# Early Breitling Observation Stopwatch



## Mikrolisk (Jan 23, 2008)

Hi,

on my search on a simple chronograph or stopwatch (to learn how to disassemble and re-assemble them after cleaning)

I found an old stopwatch at the fleabay that looks rather old and interesting.

The stopwatch was not signed but had a swiss patent number on the movement (CH-3823).

Because I like to look for every found patent I searched for this patent, too. And I found this.

CH-3823 "Chronographe-compteur d'observation"

LÃ©on Breitling, Ã St.-Imier, 27th july 1891










(short version of this patent)

At this moment I was just curious who this LÃ¨on Breitling was... and whether he was perhaps a relative to the Breitling family. But...

... yes, then it was clear, he was the founder of the Breitling SA himself!

Here's that stopwatch:



















A 5 minute stopwatch for scientific or sports observations, as mentioned in the patent. The patent is for reducing costs on building a stopwatch because of less movement parts. One lever controlls all states (start, stop, reset).

Kind regards,

Andreas


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