If you’ve noticed a theme, I really enjoyed the aesthetic of the D-Day during the day, but really felt the watch come alive with lume. In fact, I found myself consistently lighting this watch up with a black light to see the lume in action, whether I was photographing the watch or not. It was something I wasn’t expecting to be so into, but it turned out to be a pleasant surprise. Overall, the dial far exceeded my expectations based on the original renders provided, and I was delighted with how it behaved at night.

TOCKR D-DAY C-47 MOVEMENT

Inside the D-Day C-47 is the ETA 2834-A6. A pedestrian, albeit reliable, movement. As I mentioned earlier, the movement isn’t visible through the caseback, so you don’t get a visual of it, though I don’t find that to be a tick against the brand. We’ve all seen the movement a thousand times, so the “That’s All, Brother” motif is more fitting for the watch, anyway. One thing to note: I don’t know if Tockr uses its signature rotor inside this movement (I imagine they don’t), but I found the rotor to be pretty noisy. I could often hear it when I sat down or closed the car door — something I don’t find too annoying but feel important to note.

Advertising Message

The movement features hours, minutes, seconds and a small date wheel. Specs for the movement are the usual suspects: 42-hour power reserve, beats at 4-Hz, and utilizes 25 jewels. Is it the most interesting movement? For sure, no. But it’s got a solid history with solid specs and, for the price, it’s hard to argue with that.

TOCKR D-DAY C-47 STRAP & PACKAGING

The D-Day C-47 comes with two straps for this sample. The watch comes standard on a green canvas strap that channels a canvas flight bag from WWII pretty well, whether it was intentional or not. (I would be willing to bet it was.) It was incredibly comfortable with a soft rubber belly, though I must say tended to snag around the clasp pretty often. You’ll notice in the photos that, over the course of the week of photography, it frayed quite a bit on seemingly no re-collected specific instances of catching. Now, that’s common on a canvas strap, and really isn’t much of a quality thing so much as a “Well, that’s just how this is” thing when working with raw canvas. The strap isn’t course or ill-fitted; it’s soft and flexes more than most Canvas straps I’ve encountered, but the wearer will have to be aware that the canvas strap will fray and pick up fuzz relatively quickly.

The calfskin leather strap was also comfortable, though I felt the canvas fit the overall design theme. The Calfskin was a little more comfortable and didn’t have the snagging problem. When it comes to patience, I preferred the softer nature of the canvas to breaking in an all-new leather strap, although I did find myself swapping between the two frequently.

Advertising Message

The D-Day comes in some of the coolest packaging I’ve seen on a watch that costs less than $2000. I would probably be comfortable saying it’s some of my favorite packaging I’ve received with a watch. The watch comes in a really cool, WWII-inspired “Flight Box” with unique faux sheep’s wool interior emulating flight jackets from the ’30s and ’40s. In addition, pinned in the top of the box is a leather foldout featuring a metal authenticity card for the dial and an instruction manual with some cool history on the project and what this watch actually is and benefits.

CONCLUSION

I know this is getting wordy, so I’ll be brief here. This is simply a really cool watch from a brand I’ve grown to admire. Tockr has come a long way as a brand and has really flourished in the age of social media, where so many brands tend to forgo the adoption of its inevitable place in the watch industry. As for the Tockr D-Day C-47, it’s a welcome risky departure from the brand’s normal design queues but maintains the look of the brand as a whole. I didn’t think I would find this model to be a daily-wearer, mostly because of the unique colorway, but I did find myself finding ways to match this watch to what I was wearing — because I really wanted any reason to wear it.

As experimental as this watch is, I found very little to complain about. Could it be a little thinner? Probably. Could the strap have been a bit more fitted to the case? I don’t see why not. Do all these little gripes seem petty compared to the fact that you’re really getting something unique for the price? I would say yes. And when enveloped in the charitable nature around preserving a piece of history, it’s hard to argue against the D-Day. Price for the Tockr D-Day C-47 runs about $1,990 USD. Learn more at tockr.com.


Advertising Message

Subscribe to our Newsletter