Why Grand Seiko Quartz is More Than Just an Entry Point to The Brand - Discussion On 9F

Hi everyone, Teddy Baldassar here, back, familiar face, Joe Kirk. Great to see you as always, sir. Great to see you. Thanks for having me. Of course. So today this is a subject that we've actually not talked about before. We've talked about all the different subjects I feel like surrounding Grand Seiko, but there's one area that we've neglected and that's 9F. So one thing that I think people think about when they're talking about 9F is they see it as this entry point, but that's probably selling 9F pretty short. Yes, it is the entry point, but there's so much that is involved with the technology of 9F. And if you look at a lot of these other breakthroughs from Grand Seiko, you see some of these foundational elements that were breakthroughs first with 9F that allowed things like UFA to run. And there's so much here that I think you can appreciate beyond this just being a point of entry for the brand. So I'm going to start with a very loaded question. Why is 9F different when you're talking about quartz technology? Oh, I mean, there's a lot of answer to provide you in that. I said it was loaded. Yeah, of course. So, you know, I think that, you know, if you look at the history of quartz and especially in Tsuwa Seikosha when they made the first quartz wristwatch sold in the world, the Astron, right? The idea was pretty simple and straightforward to, you know, make time essentially as precise as possible. And, you know, it utilized a battery as the power source, as opposed to a mainspring of a mechanical watch. And so, you know, how do you make this energy efficient, right? Because battery consumption was very high back in those days in 1969. And through the seventies. And so energy efficiency is one of the big keys to success. But when they created the 9F in 1993, I think it was with a simple aim in mind is, you know, to create something that can last and is built and engineered more like a mechanical watch than your typical quartz watch. While at the same time, reaping the benefits, every benefit you can possibly think of, of course as well. So if I had to sum up 9F basically, I would say that our simple aim was to create the quartz that surpasses quartz, right? That we wanted to create a quartz that can be handed down to the next generation, something that is not disposable, but actually serviceable and made with longevity in mind while also ultimately being ultra precise. So a statement I always hear, and we just throw it out there, is like Grand Seiko fanatics is like, we harvest our own quartz crystals. Yes. So could we just take a little bit of the veil away and describe more around that process? Cause we always hear that being like as a concept of why 9F is different and really just Grand Seiko is different, but how has that actually done and what are some of the steps for that? Yeah. So, um, you know, with quartz crystal, basically we have our quartz forest where we, where we grow, uh, basically in autoclaves, these giant towers that are submerged into the ground, high heat, high temperature. And it starts as a thin sheet, you call a seed and then turns into this giant block, which is probably the length of my forearm. Wow. Right. That gets broken down and then, uh, all the quartz oscillators then eventually are cut into the tuning fork shape. So the, the process is similar to that of a synthetic diamond. And the reason to do that is you're eliminating any impurities is if you were, uh, to mine the quartz, right. You would get rid of the impurities by harvesting, you know, in-house grown, uh, synthetic quartz oscillators. So that is kind of a big one. Uh, it's, you know, often talked about by our customers and fans of the brand is I can't believe you grow your own quartz in house. And that's pretty remarkable to me too. And then in terms of making sure that it's going to oscillate at this high frequency for a quartz crystal, I mean, we're talking over 32,000 times per second. So how are you ensuring that that is going to maintain its rate? Because we're talking 10 seconds a year of accuracy, standard quartz movement. I mean, if you can output 15 seconds a month, that's pretty stellar. But now we're talking about 10 seconds a year. Yeah. There are many QC steps in the process from looking at the actual quartz blocks themselves, uh, you know, inspecting the quality visually. And, and then once they're cut into the tuning fork shape, we will test them across varying temperatures. We actually artificially age them for 90 days. So basically three months in a controlled environment to ensure stability and accuracy. You know, I think there's a lot of misconception in quartz. It's not that they think about the quartz oscillator. They think about the battery and it makes it disposable and it makes it sound cheap. And so quartz has sometimes a bit of a stigma to it, right? It's a little frowned upon because of this disposable aspect compared to a mechanical watch, which can be handed down. Now, as I mentioned, 9F, our goal is to be the opposite of that. We want to make sure that the quality of our oscillator is exceeding the norm, right? But the reality is the oscillator is the quartz. The balance wheel is the oscillator in a mechanical watch. So you cannot compare an actual quartz crystal to anything but a balance wheel and in terms of timekeeping. So balance wheel is about four Hertz, right? Yes. For complete oscillations within one second where a quartz oscillator is 32,768 Hertz. And so that many oscillations in one second is the reason for the ultra high accuracy, right? Less margin for error, let's say. And so the quartz oscillator may drift in its accuracy over time. So, you know, we want to make sure when you buy a 9F that it's stable right out of the box. So this is why we do this 90 day aging process. That's very important to ensure high stability on the quartz oscillator that basically if you were to buy a typical quartz oscillator right out of the box and no aging maybe in the first year or two you might see some changes or discrepancies in the accuracy compared to the previous years of ownership and we don't want that to happen. So we do this synthetic aging process. Then we test across the varying temperatures to ensure that the oscillator is stable across all temperatures and we specially select the crystals based on their reactions to temperature. Are those humans selected like that's for like a naked eye microscope or I mean how is that? It's more looking at the data, the reaction to actual temperature while it's being tested. So when you're testing across varying temperatures you can see the oscillator's reaction and then you can determine if it falls within the right range naturally then it's specially selected. But on top of that we also have what we call temperature compensation or thermal compensation. Because if you look at traditional quartz watchmaking that rate is pretty standard for a quartz watch. It has that piezoelectric effect, it's going to vibrate and at that specific rate and working with that IC to be able to have that accuracy. But you have this temperature compensation which seems like the other breakthrough that allows you to achieve this level of accuracy because one of the challenges I would imagine is just being able to with this varying degree in 10 seconds a year that's like where a high precision quartz, you know higher frequency quartz movement too because you've been able to stay at this traditional rate. So it's temperature compensation really the breakthrough that allows that to happen. You're not changing the oscillator's frequency, you're just able to adjust and ensure that it's getting that message from the IC basically. Yeah, exactly. So what we do with 9F to ensure that that high stability is consistent across varying temperatures is during that testing process we determine the reaction of the quartz has to the varying temperatures and we pair it with an integrated circuit that's ultra low power that knows how that individual crystal reacts to temperature and is programmed to compensate it accordingly. So each individual crystal has its own individually programmed IC to pair perfectly with that watch to ensure that 540 times a day or every, you know, just over every couple of minutes it's detecting the temperature and compensating if necessary. And then one other question I would have, you mentioned earlier this year when we were sitting down talking about the UFA, this like regulator switch and something that was interesting for me was learning more about how quartz movements and a quartz oscillator can be actually fine tuned and regulated in a mechanical watch. It's usually done by either balance screws. It could be done by lengthening and shortening a hairspring, but there's actually a way to make some small adjustments to a quartz oscillator as well. Yeah. You have to keep in mind too, we had temperature compensation back in the seventies so temperature compensation is not new. And we've done a variety of different ways throughout the company, you know, at Grand Seiko and independently, but Seiko as well in the history of quartz development, there's so many amazing breakthroughs, but temperature compensation nowadays, you know, we have it key. I mean 1993 it's over 30 years going strong 9F and no real changes. So I think that that's, you know, that's an important statement actually for a quartz movement. You know, it's kind of a piece of technology in a way, but at the same time it's stood the test of time, which technology typically does not do. So I think that there's something very special about 9F and in that regard. Um, but when it comes to longterm serviceability, again, I'm always stressing the longevity of 9F that regulation switch, that ability to adjust the accuracy, you know, after many, many years of use, let's say you hand it down to the next generation and all of a sudden it's not within 10 seconds a year. It's 11 seconds, you know, accuracy per year. And that drives you crazy, right? Send it to the service center. They adjust it. And you know, it's right back within range. It's a very simple process. And you know, that's the beauty of this 9F is that it's easy to maintain. So another thing I noticed when we were in Shinshu was watching some 9F assembly. It followed more of a mechanical watchmaking assembly process than a quartz assembly process. And that came down to, I think when we were in the studio, they were putting a hairspring in a quartz watch. And then just looking at the visuals of these movements, they're metal calibers. You know, they're beautiful too. I mean, I think these are actually some pretty nice movements for the price range in which they occupy. So let's maybe talk about that idea around just these being built a little bit more for longevity because it seems like there's a whole differentiation between how a 9F caliber is going to be constructed for the longterm versus a lot of quartz calibers. Yeah. No, I think that, I knew you were going to bring up the spring. That's a given. But when you look at 9F, you know, as you mentioned, it's made of metal, it's a brass movement. It's beautifully finished. So all the bridges, which is kind of compartmentalized. So you have, you know, your integrated circuit would be under this bottom bridge. The top bridge is where your keyless works are, your operating levers. And then the middle panel here is a very special attribute. This is our protective shield cabin. So this is where the gear train lies. And also where that little magical hairspring is. So obviously it's using a hairspring, but not for its typical purpose in watchmaking. So the hairspring is more for absorbing backlash. So there, the hairspring is actually attached to a gear and that gear lies at the end of the gear train. And this we call the backlash auto adjust mechanism. So basically a quartz watch, when the second hand jumps from second to second, typically there's some play, there's some wiggle that occurs. And when it lands on the marker, it wiggles a little bit and might keep it off center. So our engineers brilliantly thought of this use of a hairspring, not in the conventional way to absorb the backlash in the gear train. So when the second hand jumps, it lands assertively and on the marker. And that is a unique feature that you would find in this protective shield cabin. But the shield cabin itself is actually a construction, right? So you have the main plate, you have a mid bridge, and then you have the top bridge and sandwiched in between is the gear train. And there are essentially walls that prevents dust from entering when you're changing the battery, right? Cause not always, you know, are you doing this in a, in a dust free environment. So we wanted to ensure that even the smallest piece of dust does not get into the gear train because you know, it's longterm could cause issues. So that construction is also dramatically helping improve the longevity of the movement. So Joe, my next question would be really around serviceability. So you have a three year battery life, but when a watch is sent back as a nine F like, you know, what does that process like? What are some of the considerations there in terms of the construction to think about that longterm? Yeah. I mean, so the, you know, the idea is to create as long lasting movement as possible and to, to help retain let's say lubrication. You know, this is a nine jewel quartz movement. You don't have to use jewels and movements that are quartz, but in this instance, there are nine of them. Not coincidence that it's nine F nine jewels. It is a coincidence. So, but what, what's interesting about it is if you look right here, you'll see this one jewel that has a, what looks to be like everyone I think knows dia shock. Yes. But we call this dia fix. So that kind of almost horseshoe shaped spring is actually holding on a cap jewel that works with an open jewel or a hole jewel to retain lubricant for the rotor for the step motor. So that's what's going to drive the hands basically. Right? Exactly. So it allows the lubricant to be controlled and distributed over a long course of time. Yeah. It's so like we talked about the protective shield construction and dia fix is just adding to that increased longevity and durability for, you know, simple things like servicing this movement or let's say you need a battery change. You send it in, you know, I always recommend to send it into the service center. At least, you know that you're getting, you know, the gaskets inspected and everything's pressure tested and things like that. But the battery itself is actually quite easy to change. I mean, you can see it's right on top and you can just pop it out and pop in a new one. However, at our service center you can actually we can test on a proprietary machine to ensure that the accuracy is within its guaranteed range. And if not, we also have the ability to a little regulator switch right there by the sending a, an electrical changing the electrical current to the quartz oscillator. Is that how it's really? Yeah. I mean it's a, you know, by applying a different, let's say a, you know, a change in, in the current you can slightly change the frequency of, you know, it's always that baseline 32,768, but you can change its frequency slightly. Interesting. Okay. And Joe, like this is a nice looking movement. Like what are you calling all these surface treatments? I mean, you have like the striping finish, but there's a lot of details here you normally will never see in a quartz watch. Yeah. So I mean, obviously it's made of metal as we discussed, but you know, the striping is just plain striping similar to how we do on caliber nine or 65 as an example you know, with a cutting process to create the stripes and we have beveling all around the bridges. So, you know, the, the aesthetic and it's 45 degree angle mirror polished. I mean, the aesthetic is, is absolutely beautiful, especially, you know, considering it's quartz and at its price point. So a lot of great attributes all the way around. And then let's maybe transition to talking a little bit more about the outward appearance of the watches. We talked about nine F more of the calibers but this is where we can also speak to some of those ideas like the double step with the second hand, the instantaneous date change and give us maybe a sense right now with like nine F as a caliber and the different watches that are going to house it because there's been a lot of changes recently. So where do like you start if you wanted to get into nine F? So, you know, nine F we start with models either like SBGX 261 or 263. They've been a mainstay since the brand went global in 2010. The SBGX 261, 63 right now are going to be 2700 and you know, that's the entry point in the grand Seiko and you get a Zorazu polished case. You get a, it's a three piece brushed bracelet and 37 millimeter case, which was our most compact size for quite some time because of the size of the caliber itself. The nine F 62 is what we use in this particular model with the date. The size is because you know, this movement, unlike spring drive as an example, right coming from the same factory, which typically for an automatic movement has well over 250 components. This movement is over 130 components, but that's still more than most automatics. Yes. So it's, it's really surprising to me. There's so much care and love and all hand assembled and put together in the same studio that the Shinshu watch studio you know, you have this amazing level of care, but we can also make a much more compact size with this movement. So we have the nine F 62, which has the date display that you'll see here. We also make nine F 61, which has no date. But I think that the date is like one of the best features. It's an instantaneous date, as you mentioned. So there's a reason why you don't see that on quartz watches. Is it just the torque front? There's no availability of torque and being able to have the energy to be able to shift that forward. Is that usually the main challenge? Exactly. So with nine F, right, we wanted to use big, bold hands like we use on all Grand Seikos. They have to be that Dolphine style, you know a diamond cut, uh, highly angular hands. And we can't use plastic or any other material besides metal, right? Typically brass is our, is our material of choice. And the second hand typically is steel. And so, you know, that makes it heavy compared to a lot of quartz watches. Our steel second hand that you'll see on these, it's like three times heavier. So it can, it's a lot and it needs torque. So, you know, torque in quartz watches is the reason why you can't use big heavy hands typically. But nine F, obviously we found a solution to that. So we call our twin pulse motor, uh, basically instead of jumping from second to second, right? Have you ever seen one second was the old saying when we first came out with the quartz. Uh, this is actually moving twice in one second. But the middle step happened so fast that you can't see it unless you go in slow motion. And then how is that allowing you to have a better use of energy just because you don't have to actually use torque for it to all just jump forward all at once. And so you're doing intermediate and the intermediate step is helping you in that, in that process. Exactly. Yeah. So, you know, it does help with the power consumption a little bit, but you know, you're talking about almost twice the torque of a conventional quartz watch. So it does, you know, theoretically it should eat the battery life much faster, right? So, you know, you're instead of a three year, maybe it would be one and a half and it's, that's difficult, but we needed to be energy efficient in every way possible because as we mentioned earlier, it's also detecting temperature 540 times a day. There's a lot going on. So we need to be able to, to reduce power consumption as much as possible across the board in order to ensure high efficiency. So because of this dual step motors to pulse action of the second hand, that increases the torque. We also can use a mechanically driven instantaneous state. So it happens in a blink of an eye. There's not really a creep that's going to be happening over like multiple hours that you'll see in a lot of other I mean, there's still, yes. So there still is, but it's a matter of minutes rather than hours, right? The, well, the the jump occurs very rapidly, but the engagement of the spring lever is still you know, operating over a course of time. However, it's not you know, the same limitations that you would find in a slow crawl date in terms of like setting and things like that. So it'll probably keep the date also more square. Cause one of the challenges too, if you have a really long graduated change at that point, you might see the, the numerals get cut off pretty nasty in the. Yeah. Very true. But we wanted to ensure high legibility across every format in this watch. And again, the engineering of the movement is what brought that to life. And then some other collections too. So we're looking here, these entry points to 9F and really the brand of Grand Seiko. And then there are a few other pockets also for different 9F calibers and different complication types. But we're looking at a newer inclusion to the family, but this was in addition to the, the snowflake version of 9F, which is a three five five. So this is now the three, five, seven, seven. All right. There we go. I knew you knew it. You could have guessed. Okay. Sometimes you never know if Grand Seiko reference. Yeah. No, there's a, there's some anomalies we'll say, but yeah. So we now have, you know, we've had the three, five, five now for a little while. And the three, five, seven is a take on, you know, famously named the Skyflake dial now in 37 millimeter, also in titanium, like the three, five, five the white dial quartz snowflake. And so now we have a blue dial variation, but it's the same case, same bracelet. So it's, it's essentially the same watch, just a new dial variation. And I think it's perfect. And I mean, the texture plus this kind of distressed look of this sky blue is really, I think one of the, one of the most beautiful dials that we could have. Because texture is not something you'll typically see associated with nine F like the same way as you get higher up in the brand's catalog. So this is unique opportunity. You're spending a bit more than what we saw previously, but similar concept. You have the instantaneous chain for the date, but you know, you have the titanium. So that's of course going to increase the cost. We also have a five piece bracelet on this, which will make it a little bit more as well. And then the you know, dial process. So, you know, it does end up a little bit more, but still at the end of the day, an incredible value. And you know, I think that everyone loves the nature and textures of grand Seiko, but I think also, you know, if you want steel and you want something simple, the sunray that finish that we do is exceptional. We do have a black lacquer option in the, in the SBGX 261 but we also have the 63, which is that champagne silver color. And that's an incredibly complex dial to make too. And now we have also introduced at the same time as this blue snowflake or the sky flake is the 37 millimeter in a blue sunray finish style. And so this 37 millimeter blue is something that's actually existed in the Japanese domestic market since the others were introduced. However, it wasn't sold globally and now this model will be available on a global level. And in between these two collections, there's another collection. The SPGP series has the zero one three and that'll be a 40 millimeter case. Yeah. So the SPGP series has the nine F 85 movement. So it's a little bit larger diameter caliber. At the same time, it also has a adjustable independently adjustable hour hand. So you can quick jump the hour as you're traveling without a GMT feature. Similarly, we have the nine F 86, which is the GMT, which is also, I think one of these really cool areas of interest for people that are into grand Seiko. And in just honestly a GMT watch, you have a isolated hour function for the local hour hand. So they, something like the SBGN zero two seven, I, this is like a fan favorite. Yeah. Great sports watch. You know, I have the engraved bezel and you know, it's very you know, it's very nice to have a multi-time zone watch. I travel a lot as you know, so I find it very convenient. But I think that, you know, with the nine F the size, the style, all of that just is a winning combination. And then just the convenience of the accuracy, it's running for three years, not for, you know, three day power reserve. You know, there's a lot of practicality in it. And I think that's why it's the perfect fit. You know, nine F is the perfect fit for grand Seiko. You know, we have mechanical, which is a part of our history and tradition. We have spring drive, which is a truly unique innovation. And then we have quartz because grand Seiko was made to be the ultimate practical watch. There's nothing more practical. It's always accurate. It's always running pretty much. And you can grab it and go, you can set all your other watches to it. A lot of our customers do that. I saw you just doing it a while ago. Yeah. So it's you know, it's really incredible, you know, the benefits of nine F but I think that there's a lot to offer in, in these movements and in these designs you know, especially based on the size. Yeah. And for me, I'm somebody that, I mean, I like mechanical watches because of this idea of being the antithesis of disposable goods. And like that's the world in which we live in. But nine F is basically taking the very cerebral practicality that comes with everything that is brought forth by courts and its accuracy, its durability. But then you have this hand craftsmanship that's mirrored with that. And I think that's a combined with that. And that's fantastic. And that, I think is why it lands so well with so many people, especially people that are into Grant Seiko, which understand these ideas very well. There's a misconception in the industry where courts means cheap. And you know, we are really showing that it is not, it's really something that's exceptional and you can be proud of. Well, Joe, thank you so much. Uh, as I stated, nine F was something that we had not yet talked about. So I'm very happy to do it. And I really appreciate you walking through all the details of what nine F has to offer. Oh, you know, it's my pleasure. Anytime sir. All right. Thanks Dave.