How We Make Our Watches — Part 2: The Prototype
The Watch Journal · Second Hour · How Our Watches Are Made
The drawings are finished. The engineers have signed off. Now comes the part where everything that looked right on screen has to prove itself in steel, ceramic, and glass. The prototype stage is where many watch projects quietly fail — where the intersection of intent and capability get drawn into stark relief — and where Second Hour's standards get set in physical form.
The gap between drawing and reality
There is a particular moment in the development of every Second Hour watch when the first prototype arrives. After months of design work, colour selection, CAD revision, and engineering critique, a physical object finally exists. It is almost never exactly right.
That is not a failure — it is the point of prototyping. The first sample is not a finished watch. It is a three-dimensional question: does this translate from screen to steel the way we intended? The answer determines what happens next. Sometimes one prototype round is enough to reach production approval. For more complex watches, or watches with components that push into unfamiliar territory, it can take two or three rounds. Each round has a specific brief: the things that are wrong, precisely described, with a revised specification for how they should be corrected.
What gets rejected — and why
The Gin Clear 3 development produced two specific rejections worth documenting. Both involved the bezel — the rotating ring at the top of the case that marks elapsed time. Both rejections were made because the component didn't meet the standard that Second Hour's customers expect when they pick up the watch for the first time.
Rejection 1 — Bezel teeth: grip vs. finish
The Gin Clear Mk2 had a brushed bezel finish. The Mk3 moved to a polished finish — a deliberate upgrade that gives the watch a more refined, premium look on the wrist. The first prototype bezel came back polished. It looked right. It felt wrong.
The polished surface on the bezel teeth reduced friction in a way the brushed finish had not. The grip — the tactile confidence you feel when rotating the bezel with a single finger — wasn't there. For a dive watch rated to 300 metres, an uncertain bezel action is not an aesthetic problem. It is a functional one.
The solution was specific: slightly broader teeth, which restored the grip the polished finish had taken away. The second prototype came back with the revised geometry. The action was correct. The finish was approved.
The Gin Clear 3 bezel and crown in profile — the coin-edge teeth geometry was one of two bezel-related rejections during Mk3 development. Behind the prototype, the technical drawing from which it was made. Credit: Second Hour.
Rejection 2 — Bezel insert: colour matching and surface finish
The Gin Clear 3 uses anodised aluminium bezel inserts for the Emerald and Dark Rhodium colourways. Getting the colour right — the specific depth and consistency of the anodising, the surface texture, the way it reads under different light conditions — proved harder than expected.
The first supplier's inserts came back with colour matching that didn't meet the standard. The surface finish was inconsistent. Both were grounds for rejection. A second supplier was tested. Their result was closer but still not right. The third supplier produced inserts that met the specification on both colour and finish. They are the supplier used in production.
The process of finding the right supplier took time that wasn't in the original development schedule. It went in anyway. A bezel insert that doesn't match the dial precisely is visible to anyone who looks closely at the watch — and Second Hour's customers look closely.
The Gin Clear 3 Emerald prototype under inspection — the green anodised bezel insert colour and surface finish against the dial. Getting this match right required testing three separate suppliers. Credit: Second Hour.
Checking the prototype: radial alignment under the lens
Some of the most important quality checks happen at a scale invisible to the naked eye. Indices, the date aperture, and bezel markers all need to sit on precise radial lines from the dial centre — a misalignment of even a fraction of a degree is the kind of flaw that watch collectors notice immediately, even if they can't articulate why a dial "feels off."
To verify this, prototypes are checked using a specialist vision-inspection camera and measurement software. The system overlays a coordinate grid and radial lines directly onto a live magnified image of the dial, allowing every index and the date aperture to be measured against their intended position to a fraction of a millimetre. Any deviation outside tolerance sends the component back for correction before it ever reaches approval.
Vision-inspection software measuring radial alignment of the indices and date aperture against a precise coordinate grid. This level of scrutiny happens before a prototype is ever considered for approval. Credit: Second Hour.
Case finishing: corrected on every cycle, every case
Surface finishing on a watch case is not a single pass-or-fail check. Every case goes through repeating cycles of quality control — first at the manufacturing facility, then again at the assembly facility — and at each stage, an inspector marks up precisely where the finish falls short of spec.
The photo below shows a real inspection result: a case marked up by hand, identifying small deviations in the brushed and polished surfaces that need correction before the case can proceed. This isn't a one-off problem to be solved and forgotten — it's a discipline applied to every single case, every cycle, because surface finishing is judged by touch and reflected light in ways that are almost impossible to fully specify in a drawing.
A case inspection result, marked up to flag small deviations in the finish requiring correction. This level of inspection repeats across cycles — at the factory and again at assembly — on every case that's made. Credit: Second Hour.
What approval actually means
A prototype is approved when every element — case finishing, bezel action, dial colour and texture, hand geometry and lume fill, bracelet articulation, clasp action, crown feel — meets the standard that Peter has set for that watch. Not most elements. All of them.
This is not a document-driven process. There is no checklist that, when completed, produces an approval. It is a physical judgement made by someone who has spent months defining exactly what the watch should be — and who will have their name on it when it reaches the customer.
Once approval is granted, all required final changes are specified — with accompanying drawings — and the specification is locked. The manufacturer receives the confirmed drawings, commencement deposit, and a quality reference piece. Production can now begin. Part 3 covers what happens next — the cutting, finishing, and assembly of the watch itself.
Part 3 — how the components are made, finished, assembled, and inspected — coming soon.
View the Gin Clear 3 → See the full collection →Second Hour is an independent watch brand designed in Melbourne. All watches ship globally via DHL Express. secondhour.com.au
