I bought today's watch when I was in Tokyo and ventured to an Antiques and Collectors fair. It looks far more normal than my usual watches, but the noise was what took my interest.
The watch is a Hisonic by Citizen. In an attempt to improve accuracy and produce better electronic watches, Bulova created a new mechanism called the tuning fork. This system used a simple transistor based circuit controlling an electromagnetic tubing fork. In the mechanism, each vibration turns a small (2.4mm) wheel tooth by tooth using a tiny prism shaped ruby. This frequency results in 360 steps per second, meaning that the second hand appears to sweep rather than tick.
The first watch to use this was the Bulova Accutron in the late 60s (which I still want). In 1971, Citizen entered into partnership with Bulova to licence the mechanism and sell the watch in the Japanese market. This resulted in the Hisonic being developed, and today is one of those. The tuning fork watches ended in 1977 after the quartz movement became widespread.
This one uses a 3702 movement (the first Hisonic was the 3701), which has a 3-hand dial and day & date at the 3 o'clock position. It has a sparkly green face, and a Hisonic metal strap. The crown also has the Hisonic logo (a dual tuning fork shape like a H lying on its side). Pulling out one click puts the watch in time setting mode, and two clicks out disconnects the battery.
If the serial numbers follow the more recent pattern for Citizen watches, it will be from 1974 (but it does have too many digits). Citizen released around a million of the Hisonic watches, and the models were expensive at the time (from 38,000 yen to 60,000 yen in 1973).
The full model number is 3702-370287.
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