Ming's 29.01 Midnight Worldtimer; Orient Gives Mako 40 Three New Colors; Mido Is Already Adding More Dials To Multifort 8 Two Crowns; A Lighter BA111OD Chapter 4 Skeleton Tourbillon; Hublot MP-10s

Hey friends, welcome back to It’s About Time. Since watches are such small things, we often fixate on details, right? Well, I think I will be thinking about the shape of the Ming micro-rotor for a while. Look at how smooth that thing is.

In this issue:

• Ming Releases The 29.01 Midnight Worldtimer With Great Lume And An Even Better Movement

• Orient Updates The Mako 40 With Three Classic Colored Dials And A Black Case

• Mido Is Already Adding More Dials To The Multifort 8 Two Crowns, This Time A Matte Light Blue

• BA111OD Brings A Lighter Colorway To Their Chapter 4 Skeleton Tourbillon Ice White

• Hublot MP-10 Tourbillon Returns in Black Ceramic and Sapphire Crystal Cases

👂What’s new

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Ming Releases The 29.01 Midnight Worldtimer With Great Lume And An Even Better Movement

Ming is going through a wonderfully interesting transformation. From incredibly cool and unique watches that had a few deliverability hick-ups, they are now starting to create some of the most interesting watches on the market. While they still sell watches that are somewhat accessible, they’ve also spread out into all price points, very much motivated to do so with the winning of a GPHG award for their diver. In 2013, they released the 19.02 Worldtimer, a watch that is being updated today. This is the new 29.01 Midnight Worldtimer, a stealthy — and limited — take on their classic.

Being a Ming, you know exactly what to expect from the case, especially from these spectacular signature openworked “flying blade” lugs, which interact with the caseback via a machined groove. The case is made out of Grade 5 titanium with a black DLC coat and measures 40mm wide and 11.8mm thick. The sides of the case are matte blasted, while the tops and bottoms are polished. On top and bottom are domed sapphire crystals, giving you a wonderful view of that sensational movement. Water resistance is 50 meters, which will suffice.

The Ming cases are cool, but their dials are so much cooler. The base of the dial is a dark metal disc that holds the 24-hour scale and rotates. Surrounding that is a fixed city ring, made out of two levels of a sapphire disc. The engraved city names, as well as the 24 hour scale, are filled with HyCeram ceramic infused with Super-LumiNova X1, because Ming is known for their great lume. The hands are also made out of sapphire and also filled with HyCeram ceramic Super-LumiNova X1.

Inside, you’ll find a beautiful movement made by Schwarz-Etienne for Ming. It’s the Cal. ASE 222, an automatic movement with bidirectional winding via a redesigned tungsten micro-rotor mounted on ceramic ball bearings. Bridges and plates are coated in warm 5N rose gold and finished with diamond-cut anglage, while the mainspring barrel is skeletonized. The movement beats at 4Hz and has an 86 hour power reserve. The watch comes on a black moulded FKM rubber strap with a DLC-coated buckle.

The new Ming 29.01 Midnight Worldtimer is limited to 25 pieces, with deliveries expected in June. The price is set at CHF 22,000, without tax. See more on the Ming website.

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Orient Updates The Mako 40 With Three Classic Colored Dials And A Black Case

Orient is celebrating its 75th anniversary this year, so they’re coming out with a bunch of watch and dial combinations to celebrate. But while doing that, they’re also updating some of their more classic models. Like, for example, these updated Mako 40 watches with a new case color and three new dials.

All three versions share the same case, made out of stainless steel and measuring 39.9mm wide and 12.8mm thick. It’s a fairly simple case with long-ish straight lugs and a chamfer around the entire edge of the case. Out of the three new models, one of them gets a black coated case and a black coated bezel with a 60 minute scale on top. The other two are plain steel with steel bezels on top. All three have a sapphire crystal on top, a closed caseback, a screw-down crown and 200 meters of water resistance.

The dials also all have the same setup, with a smooth finish, applied indexes, a framed date window and lume filled hands and markers. There are three new colors available here. The two stainless steel models get a choice of either a green or a red bezel, while the black PVD version gets a grey dial.

Inside, you’ll find the Caliber F6722 automatic which beats at 3Hz and has a 40 hour power reserve. The red dial version, reference RA-AC0Q09R, comes on a stainless steel bracelet with a folding clasp; the green model, RA-AC0Q11E, comes on a color matched green rubber strap; and the black coated ref RA-AC0Q0N comes on a black rubber strap.

Since it’s so difficult to get information from Orient, I can’t say with 100% certainty, but I believe that the watches are already on sale. The price is also a bit of a guess, but it should be €399 for the two watches on rubber straps and €425 for the stainless steel bracelet. See more on the Orient website.

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Mido Is Already Adding More Dials To The Multifort 8 Two Crowns, This Time A Matte Light Blue

It’s been exactly two months since I wrote about the Mido Multifort 8 Two Crowns, a brand new steel integrated-bracelet sports watch for the brand. Mido introduced the model with two dials, a blue and a black, and it was a pretty cool release. In a slightly unusual move, just two months since launch, Mido is giving the Multifort 8 Two Crowns a whole new dial color, this time a light blue grey shade that looks very good.

The Multifort 8 Two Crowns comes in a stainless steel barrel-shape case that measures 40mm wide, a pretty spectacular 9.5mm thick and a lug-to-lug which measures 44.86mm. Can’t get much more wearable than that for a sports watch. On top is a fixed metal bezel with eight sides cut out of it. The lugs are faceted and there’s a single narrow mid-link to connect the watch to the strap. On the side are two crowns, one to set the time and the other to operate the internal 60-minute bezel. Water resistance is 100 meters.

While the launch watches came in blue and black, this new update gets a blue-grey color, once again with a thin striped pattern on ti. The dial is surrounded by a color matched internal bezel, and the hour markers are recessed into the dial. The hands are thin, faceted, polished steel batons and are covered in Super-LumiNova, just like the markers. There’s a date aperture at 3 o’clock with a white date wheel.

Inside, somewhat surprisingly, you won’t find the Powermatic 80, a staple in the Swatch Group lineup. Instead, you get the extremely thin Calibre 72, which is actually the ETA A31.111, an evolution of the ETA 2892. The movement beats at 3.5Hz and has a 72 hour power reserve. The watch comes on a stainless steel bracelet that closes with a folding clasp.

The new Mido Multifort 8 Two Crowns is available for purchase now and priced at €1,220. See more on the Mido website.

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BA111OD Brings A Lighter Colorway To Their Chapter 4 Skeleton Tourbillon Ice White

With every new release, BA111OD is proving that they really are conquering the market on expertly-made, Swiss-produced, highly-advanced watches that are sold at prices that really puzzle the market as they shouldn’t be possible. They have made waves by producing the least expensive Swiss made tourbillon – the BA111OD Chapter 4.1, as well as the BA111OD Chapter 4.5 GMT Tourbillon. Their CHPTR_Δ has one of the most interesting ways of moving hands and displaying time, for a crazy low price. And then at Watches and Wonders, they introduced the Chapter 4 Infinity Flying Tourbillon, the best watch of the entire show that brings haute horology to your wrist at a really great price. But they’re not slowing down. Their lates release is the Chapter 4 Skeleton Tourbillon Ice White, another affordable take on high-end Swiss watchmaking.

The Chapter 4 was introduced during Watches and Wonders last year, and this one follows the same shape. While there is a larger 44mm version, this one comes in the smaller 40mm shape, which measures 13mm thick and has a 50mm lug-to-lug. It’s also notable that the watch has slightly narrower lugs than you might expect, as it will need a 18mm wide strap. The stainless steel case has a combination of brushed and polished finishes, with a thin bezel on top that holds down the domed sapphire case onto which the BA111OD logo is printed on, instead of on the dial. Since there’s no dial, that is. The crown sits at 4 o’clock, which is becoming a brand staple. Water resistance is 50 meters.

The dial, or lack thereof, is a departure from the rest of the Chapter 4 Skeleton watches, which have usually been done in darker colors. Being the Ice White model, the openworked dial now has a silver minute flange on the outside, as well as silver untreated bridges. The hands are also partially skeletonized and filled with lume. At 7 o’clock you can see the tourbillon, which brings the only pop of color — gold at that — on the entire watch.

The movement that you see through the dial is BA111OD BA.01, manually wound movement developed by Olivier Mory for the brand. It features the tourbillon, beats at 21,600vph and has a fantastic power reserve of 100 hours. There are four strap possibilities for the watch — a polished stainless steel bracelet, a ceramic-link bracelet, which mixes ceramic with steel elements, a black Saffiano leather strap and a very sporty white rubber strap.

The new BA111OD Chapter 4 Skeleton Tourbillon Ice White is available now. And yes, I lament how BA111OD makes greatly priced watches, that doesn’t mean they are cheap. This particular model is priced starting at €8,500, depending on the strap. A lot of money, but it’s all about value for money. And they are among the best of them at providing great value for money. See it on the BA111OD website.

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Hublot MP-10 Tourbillon Returns in Black Ceramic and Sapphire Crystal Cases

It’s just too easy to make fun of Hublot. Sure, they have made some mistakes and they make some truly ridiculous watches, but there is no denying that they can make a watch. A truly great watch, one that is almost no longer a watch and more of a sculpture. While the majority of our focus on the Big Bang series, Hublot also has the MP line, where Hublot’s designers and watchmakers are free to experiment and come up with whatever they want. Last year, we got the truly wild MP-10 Tourbillon, displaying the hours and minutes on rollers, the seconds on an inclined tourbillon cage and the power reserve on a third roller… This year, Hublot is giving us two new versions of the MP-10, with the use of either black ceramic or sapphire crystal.

The MP-10 comes in a rectangular case that has super-rounded edges and measures 41.5mm wide, a whopping 22.4mm thick and has a lug-to-lug of 54.1mm. While the original came in a titanium case, these two new models come in black ceramic and sapphire. The ceramic has a matte microblasted finish, and the hours and minutes are featured on black anodised aluminium cylinders with grey luminescent numerals and the black anodised aluminium power reserve wheel is highlighted with green, orange and red lume. The sapphire version is very transparent from all sides, with light y aluminium cylinders with white luminescent markings for the time indications, while the rotating grey aluminium power reserve highlights its status with green, orange and red luminescent markings.

The MP-10 uses rollers to tell the time, but this comes at a cost as rollers are much heavier than hands so they require more energy to move. It gets even more complicated, all wheels are not on the same plane so Hublot has to transfer the driving force through a 90-degree angle. The hours and minutes are indicated by the two upper drums. The power reserve is shown on the lower roller with green and red zones. And most fun of all is the seconds that can be read digitally on the tourbillon’s monobloc aluminium cage that is inclined at 35 degrees from the vertical axis, situated at 6 o’clock, cut into the case.

To power all of these drums, Hublot uses the HUB9013 automatic which took five years of development. This uniquely shaped, architectural, three-dimensional movement could not accommodate a traditional oscillating weight. Instead, it is flanked by two sliding gold weights winding the movement bi-directionally by sliding up and down. The watch can also be wound manually with the crown at 12 o’clock and the power reserve is rated at 48 hours. A retractable crown at the back of the watch is used to set the time. The watch comes on a rubber strap that’s attached to four points of the case — black on the black ceramic version and transparent on the sapphire version.

The new MP-10 Tourbillon is going to be a limited edition, of course. The black will be made in 50 pieces, priced at €344,000, while the sapphire version is limited to 30 pieces and priced at €458,000. See more on the Hublot website.

⏲️Wait a minute

A bunch of links that might or might not have something to do with watches. One thing’s for sure - they’re interesting

• During the pandemic, Forrest Wickman got into birds. So into birds, in fact, that he started noticing when birdcalls in movies didn’t match up with the birds that were actually on screen. And nothing was quite so egregiously mismatched as a particular bird who appears in 2000’s Charlie’s Angels and is definitively not a pygmy nuthatch. Thankfully, Forrest Wickman is as obsessive about the truth as he is about birds, and his curiosity led him down a doozy of a rabbit hole. This is the most entertaining story you’ll read all week.

• Come for the cheap electricity and stay for the sweetheart tax deals! When it comes to Bitcoin, Texas is the crypto-mining epicenter of America. There, 40 mines are humming away, sucking up enough electricity to power 800,000 homes. Riot Platforms wants to expand their mine in the North Texas town of Corsicana. To do that, they’ll need nearly 1.5 million gallons of water each day to cool the computers mining Bitcoin 24/7. And that’s just for one farm. Can the fragile electrical grid, the environment, and the residents handle the consequences of crypto miners migrating to Texas en masse? Candice Bernd investigates in this piece published at Texas Observer.

• If you are a millennial, like me, you will be sure to identify with several things we are now being called out on. And yes, you will cringe. It is disconcerting to realize we have moved from “OK Boomer” to millennial bashing, but this is still a fascinating look into generational trends. Who decides what socks we should wear anyway?

👀Watch this

One video you have to watch today

When his father died, Charlie Tyrell realized he knew next to nothing about him. Tyrell and his reticent father hadn’t been close; as a young adult, Tyrell had been waiting for “the strange distance he felt between them to close,” as he describes it in his short documentary, My Dead Dad’s Porno Tapes. Now, he wouldn’t have the chance. This is a great short doc.

Thanks for reading,
Vuk