IWC is so entrenched in the history and business of making pilot’s watches that the breadth of its offerings in this category alone is able to dwarf the entire collections of many brands. Indeed, a scan through the brand’s offering of pilot’s watches reveals that the collection is quite the multi-threaded tapestry, with numerous sub collections and editions — Big Pilot, Pilot’s Watch, Mk XVIII, Le Petit Prince, Laureus, Spitfire, Top Gun — sometimes intertwined and cross-pollinated. Think Pilot’s Watch with Big Pilot diamond crown, sunburst blue dials on non-Petit Prince models, converging/overlapping case size between subcollections, nomenclature mashups… It’s a taxonomist’s nightmare. Yet it is a fine thing for the watch enthusiast as there is a wealth of options in case materials, styles, capabilities and price segments. If you desire a pilot’s watch, then IWC most likely has one for you.

Read all about IWC Schaffhausen’s 2021 Big Pilot’s Watch collection, here.

The Big Pilot

And then there’s the Big Pilot. There are tons of pilot’s watches by countless manufacturers great and small, but there is only one Big Pilot — and it’s made by IWC. Nothing IWC does must disturb the distinctiveness of this iconic line. Massive in girth and charisma, IWC is not gunning for record book thinness with the Big Pilot but rather something robust. Long running times have made the power reserve indicator a natural complication to inhabit the expanse of the dial face, and size too has made the Big Pilot a most well-suited canvas for display-heavy complications like perpetual calendar, annual calendar, big date and constant force tourbillon.

In all this, what was missing was that most commonplace of complications, the chronograph. But alas, a conventional configuration with two pushers flanking the diamond crown would have been too much. Mickey sans ears ceases to be a mouse; and a Big Pilot with twin protrusions will look no less strange. So no chronograph for the Big Pilot — that is, until IWC was happy enough with implementing a monopusher chronograph on the Big Pilot, with a single pusher integrated into its diamond crown to start, stop and reset the count, while preserving the signature profile of the classic Big Pilot’s Watch.

At Last, A Chronograph

Not only is ref. IW515202 the first-ever chronograph in the Big Pilot line, the IWC-manufactured cal. 59360 beating within is also the company’s only manual wind chronograph movement.

It was first seen in 2014’s Portofino Hand-Wound Monopusher (Ref. 5151); it was also the engine of choice in IWC’s first Portugieser with a monopusher, the Portugieser Hand-Wound Monopusher Edition “Laureus Sport for Good”, presented in 2020. It’s taken a while, but the same movement now inhabits the Big Pilot’s Watch Monopusher Edition “Le Petit Prince”. The 60-minute totalizer at ‘12’ is large enough to be legible, the date window is where it ought to be, and winding the watch fully in 70 turns keeps it running for eight days, with power reserve indicator on the reverse viewable via the crystal display back.

Also visible on the back besides the power reserve indicator and balance wheel is a pretty large rook-shaped column wheel, situated just above the winding stem, a mechanical logic gate of sorts which controls the chronograph functions.

Every press of the monopusher turns the column wheel by one position, courtesy of the teeth at its lower level. At its upper level visible through the caseback, the state of the chronograph is determined by the position of three levers relative to the column wheel, between resting on the six columns or the recesses between them.

The first press couples the chronograph mechanism to the fourth wheel of the base movement via the oscillating pinion, and sets the chronograph hand running. A second press uncouples the chronograph module from the base movement and stops the timing. Pressing the pusher a third time resets the chronograph, with the totalizer and chronograph hands snapping back to zero.

IWC used the LIGA process imported from the semiconductor industry to fabricate parts of the cal. 59360, attaining complex geometries and dimensional tolerances not possible with conventional machining techniques.

Does this Big Pilot chronograph move us? A 60-minute totalizer is more versatile in use and more intuitive in reading than the standard 30-minute totalizer found in most chronographs, especially when the latter is also paired with a 12-hour register. And it’s only right that a Big Pilot should not stray too far from its profile whatever its face displays, since this is what makes it a Big Pilot along with its size.

Tech Specs

IWC Big Pilot’s Watch Monopusher Edition “Le Petit Prince”

Ref: IW515202

Movement: Manual wind caliber 59365; 8 days power reserve
Functions: Hours, minutes, small seconds, date, chronograph with 60-minute totalizer
Case: 46.2mm; stainless steel; display caseback; water resistant to 6 bar
Dial: Blue; Super-LumiNova filled applied hour markers
Strap: Brown calfskin strap with folding clasp
Price: CHF 16,900 (approx. USD 18,260)
Availability: Limited edition of 200 pieces