Important Collector's Wristwatches an...

New York, Omni Berkshire Place Hotel, May 11, 1998

LOT 127

Absolut Regulateur Squelette by the engineer Vittorio Scialla, Italy, 1998, specially made for this auction.

Absolut is a mechanical wall pendulum clock that offers all of the characteristics a novice or veteran collector of horology admires in a timepiece. Created from the original design of the engineer Vittorio Scialla, this clock blends the charm and the advantages of the invariability of glass with the measurement of time. It offers classic contemporary styling, suitable for office or home. The clock's mechanism - the first of its kind made entirely of glass - is a new and exclusive patented escapement based oil two micro ball bearings applied to an anchor, which roll rather than crawl over the teeth of the escapement wheel without lubrication, making the movement very smooth. High precision work by means of advanced technology is required to cut the glass toothed wheels for this unique clock. A very high pressure water jet (60,000 pounds per square inch), bearing suspended abrasive powders, is injected through a nozzle driven by a numeric control system to achieve the desired profiles. This operation is particularly expensive because the required precision can only be achieved at low cutting speeds. Hours and minutes arc displayed oil two separate dials and the Absolut Regulateur Squelette clock features skeleton sand-blasted wheels, extra-low attrition ball bearing pinions, and 11 days winding up. The front and rear panels are made of extra-light float glass, which is produced by using selected materials and special processes, in order to neutralize the green nuance of common glass. The drilling of the two panels requires very high precision, both in the positioning of the holes and in the depth of the ball bearing housings. Holes are drilled by means of numeric control machines and special drilling tools.