When does an integrated bracelet sport watch truly come into its own? I would argue it’s when it gets a skeletonized dial that is truly worthy of being called competition for the Audemars Piguet Royal Oak Skeleton. Yeah, that’s a high bar but this is not a category, or price point, that merits any less. Fortunately for H. Moser & Cie their new steel Streamliner Tourbillon Skeleton Double Hairspring brings the full weight of the brand’s resources with sister company Precision Engineering AG and their market know-how to the table, with the result being a strikingly well-finished and horologically punchy release.
Any keen-eyed observer knew this watch was inevitable when we saw the Pioneer Cylindrical Tourbillon released back in 2022. Moser had not done much in the way of skeletonization up to that point but the results spoke for themselves with the masterful work achieved with that piece, to say nothing of the stunning cylindrical tourbillon. The Streamliner Tourbillon Skeleton takes the successes of this watch and amplifies them while scaling down the nearly 43mm wide case size of the Pioneer and utilizing central hour and minutes hands rather than having a sub-dial (keep in mind the HMC 811 was a first iteration of the HMC 810 seen on the Endeavour Cylindrical Tourbillon).
The new HMC 814 looks like a suit tailored for the Streamliner case with its sweeping lines and seemingly vast negative space created by the exhaustive carving out of unnecessary movement parts. This, of course, makes complete sense as Moser has always been preoccupied with minimalism. One wouldn’t be blamed for initially thinking this is a manual-wind watch but the rotor has been thoroughly skeletonized so as to not impede on the dial-side view. The bridges and main plate are all done with anthracite finishing and a closer look reveals through diamond beveling throughout. As for specs, the HMC 814 operates at 3 Hz with a 72-hour power reserve and, obviously, has a double hairspring.
The gold-plated indices and hands are a welcome design choice that keep legibility from becoming an issue which can happen easily and sadly does all too often. Finally, the Streamliner bracelet is top tier at this point and the case measurements of 40mm wide and 12.1mm thick (120 m of water resistance) make for excellent proportions. It’s almost trite to do comparisons against Royal Oak MSRPs but it does help understand where Moser positions this watch.
The H. Moser & Cie Streamliner Tourbillon Skeleton Double Hairspring is priced at $86,900 which is a bit more than the Royal Oak Double Balance Wheel Openworked but about one-third the price of the more mechanically comparable Royal Oak Selfwinding Flying Tourbillon Openworked. Over the course of a few short years the Streamliner has positioned itself as one of the best integrated bracelet sport watches on the market and this new model further cements this well-earned spot.
To learn more, visit H. Moser & Cie, here.
