Watches Appreciation And Resouces: Viribus Unitis A11 “Airborne Diver” is a bulletproof flieger

Tuesday, October 31, 2017

Viribus Unitis A11 “Airborne Diver” is a bulletproof flieger

The Viribus Unitis A11 Watch is a brute of a watch with a historical flair. It is a 1000ft-rated diver in a polished stainless steel case, finished with a sapphire crystal, automatic movement, shine-through-dial lume, and solid linked stainless bracelet. If you can pull off this monster on your wrist, you’re in for a wild ride.

First Impressions

The A11 comes in a nifty “capsule-style” leather-like case – undo the magnetic buckle, and slide the watch holder out of the leather oblong tube. It’s a nifty packaging mechanism, and certainly a step up from the usual boring box.

The A11 Watch is beefy but refined. It has a definite weight to it, but it’s conical screw-down crown, unidirectional beel, and anchor-themed second hand give it a refined look. The blue gradient on the dial is a nice touch too. By far the standout thought, in my eyes, is the super cool A11 airplane artwork engraved on the caseback.

Fit and Finish

The watch came in great condition – polishing is excellent, dial looks great, and all markings are crisp and clear. I love the little anchor engraving on the crown and clasp, and compement on the sweeping second hand. The bezel has 120 clicks, which feels snappy and solid.

While the lume isn’t as super as I’ve seen on other pieces, it is certainly unique. It looks like there’s an entire sheet of lume behind the dial, which shines through cuts in the dial for the indices, numbers, etc. That’s a cool feature I haven’t seen on many watches before. Instead of being painted on the dial, it shines through. Nice.

On The Wrist

On the wrist, the A11 has a certain strong elegance I like – its shiny stainless steel goes with anything you wear, and the blue dial is a compliment to the blue gradient on the face.

Viribus Unitis sticks with historical whispers with interesting altitude markings and a stencil font.

From the Virbus Unitis Website, here’s the history on the A11:

The respective inspiration for this watch model was the seaplane type OEFFAG Mickl H with the aircraft identification A11. The pilot of this aircraft was Gottfried Freiherr von Banfield, who on May 31, 1917, won the first air victory at night in the air war history. At 22:30 he forced an Italian seaplane near Miramare Castle (northern adriatic sea) to land.

This well-known Austrian seaplane, the blue bird, had originally fitted a 145hp Hiero engine and reached a speed of 155km/h. After changing the engine into a 200hp Hiero engine, the A11 reached 180km/h.

Armed with two machine guns, the rate of ascent was 3000m in just 19 minutes.

The A11 was delivered October 1916 and was flown by Lschlt Banfield until mid of 1918.

The seaplane was stationed at the Santa Catarine seaplane station in Pola (today’s Pula in Croatia), with the northern Adriatic operation area.

Standout Features

Nice artwork and engraving on the caseback – really do love that.
1000FT depth rating. At this price point, and for a boutiquey watch, this is a great feature. Now of course, you’d not actually use this as a real diver, since the unidirectional bezel doesn’t have any time markings, but it’s still a cool features from a construction point of view.
Miyota 9015 Automatic Movement – It’s hacking, so setting precisely is easy. It’s also easy to have repaired by almost any jeweler.. although at that level, the movement is essentially replaceable.

Feedback

Use higher brightness lume. And maybe change up the color?
On the back it reads “Made in Vienna Forest”. Is “Vienna Forest” a proper noun? Or are you meaning to say “Made in the Vienna Forest” or “Made in the Forests of Vienna” or something like that? Perhaps this is my ignorance here, but it stood out a bit.
Smooth out the line on the bottom edge of the case a bit – it’s sharp still from manufacturing.