Excellent condition Eterna 1948 automatic. Pre owned pprox 14 years old. This one is the classic chronometer in 18 carat gold case. The cold case is havy and thick and scrap value alone is around £1000 It is a Swiss certified chronometer ETA 2824-2 movement.Has a sapphire crystal and display bacl showing off the movement. Silver dial with date. Comes on original leather strap with Eterna folding clasp, this is gold plated. Comes in the original box. The 1948 as the name suggests is a homage to the designs in the late 1940’s so takes on a beautiful classic appearance but made to modern proportions, specifications, with the best materials and movement, so it makes for a vintage classic but made to modern standards. Eterna have been producing high quality watches since their formation in 1856 in Grenchen, Switzerland. They have been responsible for many horological innovations including the 1948 production of the world’s first automatic wristwatch on a ball bearing mounted rotor – a huge technological achievement of the era, and the Eterna logo still today bears, the five ball bearings. The world of mechanical timepieces experienced a revolution in 1948. Eterna, one of the most eminent manufactures, had introduced a paradigm change based on five tiny spheres. They thoroughly and permanently eliminated the greatest shortcoming of self-winding movements: the friction-prone rotor bearing. It was only natural that this ground-breaking invention embodied in the Eterna Matic would advance to become the global standard once the patents expired. But even then, Eterna had much more to offer: an ingenious system for polarising the motion of the rotor as well as a sophisticated gear train which significantly boosted the efficiency of the winding system. These inventions, too, are still very much up-to-date. Moreover, precision, quality, dependability and ease of service have always been at the core of the Eterna philosophy. As a salute to this pioneering spirit and in commemoration of the future of the automatic era, the Eterna Matic 1948 will always rank prominently in the Eterna collections – with its authentic case and the transparent back which reveals the brilliance of the timeless movement with all the details that turned the original Eterna Matic into a legend.  Dimensions are: width 37 mm excluding crown, 49 mm including crown, lug to lug 44 mm, thickness 9 mm.