Accutron Watches – The Tuning Fork Watch

Although consumers today may be familiar with Accutron watches as perhaps an unremarkable, but good quality and affordable Swiss made watch, the history of the Accutron brand is very important to the history of the wristwatch in the 20th Century.

To this day, Bulova and Accutron watches bear a tuning fork logo; a curious symbol for a watch company. Anyone familiar with the Accutron brand prior to 1977 may recognize the Accutron watch as "The tuning fork watch". If you are lucky enough to have examined an old Accutron tuning fork watch, you may have heard the faint ringing hum of a tuning fork emanating from the watch. Any Accutron wrist watch dealer will tell you that they are still questioned from time-to-time: "Whatever became of the tuning fork watches?"

In 1952, Bulova began to develop the Accutron. It would be, the company claims, the first real breakthrough in timekeeping technology in 300 years. Indeed, to that point, all watches and clocks operated on the same basic set of mechanical principles.

The Accutron wrist watch would be something completely different. A small tuning fork device, would oscillate at a nearly constant frequency when an electrical current was run though it. The tuning fork was fitted to a ratcheting mechanism that turned a geared wheel forward one notch at a time with each oscillation cycle. Because it incorporated transistors, it became the first "electronic" watch.

The Accutron watch entered production in 1960. It promised accuracy to within two seconds a day, or one minute a month. An immediate success, Accutron was the first wristwatch to be certified as "railroad approved". To that point, railroad engineers had used approved pocket watches which had to be frequently serviced and regulated. An examination of the history of horrific train collisions in the 19th Century will convince one of the importance of accurate timekeeping in the rail business.

The Accutron wrist watch collection includes both Accutron ladies watches and Accutron men’s watches.

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