Citizen Campanola Grand Complication Review

The quality and sound of the chimes themselves are beautiful, and likely to be equal to those of a mechanical minute repeater that uses actual hammers and gongs in the housing of the watch. The Citizen Campanola Grand Complication emulates these sounds perfectly and does so to “repeat” what the time is. Again, I can understand a bit of why Citizen chose to do with, and it is likely to do with power requirements. The watch uses a battery, like most quartz watches. If the watch were to chime all the time, it would likely deplete the battery life much more quickly. Alternatively, allowing the user to choose when the watch chimes, will lengthen the battery life. The only change I would make is to ensure that when the watch chimes, it is not a mathematical endeavor in figuring out what time it is. Still, thought did go into this and I realize the usefulness of the codes. Imagine for a moment if the watch was to indicate "9:58" in chimes. Having to make sound indicators for each number would take 20 seconds or more. 9 chimes for 9 o'clock, then another 58 chimes for 58 minutes? Think about this for a minute and realize what would go into such a function. No one would be able to keep count of what time it is. Instead the code will chime indicating intervals of 15 minute increments and such. While, the inclusion and operation of the chiming function can be debated, it is a nice feature to have, and showing your friends how it works always impressed. Further, reference back to the manual is probably required to change the date or moonphase. Again, these are small issues One version of the watch that I noticed had the hand filled in with luminescent material for night viewing. Later apparently, Citizen decided to remove these areas and make that watches empty to allow for better view of the operations below. This was probably a good decision and the previously thick hands would have obstructed the view below. Little touches like this are part of what I so enjoy about this watch.One area of the complication that confuses me a bit is the chiming function. The chiming function is known as a minute repeater. A minute repeater is a watch that chiming upon the pressing of a button or performing some mechanical action to the watch. Alternatively, the most sophisticated version is a sonnerie, which is a watch that chimes in accordance with specific time intervals. Such as every hour, or every 15 minutes. The Citizen Campanola Grand Complication will tell you the time is when you operate this minute repeater function. You press a button an a little song of chimes is played. These chimes come in two forms, and when interpreted, will tell you what time it is. The problem is that reading the chimes requires one to count and remember how to read them. Honestly, I learned when I first received the watch and have forgotten since.