Nigeria Content Online

The MB&F HM4 thunderbolt is simply not an ordinary watch.
It’s considered more as a horological machine, and goes for a price tag of
$158,000 (N23.7 million), enough money to buy eight new sedan cars.

The exclusive time piece represents an intriguing mixture of
high grade materials, precision engineering, and outlandishly macho design.
Taking three years to craft, the HM4 (Horological Machine No 4), finally
unveiled on 7 July, might be described as the perfect pilot’s or driver’s
watch.

Design

The watch is pure artistic in creation, and with its
groundbreaking and radically designed body, does not follow rules of
traditional wristwatch making. It has highly polished surfaces of titanium and
sapphire, also with seductive curves, and rigid forms with articulated arms. It
has a side order shaped in form of a bullet. It comes in dimensions of 54mm wide
x 52mm long x 24mm high. Its body is fully endowed with grade five titanium and
sapphire-five sapphire crystals. There are 50 jewels and 311 components in the
engine, and a black hand-stitched calfskin strap with a titanium and white gold
clasp

The HM4 is built around a completely complex and meticulous
engine. It has dual dials, with one for the time and the other a powerful
indicator.

It comes with a sapphire glass top and bottom, making the
mechanism visible and reveals as much of the oscillating wheel and validating
the “kinetic” in MB&F’s “kinetic art,” with its distinctive streamlined
cock which supports the balance. The metal case sections are milled from solid
blocks of high-tech grade five titanium.

Structure

On the left pod is the amount of fuel in the tanks or power
reserve indicator, clearly indicated by a skeleton hand echoing MB&F’s
battle-axe motif. On the right, hours and minutes are displayed by bold,
arrow-tipped Super-LumiNova filled hands. Each of the two aviation
instrument-styled dials is directly controlled by its own crown, one to wind
and re-fuel the tanks, the other to set the time, which provides direct and
instantaneous feedback of the action performed.

Engine

It’s got a three-dimensional horological engine and comes with
manual winding with two mainspring barrels in parallel. It has a power reserve
of 72 hours and balance frequency of 21,600bph/3Hz. Ensconced within the watch
is over 300 parts composing a transcendental engine.