Eaglemoss Military Watches Collection.

In 1926 two well established watch manufacturers in the German town of Glashutte joined forces with the aim of producing their own mechanical movements to compete with the neighbouring Swiss.
Two years after the start of World War II, work on the Tutima Flieger Chronograph was complete. Developed for the rigours of the new faster, higher flying, combat aircraft it was used by German pilots through the war.
As the Russian Army advanced through Germany at the close of World War II they captured Glashutte. The Soviets quickly recognised an opportunity and seized all the watchmaking machinery and equipment, technical diagrams and spare parts, that they could, loaded them onto trucks, and carried them off as war reparations to Moscow
From 1947 the First Moscow Watch Factory, the major Soviet watchmaker of the time, started to supply Soviet Pilots using re-branded and re-cased German watches, and by 1949 the captured machines were producing components to enable the factory to produce components for a watch that was the same design as a Tutima Type 69 Chronograph
The French military used a number of the original Tutima watches, rebranded as IRAM, for their own pilots and also as a design template for future models.

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If you have been paying attention this is basically a rehash of two earlier overviews, many post war French Pilots used variations of the Glashutte watches and many Russian Pilot chronographs owe a lot to the excellent German design







Case
Unusual Bronze Effect Case, 40mm across, 43.1mm at the crown, 9.3mm deep, 46.2mm Lug to Lug, 19.8mm lug width
Case Interior, 34.5mm diameter, 7.2mm deep. 6mm crown, 34mm glass.
Dial
Black Dial with white printed minute/5th second scale, Arabic numerals at 5-minute intervals,
Hours indicated by White Arabic numbers
Polished Gold colour Cathedral style minute and hour hands with white infill, slim gold second hand
Strap
Black PU leather strap 20mm wide at the lug narrows to a 18mm buckle, approx. fitting 180/220mm


MWC 26 - 1950s French Pilot


MWC 31 - 1940s French Pilot


MWC 86 - 1950s Russian Pilot