With the entry barriers to start your own watch brand at a historic low, many new brands pop up. One of the great things is that this has enabled many creative people to finally realize their vision, and one of them is Saket Sharma. His brand SaStek just released its very first model on Kickstarter, the Time Speed Indicator, for which he reinvented the classic aviation watch!
That is quite a task, but SaStek really succeeded in it by thinking outside the box. The Time Speed Indicator features a regular dial, but this only houses the hour hand which seems to float over a ring marking the hours and stamped with a circular guilloche motive. The center of the dial is covered, with a cut out for the running minutes, and in the middle for the seconds.
Reading the time might look difficult, but is in fact surprisingly easy. Actually I found myself usually treating the watch as if its a single hand watch. The three dashes between the hour markers, and the large triangle hour hand where enough to tell time within about a 5 minute accuracy. When you want to know the exact time, all you had to do was read the center dial. The SaStek allows for easy, simple and very precise time-reading, and you actually wonder why not more watch manufacturers do it like this.
The spinner profile at the center of the dial is a direct reference to the world of aviation. Jet engines feature the same image so that ground crews can easily tell if the engine is spinning or not. At the SaStek it tells you if the watch is running or not, merely serving the same purpose. Other then that, it is also mesmerizing to just watch during the day!
The watch is 44mm in diameter, but has a slim profile, and I especially liked the unique shaped lugs, which give the case a bit of character. With the crown at four o’clock it stayed nicely out of the way when you moved your wrist, making it a very comfortable watch to wear. The texture on the crown, not only amplified the military look of the watch, but also made it very easy to operate.
The watch we reviewed here at Watchisthis?! is a prototype, which will be very similar to the actual production model, but the strap and the buckle have been upgraded, so we won’t go into them.
The SaStek is powered by Miyota’s 9015, a very robust and reliable caliber. The only part where it doesn’t score any points is on looks, so SaStek did right to go for s nicely engraved closed caseback instead! It features a jet pilot in full gear, a perfect match with the rest of the watch.
The SaStek Time Speed Indicator comes with three strap colors, two case finishes and five dial colors, making it that there is quite a lot to choose. Luminova ensures that also at night you can read the time, which is quite unique for a watch with this dial layout. Priced at US$350,- it is ready to take on the competition. I wouldn’t call it a steal, but it comes very, very close to it. Not only the unique time display makes the watch earn this price, but also the extremely high level finish, will make you not feel disappointed when you order one. You can find more info on the SaStek Time Speed Indicator here or on Kickstarter.