CitizenCitizen Men’s Eco-Drive 3-Hand Date Avion Watch with Leather Strap (Style: AW1361:10H)

I grabbed this years ago for less than 100 dollars after eyeing it up for a while. I am a big fan of aviation style watches (flieger) and I'm partial to the busier type B face, since I'm a sucker for data. Readability is up to the user, as I have no problem with quickly determining the time, but it is a fairly busy watch.In five years, it has seen daily wear. I don't intentionally abuse it, but it has seen plenty of knocks. It's been smashed into steel doors and frames, bashed against tools, dropped onto hard floors and asphalt, so on. It's met some sharp edges and corners, but it tanks them. There's only one small chip on the crystal, which has proven remarkably robust despite being mineral and not sapphire. The case has some weathering, but it has a fair bit of character now. I haven't gone diving with it, but it stands up to negligent hand washing, rain exposure, and dishwashing. The second hand, which tends to become off center with so much impact, still reads dead zero.The lume is alright. It glows quite bright for a few hours if it sees some good light. I wouldn't depend on it to be readable if it's terribly dark for a while. If you want that, you should look elsewhere. Note that only the hour and minute hands are painted with lume.Accuracy/precision is pretty good also. I usually only adjust it when I notice it's more than a few minutes off, which is maybe once or twice a year (if I don't accidentally pull the crown out when taking off a sweater or gloves).It's never been serviced in that time, either. I might send it in for a service and maybe a new crystal.Overall, I think it's an excellent watch at MSRP, and if you can get it cheaper, even better.

Every good watch collection should have a pilot’s watch, and if you are looking for a low-maintenance Flieger style timepiece that looks great and functions flawlessly, check out this model from Citizen.This is a large watch, don’t get me wrong, but as an pilot’s watch, it’s supposed to be. (When you’re flying an aircraft, a big dial with easy to read numerals is a must!) This is actually a bonus if like me, you have larger wrists, but for you that have normal size wrists, fear not, this watch will look great on you, too!The hour hand is thick, outlined with an attractive orange, which is also used on the 1-12 hour numerals outside the inner dial. The minute hand is more narrow, but still substantial, lined in black. Both hands have a considerable amount of lume, giving them a distinct white appearance which makes for easy accusation in daylight, and lights up like a flashlight in the dark. While I wish Citizen also applied lume to the numerals, the hands are large enough to tell time without the hour markers at night.I like what Citizen did by printing the 13-24 hour numerals on the inside of the inner dial. It fits with the pilot’s watch, and it makes for an interesting dial.The date wheel is awesome. It fixes a problem that plagues other Citizen watches where the date window is far too small. On this watch, the date window is narrow but long, showing three dates at once. With the middle date being the correct date. It is clearly marked, and easy to read. I love how the date works on this watch!This watch is extremely accurate. I own several watches with Citizen’s Eco-Drive movement, and there are several reasons that I keep coming back for more. This watch is as accurate as any quartz watch I have ever owned. I reset my watches when Daylight Savings Time comes and goes, and this watch is never off more than a few seconds from when I set it six months before. Unlike most other quartz watches, the Eco-Drive movement is solar powered, and does an amazing job. With this watch, you don’t have to worry about changing batteries every year or two. Wearing this watch outside for one day a week is enough to keep it “charged” up and ready to go. If you store the watch on top of a dresser where it gets some sunlight, you won’t ever have to worry about the power reserve. If you are like me and wear watches on rotation, this Eco-Drive powered watch will work for you. On a full charge, you can store the watch in a dark drawer for more than 6 months without it missing a beat. Simply wear it in the sun for a few days or leave it under a lamp to charge back up.The brown leather strap is of good quality, and I have kept it on the watch. It is soft, yet strong enough to keep a good hold onto this pilot’s watch.In summary, this is an amazing pilot’s style watch at a very affordable price. Citizen’s EcoDrive Quartz movement will keep going for years without any maintenance, all you have to do is make sure it sees some sunshine.Whether your adventures take you into the cockpit of an airplane, coach class, or just watching Topgun on TV, this Citizen will be by your side, just ticking away.

Love this watch. Can’t beat Citizen eco-drive

This Flieger-style watch from the venerable Japanese watchmaker, Citizen, went into my collection this past September. Citizen calls this watch the "Avion", but a Flieger it is. I paid $130 US, but it has gone for sub-$100 at times on Amazon. Now that I've worn it a number of times in the past two months, I have a few thoughts.First a little history. "Flieger" is German for "flyer", and modern variants like this one are homages based on the aesthetics of the watches provided to German pilots and particularly the navigators on larger aircraft, such as bombers, in the Second World War. Interestingly, the watches were aircraft equipment and not the personal property of the flyer, meaning that each was kept with its plane and returned with it at the end of each mission. They were huge, 55 millimeters in diameter, with pocket-watch movements, and had long leather straps to wrap around the outside of the flyers' thick flightsuit sleeves. They were intended to be easily readable at a glance in a variety of flying conditions, so they usually had highly contrasting colors with simple indices and Arabic numerals, and the hands were easily distinguishable, with a long, thinner minute hand, a short, thicker hour hand and a very long skinny seconds hand. All of the variants had a triangle at the 12 o'clock position so that the flyer could easily orient to the correct time no matter the attitude of the aircraft at a given moment in flight.This Avion is pretty true to the Flieger aesthetic with a pleasing modern twist or two. At 45 millimeters in diameter, it's the largest watch in my collection, and just about the largest I'd ever want to have on my 7-1/2 inch wrist. It's got two race tracks of markers, as some of the WW2 variants had, with minutes/seconds on the outer track, and a combined civilian/military hour racetrack on the inner part. The dial is a pie-pan so that the hands and indices are in-set on the dial face, which is a pleasing effect if you ask me. The Avion also has a date window, which the original Fliegers never had, but the modern ones typically do, and I usually like a date complication when I can get it. The date is at once both small and large - the numerals are small almost to the point of being unreadable except in very good light or with reading glasses (at least for this middle-aged+ guy), and nevertheless it shows not only today's date, but yesterday's and tomorrow's as well. I'm not sure why I need to see yesterday's and tomorrow's dates and for me the aesthetics of that may be slightly too much given that the dial is already pretty busy.Although this is a quartz watch, it never needs a battery change, thanks to Citizen's 'Eco-Drive' movement which utilizes solar energy to charge its capacitor. Once fully charged, it will last months in complete darkeness, and it only needs occasional wearing to stay topped up. Many people seem puzzled by its 2 second skip behavior - this is a feature, not a bug, and indicates that the capacitor charge is low. It will be seen to exhibit this behavior right out of the box which may prompt the uninitiated to return the watch. Just put the watch in a well-lit area for a couple of hours for its initial full charge. Not direct sunlight, however, as that may be too intense for some of the components.The case is stainless steel and despite its diameter, it isn't thick or heavy. The included leather band works well with the watch and seems good quality. It has a very pleasant feel on the wrist and the watch is fun to look at. And since it's a Citizen, you're getting a precision movement and quality build. It's water resistance is rated at 100 meters, which isn't as good as it sounds since it doesn't have a screw-down crown. It's fine for accidental splashes and dunks but I wouldn't swim or bathe while wearing it.I have a few quibbles (as, admittedly, I do with all of my watches.) I have already referred to the date window, which could stand to show just today's date and be a bit larger, or include a magnifyer on the crystal, or perhaps just be removed altogether.I would have preferred a sapphire crystal but instead it is mineral. However, it is flat, which I much prefer to domed as that makes them less likely to scratch and there is less light reflectivity and glare, in my experience.Perhaps my biggest dissatisfactions are the color contrasts and the lume. The hand and indices colors do not contrast enough with the dial, making them harder to read at a glance, especially the very narrow seconds hand, for which I have to search for a few moments as it blends in to the background. There is lume on the hands and some of the indices but it's not bright and it fades fast, and curiously the 12 o'clock triangle is not lumed, a disappointing missed opportunity.Still, this watch will stay in my daily wear rotation, at least for now. If you can find one on sale for around $100 or less, take it, as that is a very good price in my opinion.