WORLD FIRST: BLANCPAIN CARROUSEL VOLANT UNE MINUTE
Blancpain once again displays its innovative strength by presenting the first ever movement
equipped with a one-minute karussel. A complication all but forgotten for over a century by
the great names in the watch industry, the karussel is a viable alternative to the tourbillon.
Like the latter, it aims to reduce the effect of gravity on the rate of a movement. By
rehabilitating this mechanisms and opening up whole new horizons for this mechanism
reduced to wristwatch size for the very first time, Blancpain once again makes its mark on
watchmaking history and puts a stylish end to the heated debate between exponents of
diverging views on the definition of the karussel.
Whereas very few brands in 1989 fully mastered the creation of classical tourbillons, Blancpain
already stood out from the crowd by presenting the world's thinnest tourbillon. To achieve this,
the master-watchmakers of the Manufacture in Le Brassus had modified the classic arrangement
of the balance in order to achieve optimal slenderness. In doing so, they had naturally deviated
from the architecture of the historical model developed by Abraham-Louis Breguet on which the
balance was placed at the very centre of the carriage. Blancpain's decision to take such a liberty
had already generated a number of reactions among connoisseurs, some of whom found it hard
to recognise such an unusual composition as a genuine tourbillon. While the function was
definitely there, the form had been entirely redesigned. This reinterpretation of a grand tradition
already confirmed Blancpain its two-fold role as the guardian of a noble heritage and an
enlightened innovator.
Like the tourbillon, the carrousel counteracts and neutralises the effects of deceleration and acceleration of the balance wheel caused by the gravitational attraction of the Earth. The balance wheel and escapement, the regulating organs of a watch, are influenced by gravity when they are positioned vertically. But when rotated by a tourbillon or a carrousel, they pass through all vertical positions in succession, cancelling out these inaccuracies.
A tourbillon consists of a rotating carriage; a carrousel, in contrast, consists of a platform on which the balance wheel and its bridge go round like a wooden horse on a merry-go-round, the reason for its name.
Blancpain has achieved a world first by reviving this complication, almost forgotten for more than a century, and using it in a wristwatch. Incidentally, the carrousel from the Manufacture of Le Brassus is the first to have a carriage that completes one revolution in exactly one minute.
To allow the owner to admire this ingenious system, the carrousel is visible through an opening in the dial at 12 oclock. A refined presentation shows off this elegant mechanism, one of whose bridges takes the form of a hand displaying the seconds.
