is perhaps the most utilitarian of all complications, but still, the fact that Rolex was making a complicated watch is a big deal.




The annual calendar inside the Sky-Dweller is based on a mechanism called SAROS, and its genius lays in its simplicity. Only two gear ratios and four gear wheels were added to the traditional Rolex date calendar system to make for a full annual calendar (which, by definition, requires re-setting but once per year - at the end of February). Called SAROS after the Greek term for the 18 year cycle between the sun, earth, and moon that is responsible for both lunar and solar eclipses the Sky-Dweller's annual calendar mechanism is designed around a fixed planetary gear wheel (ie the sun) at the center of the movement. A satellite wheel (aka the earth) engages the planetary wheel in one month, driven by the date disc. The satellite wheel (the moon) is fitted with four fingers, for the four 30-day months (April, June, September, and November).






The Rolex Sky-Dweller comes in three different configurations. All are sized at 42mm with a screw-down caseback, a 100m water resistant Oyster case, and a synthetic, scratch-resistant crystal with cyclops date window.



For more details and pricing, see Original article on Hodinkee: http://www.hodinkee.com/in-depth-the-rolex-sky-dweller-live-pics-specs-official-pricing

WOW!



That watch is something else! The functions are amazing!!

Man that's a beauty. Never cared for the fluted bezel until this one.