MB&F Legacy Machine LM Perpetual
On Tuesday 3 November 2015, the Swiss press was invited to the M.A.D.Gallery in Geneva, the kinetic art gallery created by the talented Maximilian Büsser and his team: MB&F.
An invitation from MB&F is always a pleasure, because it promises the unveiling of a new machine.
This time, Charris Yadigaroglou, the brand’s communications man, is going to present a new Legacy Machine. The Legacy Machines concept is built around a projection: “what watch would MB&F have designed 100 years earlier?”
The new Legacy Machine presented is called “Perpetual”. Above all, it’s a story of people, of Friends (MB&F for Maximilian Büsser & Friends).
The key person behind this creation, beyond MB&F’s core team, is a discreet man. He’s standing behind us, in a corner of the gallery. That man is Stephen McDonnell.
This Irish watchmaker played a very important role in the brand’s life when the very first watch was being created, a few months before its launch. Abandoned by the workshop in charge of developing the movement, MB&F could have withered away without Stephen McDonnell’s intervention, as he took over the movement’s development. The brand subsequently enjoyed the success we know today.
The Legacy Machine LM Perpetual was born from MB&F’s desire to create a perpetual calendar for the fourth Legacy Machine, and from McDonnell’s revolutionary concept. MB&F would reinvent the perpetual calendar—technically and aesthetically—after four years of research and development, with a movement comprising 581 components.
The perpetual calendar is a great traditional complication. It displays the date despite the varying number of days in each month, leap years included. However, it is not without constraints when it comes to setting and after-sales service.
Often, QPs (perpetual calendars) make regular trips back and forth to brands’ service departments—hence the nickname “boomerang” watches—because of breakages caused by corrections made at the wrong time by the wearer. MB&F’s goal was to offer a perpetual calendar that frees itself from the issues associated with this grand complication.
Reinventing the perpetual calendar
Rather than using 31-day months as the reference, as all perpetual calendars do, McDonnell started from the principle that all months have at least 28 days. He therefore flips the problem on its head.
Traditionally, if it is 28 February, the movement must rapidly jump over the 29th, 30th and 31st to reach 1 March.
In the system created by the watchmaker, a calculator (a “mechanical processor”) takes the 28-day month as its base and adds the necessary dates for months that exceed 28 days. You therefore obtain the correct date without rapid jumps over superfluous days—jumps that often generate problems and that do not satisfy the perfectionism of McDonnell and Büsser.
To correct the leap year independently, you use the pusher at 7 o’clock, which avoids having to scroll through 47 months as is the case with traditional perpetual calendars.
A safety system disconnects the correction pushers when a date change is being carried out. It is therefore possible to play with each correction without any risk.
Watch the day change below:
The “dial”
While the revolutionary mechanical processor improves the date calculation, it also offers the luxury of dispensing with the large lever system used in classic perpetual calendars. This is how MB&F was able to add its indispensable suspended balance wheel thanks to the space freed up, and to mount the sub-dials invisibly.
The balance wheel dominates the time dial and the sub-dials that float above the complication. The mechanical processor sits in the centre, slightly to the left.
The time is indicated at 12 o’clock, the days at 3 o’clock, the months at 6 o’clock and the date at 9 o’clock.
The power-reserve indicator is positioned at 4 o’clock and the leap-year indication at 7 o’clock.
The escapement is located on the caseback side and is connected to the floating balance wheel by what must be the longest pinion in the world!
The transparent caseback reveals beautiful bridges, plates and Geneva stripes.
On the wrist
The watch is surprisingly slim despite the domed crystal made necessary by the floating balance wheel. The frequency traced by the balance is mesmerising, and it is a genuine pleasure to wear.
The 44mm case is the right compromise.
Series and price
The launch editions are limited to 25 pieces in 18K 5N+ rose gold (the “+” is the addition of platinum to prevent corrosion) and 25 pieces in 950 platinum.
From €130,000 excl. VAT.
What’s next?
Judging by the knowing half-smile of McDonnell—whom I asked about the subject—there is no doubt that the technical feat of the mechanical processor can be applied to other complications. MB&F has also filed a patent to protect its new technology.
Another fine success for MB&F.
