(2023-11-27) Got a Tristar... What now?
---------------------------------------
The troubles at my workplace suddenly have returned, and I got some more
unwanted free time on my hands again. But the day that happened, I was at
least rewarded with something: the Orient RA-AB0F09L arrived to me a day
earlier than expected.
Yes, I did it, I bought a Tristar, as the Kamasu had shown consistent
performance for over 2 months not deviating beyond ±1 spd, which is fully
satisfactory for a mech watch. But I really wanted to check on the legendary
Orient lineup of the cheapest non-Chinese mechanical watches you can get
these days, especially that now they too are produced under Epson's control.
Besides, the Kamasu is still a bit bulky and heavy (even on a 22mm mesh):
not by a critical margin but that really is the limit of what I can put onto
my wrist and still get away with wearing it on a daily basis. So, I might
have postponed the inevitable but the reasons had piled up and I made the
decision. And yes, the white-dialed RA-AB0F12S actually turned out to be out
of stock when I ordered it, but the dark blue Vega, RA-AB0F09L, was
available from another seller, and I thought it would be a nice choice as
well to match the color of my Nokia 130-2023, my fleece and my winter coat.
And you know what, I guess it was an even better choice than the white dial
one, and I'm really impressed with it so far.
However, before I get to the details, I'd like to talk about this thing's
philosophy. Yes, all things we can buy have some marketing image behind
them, but not all of them have an idea behind them, and it is important not
to mix these up. Especially for watches: all of them have their price,
design and niche, but most of them do not convey a fundamental message about
the principles they are trying to represent. In case of the Orient Tristar
lineup, which is over 50 years old as of now, the main idea behind it is
self-sustainability. Although the 1970s gave rise to quartz wristwatches,
this lineup was specifically created to coexist with them. It was initially
designed for the countries where people didn't have access to batteries and
watch service as a whole, so they got everything they needed right away when
they bought the watch: date and day display, dustproof/splashproof cases and
very reliable automatic movements that didn't need any servicing for
decades. The latter was an additional humongous advantage over the early
quartz: remember that in the 1970s, even 2-year battery life was a lot for a
quartz watch, usually it was less, and they didn't run on a single battery
either, two- or even three-battery configurations were common instead. Even
the stock bracelet of the Tristars, despite its overall questionable
quality, has always had _eight_ micro-adjustment positions so that anyone
could fit it without removing the links so that the watch could be further
sold or passed to other people basically intact. This mindset of
self-sustainability is what made this lower budget lineup so successful
around the world, and this is what I also resonate with in terms of reducing
overall resource consumption.
Now, onto my own impressions. Of course, the first thing I did after the
unboxing was to take off that bracelet (which, for the Tristar lineup, is
traditionally awful, but I wouldn't keep it anyway) and put the watch on my
20mm quick-release steel mesh strap. In fact, I think that steel mesh straps
fit into the Tristar ideology even better, as they are just as durable as
the regular ones but have none of their problems and can be adjusted to any
wrist size much easier than any other bracelet type. They really transform
the look of any watch instantly, not to mention they make it much more
comfortable to wear. The dial itself is really dark blue but exhibits a
gorgeous sunburst effect when put under a light source. Combined with the
overall case shape, Kamasu-style indices, adequately sized hands that
actually reach their markers and much stricter dial style than it was in the
pre-Epson era Tristars, all this makes the watch look much more expensive
than it actually is. Although it's not as cheap as the earlier Tristars
either, at least where I live. And for its price, I'd expect a bit more lume
longevity, but I guess I might have been spoiled by the Kamasu's one. The
overall case size and weight of this watch is also much more suitable for
day-to-day wear without even noticing it until you actually need to look at
it. And when you do... oh man, it doesn't disappoint.
"But wait, there's more!" As you may know, all current Tristars (except some
Brazil-exclusive models and the RA-AK05 (Altair) which I don't know what
it's doing in that lineup) run on the F4902 movement (code AB), which was
marketed as the direct successor of the famous Orient's 46943 movement (code
EM), and, like the 46943, cannot hack (stop the seconds) and handwind.
Normally, inability to stop the seconds would be a strong deterrent for me
(e.g. it's one of the primary reasons I don't wear my Seiko SNK809 with its
7S26), but in this case, I do have a strong suspicion that the F4902 has
much more in common with the Orient's F6 platform than with its predecessor,
up to the point of this movement essentially being just an F6922 with extra
details removed to cut costs and thickness, like the hacking lever and
manual winding gears, but with the same positional stability and other
timekeeping merits. The movements have the same manufacturer's accuracy
rating (-15/+25 spd) and look extremely similar too, except the F4902's
rotor is not decorated as nicely. And when I started the accuracy
measurement, I began receiving some more confirmations of this suspicion.
The watch had been set and wound by the seller before sending it to me, but I
doubt they performed any additional regulation or opened the caseback at
all. Nevertheless, the second hand was off by about 5 seconds from the
reference time, so I recorded that when starting the measurements, and
started recording the relative deviations every 24 hours. And... I can't
really say it's performing any worse than the unregulated F6222 I have here
(maximum relative deviation being +5.5 seconds per day, but it was a
one-time fluke after a very active day, usually it's much lower). Of course,
too little time has passed, we'll see which daily deviation it eventually
settles on, but for now it might need just a tiny bit of intervention to run
within the grail ±1 spd. But if all of this is true and F4902 is in fact
nothing more than a stripped-down F6922, this means two things. First, it
means that even if it settles on some large deviation like +8.5 spd my
Kamasu had out of the box, then it can be regulated the same way as I did
for F6922, and it can yield some nice and predictable performance results.
Second, it means that F4902 is not just a direct successor of 46943, it is
lightyears ahead of both 46943 and 7S26 because it in fact belongs to the
newer F6 family which is much more stable than those ever could be. As the
Tristar lineup was initially designed to compete with quartz watches in
terms of affordability and reliability, it would be extremely cool if its
newest generation can compete with them in terms of accuracy too by reaching
under ±30 seconds per month deviation.
So, let the experiment begin. I hope it will be a success. Anyway, to me, a
mere possibility to make one of the cheapest Japanese automatic watches not
only look not cheap but also be more accurate than most expensive Swiss
automatic watches definitely is worth giving a shot.
