Jüles Jürgensen - Five Minute Repeater With Foudroyante Chronograph - Horology Deconstructed

High resolution, book format. Deconstruction Jules Jürgensen Five minute repeater with foudroyante chronograph (1890) by THE NAKED WATCHMAKER Images from www.thenakedwatchmaker.com All texts, photographs and illustrations are Copyright ©2018 The Naked Watchmaker Edition JJ.1a Formatted for use on mobile telephones, laptops and tablets. All rights to this publication are reserved. It would be appreciated by the author that no part of this book may be reproduced, copied or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, xerography and videography recording, with out the permission of The Naked Watchmaker. Jules Jürgensen Jules Jurgensen, born in Locle, Switzerland in 1808 while his parents were visiting and his father was studying jewel making. The family was based in Copenhagen where his father Urban made timepieces and thermometers. Jules grew up in Copenhagen working at the bench with his brother, Louis-Urban under his father’s guidance. Jules was the third generation of his family to study watchmaking. The Jurgensen house established by his grandfather Jorgen, apprenticed to a clockmaker in Copenhagen. Jorgen advanced his education in Locle with the renowned horologist, J. F. Houriet with him he set up a business association. Jorgen’s son Urban studied the profession with his father and after which he went to Locle, Paris and London to finish his education. He later married Sophie-Henriette Houriet, daughter of J. F. Houriet while in Locle. Jules followed his father’s route and studied in Locle, Geneva, London and Paris. Approximately in 1835 he started making watches in Locle. He married a Swiss woman, Anastasie Lavalette who was from a watchmaking family based in Geneva in 1836. She bore five children two sons and three girls, Jules-Urban-Frederick and Jacques-Alfred who also became watchmakers. This part of the family added to their watches “Copenhagen” for many years, even though they were made in Switzerland. The business remained under family ownership till 1916 when David Golay a watchmaker from the company purchased it from Jacques-Alfred’s widow. He then sold it to E. Heuer in Bienne in 1925. By 1936, with the depression, desire for exceptional time-pieces reduced to virtually nothing and the company was sold to the New York house of AisensteinWoronock. The watches continued to be produced in Switzerland until 1957. In addition to being generally heavily over-engineered horology, the system of setting is unique to Jurgensen. It is five minute repeater with single push piece chronograph. The chronograph records up to 1 minute and the offset seconds has 5 incremental jumps in a single second (foudroyante). There are two trains in the movement and the watch is wound by winding the crown in both directions, winding both barrels. One for the going train, one for the chronograph/foudroyante. Another aspect of this watch which makes it unusual is the setting of the hour executed by tilting the bow towards the dial, then the crown adjusts the time instead of winding the mainsprings. Five minute repeaters were first made in 1710 by Samuel Watson, the repeater strikes the hours on one gong and then the number of five-minute periods after the hour on the second gong. The mechanism uses a low tone for the hours and a higher tone for the minutes. A “foudroyante” hand, has a cycle of one second. Watches equipped with such a hand typically also feature a conventional seconds hand. The foudroyante hand can be central or in a sub-dial, and can be used for timekeeping or as part of a chronograph. The underside of the movement with the dial removed. The repeater mechanism is shown to the left of centre. Setting to the right and the foundroya