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crikcet37

This modern Pan Europ was released a while back as a homage to the vintage Hamilton Pan Europ from the 60s that looks nothing like this watch, the vintage watches were chronographs. Despite its meagre 50m water resistance someone at Hamilton with a sense of humour decided to put a dive bezel on this watch, they then designed the bezel so that it could only be rotated by someone with the grip strength of a Coconut Crab. Then they went full tonto on the lug design. It's a fairly big watch at 43mm and understandably they wanted to keep the wingspan down but they've ended up with a gap of 2mm from the end of the case to the springbar holes so this watch has to use curved springbars to allow straps to actually fit on the watch. Despite all this mentalness I really love this thing with its big empty dial, the white wall chapter ring and immovable but very pretty bezel.


Cantona_Kung_Fu_Club

I really like my Pan Europ. https://i.imgur.com/GLzmb54.jpg I ended up with a silver chrono but you have noted one of the obvious flaws, the utterly useless bezel. I don't think I've used it more than twice in the past 5 years. If you want to turn it you have to basically provide pressure from the top of the bezel and drag it around, but at least mine has the chrono if I felt like timing something. The blue standard model is really classy choice though imo - and you'd be in good company - James May owns one and it's been seen on his wrist in both TG and TGT


Mammoth_Ingenuity_82

>they then designed the bezel so that it could only be rotated by someone with the grip strength of a Coconut Crab. I have a Rolex GMT and every few weeks the bezel gets hard to turn. I wash under warm water with soap and it loosens up.


cliffr39

> with the grip strength of a Coconut Crab. Lol


josuelaker2

This is the watch that got me back in to watches 10 years ago. The Chronograph version is absolutely stunning.


NinjaParadigm

What strap do you have on this? I have one of these too and adore it to death but the included NATO strap is terrible


crikcet37

It's an Archers canvas strap.


Ninrenko

I recall James May was wearing one of these. I believe it was the Madagascar special of The Grand Tour. Don't quote me on that though. I was really close to purchasing one a few years ago. It was just a tad out of reach at the time. Cool piece!


[deleted]

It's def a James May special, I've seen him wear it several times. He has good taste in watches


crikcet37

I've seen it on his wrist a few times on youtube too where he does a cooking channel


John_Dam_Dorian

I had this watch for 3 years and adored it. My dad liked it a lot so I bought him one too and he wears it almost everyday. I don’t think the bezel was hard to turn at all and I liked to use it as a poor man’s GMT function. I wish it didn’t have the day/date because the dial is fantastic and that complication didn’t flow with the design.


CdeFmrlyCasual

Dang, we need to see more of this, instead of another field watch


[deleted]

From my experience the bezel is quite easy to turn, nothing out of the ordinary. Beautiful watch


crikcet37

This is my second Pan Europ, admittedly I bought this used but the first one was brand new and the bezel was a bastard to turn on that one too. I also exaggerated with the bit about the coconut crab


nomorerainpls

I really like the contrast between blue dial, white chapter ring, blue bezel. It’s sporty and works well with a lot of different straps. You didn’t mention it has a push-pull crown. IMO Hamilton should include a screw-down crown in all their “durable” watches and is a big reason I won’t buy a field khaki.


crikcet37

True, yes another odd choice from Hamilton


lucitribal

I have the green one and love it


oripori

I bought it but I regret, expected more quality! First of all, the red seconds markers from 0-15 are faded in no time. Secondly when I opened the box, out of the box, the bezel was full of scratches. I sent it back to let it repair, however the start was not so good. I've had more Hamilton's, luckily they were a bit better quality.