Victorinox Airboss Mach 9 Black Edition Watch Review

Made by the same brand that produces the Swiss Army Knife. Victorinox is a high-quality manufacturer, that is easy to find in the market.

The Airboss 241507 Mach 9 Black edition is an amazing Swiss made pilot watch, without the super hefty price tag. The Airboss series offers 3 different models. These are the Mach 9, the mechanical edition, and the mechanical chronograph.

Design

The Mach 9 Black edition has a diameter of 45mm and a weight of 4.9oz. Despite the watches weight, it is definitely meant for larger sized wrists. A Black PVD sandblasted case makes for a nice matte, and smooth finish. One particular part of the design of this piece is the flipped or inverted sub dials, pushers, and crown. You will find the pushers and crown to be on the left side of this watch, which in thought makes this a watch for “lefties”. This piece is inspired by pilots. This particular watch has a casual, but also sporty look to it.

Victorinox complements the case with a semi-separated, fixed bezel, which is also Black PVD sandblasted. On the bezel, you will see a White painted circular slide rule which really contrasts the black look of the watch. Painted on the bezel you will find fuel lbs, liters, lbs, kg, us gal, and oil lbs. On various watches that feature tachymeters, or scales on the bezel they can only be seen looking directly at the bezel, Victorinox fixed this by making the bezel beveled.

This piece also features a bidirectional inner rotating bezel. On the inner bezel, you will find the tachymeter which has MPH, KM, NAUT, and STAT painted on. The inner bezel is operated using the crown which is found on the right side of the case.

A triple coated anti reflective, scratch resistant, sapphire crystal is covering the dial. Painted on this crystal you will find a red painted dial with hours 13-24. This allows the watch to have military time. Also featured is a see-through, screw-in case back.

Airboss Mach 9 Movement

This watch features an automatic movement. It is an ETA 7750 automatic chronograph movement. This watch does feature hand winding, and also hacking. The movement has been flipped to fit the inverse pushers and crowns. Although the movement is inverted, in no way does it affect the performance of the movement or watch.

Dial

The dial on this piece is very nice. Victorinox matched it to the case. It is a nice PVD black. You will find rings going around the outer part of the dial, while you will find it smooth on the inner part. On the outer rings, you will find lume painted and raised, applied Arabic numerals. These numerals are all white, which contrasts with black dial to make it very legible. The hour, minute and second hands are shaped like elongated diamonds, which are all white, and painted with lume. The second hand for the tachymeter is a vibrant red which adds more color and life to the watch.

There are 3 sub dials. These are the 30 minute, 12 hour, and 60 second dials. These are found on the left side of the watch due to the inverted movement. The hands on then 30 minute and 12 hour dials are red which looks very nice against the white numerals in the sub dial. At 12 o’clock Victorinox replaced the numeral with two Lume painted dots. They did the same at 6oclock except there you will find a single dot. This watch does feature date, not day. You can find the date at 6 o’clock. Although there are very few surfaces you can find polished, this tool watch is also very casual. You can definitely tell Victorinox took their time and dedicated it to this watch. Every detail on this piece is important to make this watch look as good as it does.

Band

This piece features 2 bands. Either a stainless-steel bracelet or a black fabric strap, with red stitching at the top and bottom. The black strap is also very thin and flexible. Don’t be fooled, even though the strap is very thin, it is also extremely strong and durable. This strap has a black pvd deployment clasp which can be fit for 1 of the 10 adjustment holes.

Opinion

If you are looking for a starter watch, I would definitely consider purchasing this piece. It is strong and tactile, the colors contrast perfectly to make this a tool watch that is also very casual. I am a big fan of the ETA 7750 movement which features hand winding and hacking. For a price of $2,125 for the piece with the fabric strap and $2,350 for the piece with a stainless-steel band. I truly believe that this is one of the best starter pieces money can get.

To have a look at Victorinox’s entire range of timepieces, head over to their official website here.