1980s Sekonda [in actual fact a re-badged Raketa model - see below regarding Sekonda watches] with a Raketa 2609.HA (19 jewels) manual, i.e. hand wind, movement which runs at 18,000 bph/5 'ticks' per second. The movement has the (from 1962) Ракета (i.e. Raketa) logo stamped below the balance wheel and SU and 2609.HA is stamped on the bridge. The stainless steel case houses a white dial with black printed Arabic indices and black hands. SEKONDA is printed in black below 12 o’clock with 19 jewels above 6 o’clock and USSR below 6 o’clock. The centre of the stainless steel case back is stamped with 41705. Overall this watch is in fantastic condition. The acrylic crystal is free of any significant blemishes or marks. In fact, for a vintage watch it is remarkably well kept and works perfectly to keep pretty good time, provided you remember to wind it up of course! It comes fitted on a barely worn and good quality black English calf leather strap.
Approximate dimensions of case: diameter 34mm (excluding crown), lug to lug 40mm, thickness 9mm (including crystal).
About the watch brand Sekonda:
In the early 1960s, the Soviet export market was experiencing unprecedented growth. International demand for timepieces was so strong that, by 1964, all major watch factories in the USSR had been reorganised and rebranded with an Anglicized name that better lent itself to international markets (prior brands were almost always written in Cyrillic).
In 1966, a further step was taken toward the internationalisation of Soviet watches. In that year, the Scientific Research Institute of the Soviet Watchmaking Industry (NIIChasProm) partnered with a British company, Sekonda, for the creation of a new line of Soviet watches to be manufactured in the USSR's watch factories and exported by them to be distributed in the U.K. under the brand name Sekonda. With extensive marketing campaigns and superb customer service Sekonda soon became a household name. Sekonda watches were originally produced at the First Moscow Watch Factory (Poljot) in Moscow and the Raketa Watch Factory in Leningrad (now Saint Petersburg). Many Soviet-era Sekonda watches exported to the West were actually just re-badged Poljot and Raketa watches, plus others. The factories that then went on to build Sekonda watches (generally relabelling their own brands) were:
* 1st Moscow Watch Factory (Poljot), formerly 1st State Watch Factory
* 2nd Moscow Watch Factory (Slava), formerly 2nd Watch Factory
* Chaika Watch Factory (Chaika), formerly Uglich Watch Factory
* Raketa Watch Factory (Raketa), formerly Petrodvorets Watch Factory
* Minsk Watch Factory (Luch)
* Molnija Watch Factory (Molnija), formerly Chelyabinsk Watch Factory
* Penza Watch Factory (Zaria)
* Vostok (Восток) Watch Factory (Vostok), formerly Chistopol Watch Factory
* Maslennikov Watch Factory (ZIM)
* Integral Electronics Factory, Minsk (Elektronika)
Like all Soviet watches, Sekondas were well-designed, durable, and reliable, with fully-jewelled lever movements, but their primary feature was their low price, costing just a fraction of similarly designed timepieces from Switzerland. This venture proved enormously successful and, by 1988, Sekonda was the bestselling watch brand in the U.K.
In 1993, shortly after the fall of the Soviet Union, Sekonda severed all ties with the Russian watch industry and the brand became a wholly British wristwatch manufacturer. The Sekonda range was relaunched with new products being sourced from the Far East featuring the latest Japanese mechanical and quartz movements. This change of manufacturing location also allowed Sekonda to introduce more fashionable styles. Since then, Sekonda has marketed primarily fashion watches. It is still a top selling watch brand in the U.K.
About Raketa:
Raketa (Russian: Ракета, "Rocket") wristwatches, have been manufactured since 1961 by the Petrodvorets Watch Factory, Leningrad (now Saint Petersburg). Between 1721 and World War II a simple lapidary workshop founded by Peter the Great made items from precious stones in Peterhof (called Petrodvorets between 1944 and 1997), a suburb of Saint Petersburg. It became known as the Imperial Lapidary Factory in 1816 and at that time was supplying various decor elements for palaces, cathedrals and fountains. In 1927 the factory specialised in stone works and produced facing slabs for Lenin’s mausoleum. During World War II (and the Siege of Leningrad) the factory building was located in the no-man’s land between the two front lines and was practically destroyed. By 1949, thanks to the incredible efforts of the workers, the factory was almost completely restored and was progressively converted to a watch plant. In honour of the end of the war, watches branded Pobeda (Победа: “Victory”) had been created. Hugely popular, they were the most mass-produced model in the world until the 1960s and were manufactured in several Soviet watch plants, including the one in Petrodvorets. The factory was officially renamed Petrodvorets Watch Factory in 1954. Watches under the brand name Raketa (Ракета: “Rocket”) were produced in 1961, after the first manned flight into space by the famous cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin. At the height of the Space Race, in 1962, the factory name and logo were changed one final time to what it is still known as today: Raketa. Besides Raketa, multiple other brand names were used: Zvezda (Звезда: “Star”), Mayak (Маяк: “Lighthouse”), Sekonda, Neva, Svet (Свет: “Light”), Leningrad, Cornavin, etc. In the 1970s and 1980s the factory expanded, but everything changed when the Soviet Union collapsed in the early 1990s. Raketa Watch Factory was unprepared for the market economy and the import of cheap, plastic watches with quartz movements. In the 1990s most of the factory buildings were rented out and a lot of equipment sold or disassembled. After the fall of the USSR and until 2009 the Raketa manufactory existed partly thanks to orders from its loyal customers: the government departments and military structures of Russia. Despite the debts of the factory, its employees fortunately managed to preserve some of the equipment. In 2009 David Henderson-Stewart (a Franco-British entrepreneur with Russian origins living in Moscow) invited Jacques von Polier (a French count with Russian roots who moved to Russia in the 1990s) to join him in the purchase of Raketa Watch Factory. Prior to this, Henderson-Stewart had been studying the Russian watch industry for several years. With most of the fine manufactories closed, and Raketa being among the rare ones remaining, he invited Jacques to work together to save the factory. The French count was attracted by the rich history of it and despite his lack of previous experience in the field of watches he agreed to this risky endeavour. The new owners of the factory created an investment fund, which included Russian and foreign investors. The first new collection from the factory was released in early 2011 and today there are two remaining workshops at the old Petrodvorets Manufactory. In the first workshop, which is called the “unclean” area, parts and small details are cut out for the mechanisms and in the second workshop, called the “clean” area, the watches are assembled. Each component passes long, complex and multi-level checks before the manual assembly of the entire watch mechanism. Nowadays, Raketa Watch Factory produces 40,000 watches per year. These have either a modern design or else repeat the style of Soviet-era watches. Whilst the movements are made locally, according to some reports, the dials and cases are ordered in from China.
About the movement:
The Raketa caliber 2609 was launched in 1965 as a 16 jewels lever cock construction. The 2609.1 soon followed with a 17 jewels lever bridge construction and then the 21 jewels 2609A, 2609A.1, and 2609B. The old Raketa 2609 was a beautiful, classically constructed mens' size movement containing a directly driven centre second hand. It also had a directly driven centre minute indication. The real speciality of this movement was the gold-toned screw balance with its breguet-type hairspring. Such detail was, outside Russia, very expensive and only used in high-end watches and allowed very good timing results. The calibre features, i.e. its gold-tone balance - Incablock shock protection - Breguet overcoil - a regulator arm, were technically and aesthetically top of the range for the time of production and, for Russian movements particularly, Incabloc shock protections was quite unusual. The 2609 calibre family comprised the following (manual) versions:
2609 - 16 jewels
2609.1 - 17 jewels
2609A, 2609A.1, 2609B - 21 jewels
R2609 - 17/19 jewels
2609.H - 17 jewels
2609.HA - 17/19 jewels
2601.H - 19 jewels, without second
2610 - 19 jewels, antimagnetic
R2614 - 19 jewels, date
2614.H - 19 jewels, date
2623.H - 19 jewels, 24h display
R2628 - 19 jewels, day, date
2628.H - 19 jewels, day, date
There was also an automatic version:
2627.H - 29 jewels, day, date
The initial 2609 had a power reserve of 39 hours, but later versions (including the 2609.HA) had 45 hours. There were no significant differences between the R2609, 2609.H, and the 2609.HA (launched in 1975).