H. Moser & Cie. Pioneer Centre Seconds Swiss Mad Red

H. Moser & Cie.’s answer to an everyday beater is the steel three-hand Pioneer Centre Seconds. With its distinctive dial displaying the bare necessities, the Pioneer Centre Seconds combines resilience and hallmark Moser features. At 42.8mm in diameter, it is one of the largest Mosers on the block and features luminescence, 120m water-resistance and an efficient automatic movement with a 3-day power reserve. Visited in funky blue and green fumé dials in the past in steel (there are other models in red gold), the Pioneer Centre Seconds is now treated to a bold red dial, a dial with an interesting history that has a lot to do with Swiss cheese and a dash of Moser irreverence.

Cheesy background

What do you get if you cross a Pioneer Centre Seconds with the Swiss Mad watch – the one with the Swiss cheese case? The answer is the Pioneer Centre Seconds Swiss Mad Red. For those of you who missed the 2017 presentation of the Swiss Mad watch, a quick recap is in order because the case of the watch was made from Swiss cheese; to be more precise, from Vacherin Mont d’Or cheese. With its red fumé dial and white indices arranged like a cross to evoke the Swiss flag along with its cowhide strap, the Swiss Mad watch was a 100% Swiss Made watch. Provoking much hilarity and surprise among watch journalists, there was a very clear message behind this provocative watch.

The Swiss Mad watch was Moser’s way of snubbing the 2017 legislation passed by the Swiss Federal Council which only requires 60% of the components in a watch to be of Swiss origin to define a movement as Swiss. For Moser, with its high degree of manufacturing autonomy – it produces its own hairsprings – 60% was not high enough. If a watch is going to bear the Swiss Made label, it has to be 100% Swiss Made. The Swiss Mad watch with its cheese case was the brand’s entertaining take on the situation. In light of the 2017 legislation, Moser decided to remove the Swiss Made label from all its watches.

The Pioneer Centre Seconds family

To cut a long story short, the bright red fumé dial that made its debut on board the Swiss Mad cheese watch has made its way to the Pioneer Centre Seconds. The simplest model in the Pioneer family, which also hosts a Tourbillon and Perpetual Calendar, the Pioneer collection appeared in 2015 as a luxury sports-styled option with more aggressive lines, luminescence and water-resistance… the only problem was that its watches were housed in a case partially made of red gold. Not really what we would consider a sports watch, thus Moser decided to introduce stainless steel into the Pioneer collection in 2017 – and also cut the price tag by half.

Swiss Mad Red dial

Red might not be the easiest colour for a dial or maybe not the first colour you would go for when choosing a watch, but in the hands of Moser, red takes on a different connotation. Like all Moser’s trademark gradient/fumé dials, the red colour transits from a lighter tone in the centre intensifying to an almost cherry black tone at the periphery. Nobody does gradient dials quite like Moser and the surge of gradient dials on the market today is, I suspect, due to Moser.  In keeping with its sportier nature, the faceted hour markers are larger and thicker than those you might find on an Endeavour or a Venturer watch and feature a luminescent dot on the flange of the dial. Another Moser trademark are the leaf-shaped hands, which on the Pioneer Centre Seconds are wider to accommodate a layer of Super-LumiNova but are skeletonised at the base allowing the red dial to shine through.

Steel case

The solid 42.8mm steel case with its height of 10.6mm transmits a sportier feel than its more refined three-hand counterpart in the Endeavour family. If you look at the sides of the case, you’ll see four indented areas that look a bit like the grille intake vents on a car which add a touch of aerodynamic, sporty styling to the case. The screw-down crown attests to the 120m water-resistance of the case and is engraved with an ‘M’ and the surfaces are beautifully finished with polished and brushed surfaces.

100% Swiss Calibre HMC 200

The movement inside the Pioneer Centre Seconds is the HMC 200, an automatic calibre designed, developed and produced entirely in-house – even the regulating organ is manufactured by Moser’s sister company Precision Engineering AG. As Moser points out, the calibre HMC 200 is ‘100% Swiss, 100% Moser’. Thanks to the bi-directional pawl-winding system, the watch is wound more quickly and holds power over a minimum period of three days (72 hours). Equipped with an original Straumann Hairspring with a flat overcoil, the large gold oscillating weight is engraved with the company logo and the movement is finished with Moser stripes.

Price And availability

A sporty black rubber strap with a steel pin buckle accompanies the watch. The retail price of the Pioneer Centre Seconds Swiss Mad Red is CHF 12,900 or EUR 12,300. The H. Moser & Cie. Pioneer Centre Seconds Swiss Mad Red can now be ordered online, via the brand’s e-boutique here.

 More details on www.h-moser.com.