A flying tourbillon suspended in grade 5 titanium and sapphire. Three hundred and twelve components, machined to two microns and finished by hand in the Vallée de Joux.
Inside Calibre C.01
312 components.
One heartbeat.
Beating ten times every second, for five days without rest.
§ 01
Gravity is the watchmaker's oldest adversary. For two centuries the tourbillon has fought it from inside a cage. We removed the bridge, held the cage from below and let it turn in open air. What remains is not a complication. It is a declaration: time, set free.
§ 02 Anatomy
Keep scrolling and the watch separates into its eight assemblies, in the order a watchmaker removes them.
§ 03 Engineering
Four decisions define Calibre C.01. Each one took years to prove, and each one is visible the moment you turn the watch over.
One rotation · 60 seconds
Live · 5 Hz
Anglage · 45° · gentian wood
One rotation · 60 seconds
01 · The flying cage
Conventional tourbillons hang between two bridges. Ours is held from below by a single ceramic ball bearing, leaving the cage floating in open air. Skeletonised from grade 5 titanium to just 0.29 grams, it turns once a minute, averaging out the pull of gravity in every position.
Live · 5 Hz
02 · Silicon escapement
The escape wheel and pallet fork are etched from monocrystalline silicon: lighter than steel, immune to magnetism and so smooth they run without lubrication. Beating at 5 Hz, the balance divides every second into ten precise parts.
03 · Two-micron tolerance
Every plate, bridge and wheel is cut on five-axis machines in our own manufacture in Le Brassus, then measured optically against its drawing. Anything more than two microns out is recycled. A human hair is seventy.
Anglage · 45° · gentian wood
04 · Finished by hand
Once machined, each component passes to a single artisan. Bevels are polished at 45 degrees with gentian wood, flanks are straight-grained by hand and screw heads are mirror-polished, then flame-blued. Every Calibre C.01 is assembled, adjusted and signed by one watchmaker.
§ 04 Precision
Every figure below is checked on every watch, by hand and under magnification, before a movement is allowed to leave the manufacture.
01
2µm
Maximum tolerance on every machined component
02
312
Components in Calibre C.01, each finished by hand
03
36,000vph
Vibrations per hour, a 5 Hz heartbeat
04
120h
Power reserve from twin barrels in series
05
0.29g
Weight of the titanium tourbillon cage
06
88
Pieces worldwide, individually numbered
§ 05 Collection
§ 05 Collection
Each reference is produced in a numbered series and never repeated. Select a piece to explore its specification.
Keep scrolling
Flying Tourbillon
Flyback Chronograph
Tourbillon Noir
Sapphire GMT
Bespoke
Choose the case, dial and strap of your Aphelion and watch it come to life before you reserve it.
§ 06 Materials
They refuse to rust, to scratch, to weigh you down or to hide the movement. Move across each surface to play the light over it.
01 · Ti-6Al-4V
An aerospace alloy of titanium, aluminium and vanadium. Forty per cent lighter than steel, entirely hypoallergenic, and milled from a solid billet in 64 separate operations before every surface is finished by hand.
4.43g/cm³
Density
64
Machining operations
Worn on Aphelion
02 · 600 layers
Six hundred layers of carbon filament, each thinner than 30 microns, are laid at shifting angles and cured under heat and pressure. No two cases share the same grain, and the finished case is lighter than titanium.
30µm
Per layer
600
Layers per case
Worn on Stratos
03 · ZrO₂
Zirconium oxide is injected into a mould, then sintered at 1,450 °C, shrinking by a quarter as it hardens. Polished with diamond paste, it is almost impossible to scratch and will look the same in fifty years.
1,450°C
Sintering
1,250HV
Vickers hardness
Worn on Monolith
04 · Al₂O₃
Grown as a single crystal at over 2,000 °C, then cut, drilled and polished with diamond tools for more than 800 hours. A case as hard as it is transparent, second only to diamond.
9Mohs
Hardness
800h
Machining per case
Worn on Perigee
Reserve 64 hRunning at 5 Hz
§ 07 Configure
This is your watch, keeping your local time. The tourbillon turns once a minute and the reserve runs down as you read. Hold the crown to wind it, then make it yours.
Your configuration
Aphelion in Grade 5 titanium case, Aventurine dial, Obsidian rubber strap
§ 08 Collectors
01 / 03
It is the only watch I own that makes me forget to check the time. I simply watch the cage turn.
§ 09 Private viewing
A Caelum is never sold through a screen. Each piece is presented privately, at one of our salons or at the manufacture where it was made.
Request
Tell us where you would like to meet and which piece interests you.
Concierge
A member of our concierge contacts you personally within 24 hours.
Viewing
Hold the watch in one of our salons, or at the manufacture in Le Brassus.
Salons & manufacture
Geneva
Salon, by appointment
Le Brassus
The manufacture, by invitation
Dubai
Salon, by appointment
Singapore
Salon, by appointment
New York
Salon, by appointment
London
Salon, by appointment
