After bringing back the F1 earlier this year, the Swiss watchmaker is at it again - this time unveiling two new technologically advanced feats of horology
One thing we have come to expect from TAG Heuer is it always knows how to make a statement. The Swiss powerhouse simply doesn't do things in halves. Indeed, for TAG's first outing at Geneva Watch Days the brand has rocked up with not one, but two massive headline acts. The first is a huge technological leap forward, while the second will send you to the moon and back.
After a decade of toying with the idea of carbon hairsprings (trials included 2019's Isograph Autavia and 2021's Only Watch Monaco), TAG Heuer has found a way to make them a mass-producible reality. Introducing the new TH-Carbonspring in two carbon-cased watches.
"Developing a hairspring is probably the most difficult thing in watchmaking. It's a tiny component, but it has to fulfil so many different functions, and you have to find the right balance between all of these functions," explains Emmanuel Dupas, technical director for TAG Heuer. "What is more difficult, even when developing the hairspring itself, is developing the technology at the same time to produce this component. And that's what we had to face in house."
Despite the dominance of silicon, carbon is actually a better material for a hairspring; something TAG Heuer is on a mission to prove. "The first thing, it's a-magnetic so in terms of durability, regarding magnetic fields, it's an ideal solution," says Carole Forestier-Kasapi, haute horlogerie and movements strategy director at TAG Heuer. "The other advantage also, of this material, is that it is light." Lightness is important. The heavier the material of the hairspring, the more effect gravity can have on subtly distorting the spring, which in turn effects accuracy.
TAG Heuer thought they had this technology tapped in 2019, however what was contained in the Isograph Autavia didn't meet the Maison's standards in terms of precision. What might be more pertinent to today's announcement is TAG Heuer also wasn't confident about scaling up.
"The product showed good performance, but it was not repeatable," says Dupas. "So, from one hairspring to the next, there could be a big difference in its behaviour. With the Only Watch [a one-off auctioned to raise money for research into Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy] obviously this wasn't a problem. We could deliver a single good hairspring. But there was an ambition to go for mass production."
To test the water, TAG Heuer has launched two carbon-cased designs - the Monaco Flyback Chronograph and the Carrera Chronograph Tourbillon Extreme Sport - limited to 50 pieces each. "We are at the beginning of optimisation," says Dupas. "We have a process that works, but the whole process of maturing, perfecting this process and the technology that goes with it, for that there is still work to be done."