Cairelli's are special. Big, attractive, authentic military pilots' watches, with in-house movements, a cool co-brand and "Roma" on the dial, and a limited production. If the Cairelli finds a level above $15-20k, its ascent will not surprise me the way the trajectory of, for example, the Nina Rindt has.
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Not to get too nit picky - but would you really call their movements in-house?
Yes - I suppose in a technical sense - if Martel was purchased before the making of these chronographs... you might have cause to say they're in-house. But it's a meaningless cause, in my eyes - as they did not personally invest in the making or design of the caliber...
Well, the 146HP was made by Zenith, for Zenith, so yes. I am less sure whether I would say the same about, for example, a UG cal 285, because I'm less sure of the nature of the business relationship between UG and Martel. I know only that Martel was not making movements exclusively for UG.
I would say that contracting with a chronograph house for thousands of movements over a period of decades, before purchasing said house, is "an investment." As I see it, Zenith and UG basically co-owned Martel, before Zenith owned them alone.
It was my impression that the 146HP was more or less the same caliber as that used by UG. It was a matter of bridge design. Shows how little I really know about the subject...
Compared with earlier versions of the cal 146 (and cal 285), produced before Zenith bought Martel, the 146HP had different shock protection (Kif instead of Incabloc), a different (glucydur) balance wheel, a different regulator, etc. But this is beside the point. Martel existed as the chronograph shop of UG and Zenith throughout the history of the wrist chronograph. The relationship between these three geographically proximate companies was extremely intimate throughout the 30's and 40's. Zenith used Martel movements in most of their chronographs - there was an overlap with Excelsior Park, of course - right up until they bought Martel. So this was not like Mont Blanc buying Minerva. Zenith had been paying a big chunk of Martel's R&D budget for decades.
