Some specs:
35mm stainless steel case
Mido 1300 manual wind movement
Plexiglass crystal
1940’s
Tauber et Fils case (formerly François Borgel)
Chronograph with central minute and seconds hand
Our opinion:
We absolutely love the odd pieces and special and historical watches. The Mido Multi-Centerchrono is obviously one of those that ticks all the boxes.
First of all the case, usually people refer this as a François Borgel case which is actually half correct because by this time the company had been acquired and renamed Tauber et Fils. This company was a very famous case maker and well respected by the quality of its cases which included the first Patek Philippe’s waterproof chronograph for example. Also the pushers have the same design of some of Patek’s chronographs famously know as “Tasti Tondi” , in fact the whole case is very similar to some of Patek’s vintage chronographs.
With this piece, there are no sub-registers as we’d expect from all standard vintage chronographs. If it weren’t for the pushers, you could easily overlook that the Mido Multi-Centerchrono is even a chronograph at all. The chronograph functions were centralized and the short sub-registers hands were substituted by two central superimposed hands.
Just absolutely amazing and hardly matched by any other watch brand at the time.
They also had available a variety of dial with special features for different uses.
The dials were made by Eggli Louis - Weibel and it’s common to find many of these turned a copper tone or more commonly known as tropical which is the case in this one.
This particular version has the “chronograph compteur” dial turned tropical with the original radium numerals and radium filled hands. Case has no signs of being polished and it has the famous Portuguese import hallmark on the top left lug which adds another layer of important features of this watch. Movement is incredibly clean and working well.
