If you are in search of a well made, goodlooking, durable automatic watch at a reasonable price, the Seiko 5 series may be for you.

It’s not only one of the most inexpensive automatics on the watch market, it also comes with an in-house movement developed by Seiko, namely the 7S26.

This movement is highly praised by experts and known for running decades without complications.

In short, this line of watches are superb quality and great value for the money.

The Seiko 5 Series

Seiko 5 is a line of automatic watches by Seiko introduced in 1963 to attract university students and young workers.

The company realized that younger consumers demanded more of their timepieces and therefore initiated the Seiko 5 series with particular focus on high quality and low price.

Since then, Seiko has produced hundreds of Seiko 5 models, all carrying the emblematic shield logo with the number “5” in the center on the dial, and with five distinctive features in common.

The Number “5”

So what’s up with that number “5” and what does it mean?

The number 5 is referring to five different key attributes:

In 1959 Seiko developed an automatic winding system that employed the socalled magic lever, a serious breakthrough in mechanical watchmaking.

This device harnesses energy from the rotor, greatly increasing the power transfer to the mainspring.

All Seiko 5 watches are automatic meaning that when the wearer moves his wrist, the mainspring is wound automatically to provide the energy required to keep the watch going.

In 1968 Seiko introduced the second-generation 5 Sports line featuring a water resistance of 70 m, which was an impressive accomplishment at the time.

Protection from water ingress has been an important feature of the Seiko 5 series ever since.

The day and the date is displayed in a single window at the 3 o’clock mark.

To that end, Seiko made the mainspring out of an unbreakable alloy called Diaflex and created the Diashock system to protect the movement from shock within the case.

Back in the day Seiko had to come up with a new, fresh design to attract a younger customer segment, an important aspect of which was the metal bracelet, which was unusual at the time.

Because of the ‘magic lever’ users didn’t have to wind their Seiko 5s and therefore the crown was made smaller and placed at the 4 o’clock position.

Nowadays, the crown is also placed at the 3 o’clock mark sometimes, mainly to accomodate contemporary aesthetics.

Jewels Inside the Movement

Apart from the shield logo with the number “5” in the center, a Seiko 5 watch often have the word “AUTOMATIC” and a number next to the word “JEWELS” printed on the dial.

If you are not aware of what “JEWELS” refer to, you could get the idea that Seiko is attempting to make people think there are precious jewels in the watch, but of course it is not so.

There are jewels in a Seiko 5 watch, but synthetic jewels, and the number varies depending on the model.

These jewels are inside the watch movement itself, the main purpose being to reduce the friction between the rotating and moving parts, thus avoiding metal to metal frictional tear.

This means less wear and tear on the movement, better durability and higher accuracy.

Previously, the jewels used in watch movements were precious stones such as diamonds, rubies and sapphires, but now that it has become possible to replace expensive gemstones with synthetic jewels, this means that watchmakers retain the benefits of being able to use jewels in their watches, but at a much lower cost.

Drawbacks

There’s a couple of minor disadvantages that deserve to be mentioned:

You can not manually wind a Seiko 5 watch. The crown is exclusively for setting the watch.

The power reserve is smaller than average meaning that a Seiko 5 watch will stop earlier than other automatics, if it’s not moved.

However, this is not a problem as long as you wear the watch most of the day.

Conclusion

If you want a reliable and durable automatic wristwatch at a price where everyone can join, the Seiko 5 line could very well be your best option.

In fact, price per quality, there’s really no competition out there and you just can’t go wrong with the Seiko 5.

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2

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3

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4

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5

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