ESA/ETA caliber 940 prototype, #100, 1976
Category: functional prototype
Description: Symmetric, stainless steel cased prototype with stainless steel snap bezel and snap back, latter marked with production info. Round, metallic blue dial with vertical decoration, raised hour indexes. ‘ESA/ETA’ ’12’. Date window at ‘3’. ‘Quartz’ printed in white above ‘6’. Silver hour and minute hands with white insert as hour markers, silver seconds hand. Steel crown with raised ‘Eterna’ logo. Mineral crystal.
Dimensions: 34.5mm (without crown), lug – lug: 39.8mm, Overall thickness: 8.25mm, lug width: 20mm
Movement: ESA/ETA 940.111 prototype, scratch numbered ‘100’
Additional info: This is the 100th ESA/ETA prototype for creating the first generation of very slim quartz calibers of the ‘940 Flatline’ family. It includes a ‘Statek’ quartz module (tuning fork shaped quartz) produced in-house in the newly stablished automated production line at EEM in Marin and a CMOS integrated circuit (scratch numbered ’22’) also built in-house in Marin with the expertise and licence of ‘Hughes Microsystems’. Thus, this is one of the first all Swiss quartz calibers produced on a (semi)- automated production line, featuring then state of the art components (1).
Other differences to the marketed caliber include a different, more ‘primitive’ trimmer and a differently etched wafer. Additionally the wafer base is green instead of the later used blue. Also, the ETA and ESA logos are not stamped on the same recesses as in the production versions.
The movement is set inside a very slim ‘Eterna’ case, the Eterna logo is stamped in the center of the crystal. Eterna was the brand out of which of ETA (ETernA) was outsourced and run as semi-independent caliber manufacturer within the Ebauches SA group and many initial prototypes for internal use were built using cases made for Eterna or parts used in Eterna models. Also some prototypes using Certina elements are also known. More sophisticated prototypes, which would be destined for representative purposes, would be preferably cased in Longines cases (1).
This prototype was the personal watch of André Beyner, and as it seems to have been one of his favourite pieces to be worn during the mid 1970s. It retains also the original strap and buckle, latter also with the raised ‘Eterna’ logo. If it was on purpose that prototype #100 was attributed to him remains unknown.
Provenance: Ex Estate of André Beyner, former technical director of Ebauches SA
Ref.:
- Personal communication with a former Executive Vice-President of Ebauches SA, in charge of Research & Engineering.
