IWC Portuguese Chronograph Review

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Three weeks ago I purchased a grail I'd been wanting for the better part of a year, the IWC Portuguese Chronograph (Reference 371417). This model has the stainless steel case, silver dial and blue hands. It also comes with the blue "croc" strap and stainless buckle.


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The watch measure just under 41mm which is surprising because it appears huge on the wrist, much bigger than the stated size. Side by side with a 44mm Sinn U1 or a Debaufre B-Uhr., it appears equal in size. I attribute that to the fact that the watch is all dial with a negligible bezel surrounding it.


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The movement is the venerable Valjouz 7750 which has been modified by IWC. Now I know what people are referring to when they mention the 7750 "wobble". The movement is hacking with two subdials, a small seconds and a minutes counter. The minutes counter only goes to "30" so its not much of a useful timer. That's fine with me as I purchased the watch based on looks and reputation first and functionality second. In typical fashion, the top plunger starts and stops the large seconds counter and the bottom plunger resets to zero. There is no date function, I haven't decided if I miss having a date yet. Some of my watches have date complications, some don't and I don't really care that much one way or the other. The power reserve is 44 hours.

You can see from the catalog picture, that I had my choice of metals and dial colors. My budget only permitted me to consider the steel case versions. I was torn between the white dial/gold markers version and the silver dial/blue markers model. I ultimately decided that the silver and blue combination was more legible and went with that color scheme.


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The watch is only 12.3mm thick which I like. It easily fits under a sleeve and is light enough I hardly notice I'm wearing it.


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The back is solid.


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The glass is, of course, sapphire, convex with AR on both sides. It's not quite as effective at stopping glare as the coating on the U1 but it doesn't seem to smudge as easily. A trade-off I can live with.


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I've not closely checked the accuracy but it's excellent. I don't recall have to reset the watch since I bought it. All in all, it's a wonderful watch, very distinctive, very attractive and a bit of an icon. I'm very pleased with it and intend to keep it until I pass it some day to a grandson.


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Thanks for reading. Chris