Red Star Historic Watch with ST5 Mechanical Movement and Black Strap #8608-BL

Here is a watch that literally has a piece of history inside it. In the mid 1960's, the Chinese Government requested that all factories create a unified movement for watch making. Up until this point, there were no Chinese watches exclusively of Chinese design and manufacture.

The ST5, from the TianJian Watch Factory, was the first Chinese Watch Movement designed, developed and manufactured in China using Chinese tooling. It remained in production for many years. Unfortunately, within 10 to 15 years, the quartz crisis all but killed the need for a mechanical movement, so many of these watches just got put away or trashed. By the time the ST5 was discontinued, millions had been produced.

The owner of Red Star, working for SeaGull for many years, started to collect these defunct ST5 movements. He amassed quite a collection, and in 2021 started to take them apart, clean, oil and bring them back to life. The movement in these three-handed watches is a reborn ST5, complete with SeaGull stripes. The 17 jewel movement is a mechanical wind, and has a power reserve of about 36 hours. Accuracy is about 30 seconds per day.

The black dial is marked with Arabic numbers in a vintage lume color. The cathedral style hands are done in white, and filled with the same vintage lume that glows green in low light. The cushion case is a very comfortable 39mm in diameter. The caseback of each is stamped with it's own series number.