In October 2008, Richard Garriott, the renowned video game designer and adventurer, will become the sixth private space explorer. Richard will conduct his space mission aboard the International Space Station, and during his flight, he intends to conduct a spacewalk, which would make him the first private individual to do so. As steps out into free space, he will be wearing a SEIKO Spring Drive watch, specially designed and built for this purpose.
 
The Spring Drive Spacewalk as Richard Garriott plans to wear it when he goes into free space .
Three years ago, the “Quiet Revolution” of Spring Drive started, and all over the surface of the earth, Spring Drive is increasingly accepted as one of the most important new developments in luxury watch-making. In 2008, the revolution goes into space.
This unique watch, the Spring Drive Spacewalk, is presented for the first time at Baselworld 2008 and takes pride of place in the new SEIKO Stand.
The second generation in space
Richard Garriott is not only a remarkable entrepreneur and adventurer (see biography below) but he is also the son of a NASA astronaut. Richard's father, Dr. Owen Garriott, made two space flights, aboard Skylab in 1973 and aboard STS-9/Spacelab-1 in 1983. In total, Owen spent 70 days in space and he carried SEIKO watches on both of these flights and wore one continuously during his Spacelab mission. His trust in SEIKO was inherited by his son, and so it was natural that Richard should contact SEIKO as soon as his mission was arranged. Richard and SEIKO will be the first “second-generation” space partnership.
Richard Garriott Biography
Born in 1961, in Cambridge, England, Richard is one of the leading
designers of video and on-line games. He created his first game,
Akalabeth in 1980 but his major success was the Ultima series, which is
still popular today in its MMOG form. His latest game, Tabula Rosa, has
just been released. In addition to his work in the gaming industry,
Richard is a serial adventurer. He has trekked across Antarctica in
search of meteorites, tracked mountain gorillas in Rwanda, and led a
research mission to investigate the hydrothermal vents deep on the
Atlantic Ocean sea floor. Richard now lives in Austin, Texas, where he
supports a variety of cultural and environmental charities, including a
Shakespeare Festival which takes place in a replica of the Globe
Theatre that is on his Britannia Manor estate.
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Meeting the challenge and the future
The task of creating this remarkable watch was difficult, and it has involved new developments in every aspect of SEIKO's watchmaking skills. It has taken a dedicated team over three years to create and to test the Spring Drive Spacewalk and new skills, materials and ideas have been generated as a result. SEIKO's history is replete with examples of how watches like Spacewalk later inspire future generations of SEIKO watches. That is the spirit that inspires SEIKO. Perhaps, the SEIKO Spring Drive Spacewalk will be another example. We are going to create just 100 watches. Among them, three pieces will go with Richard on his mission and the remaining watches will be marketed worldwide in December this year.
The air-tight case
Because of the vacuum of free space, the watch case needs to be completely air-tight. Based on SEIKO’s long experience with Divers watches that can withstand pressures up to 1,000 meters, Spacewalk was designed with special features that will guarantee air-tightness. In addition, to maintain the air-tightness in the huge temperature changes that occur in the vacuum of free space, and especially in cold temperatures, it was necessary to develop a new type of gasket using a rubberized material.
The lightness of High-intensity titanium
Everything to be taken into space needs to be as light and as strong as possible. High -intensity titanium was chosen as the case material because it is 40% lighter than stainless steel.
The optimum balance of lightness and wide dial-opening
The next challenge was to make the watch both as light and as large as possible. The case was designed for minimum volume but maximum dial opening size, to ensure quick readability. The solution was to build a case with recessed sides, but this required a new engineering solution, using a CNC machine that SEIKO developed in-house. This process reduced the volume of the case material by 30 %. With this process, a case was created that has the optimum balance of strength, lightness and wide dial opening.
The most readable dial.
Richard needs to be able to see time and elapsed time at a glance. After many dial designs were tested, a new layout, with the chronograph dials at the top, was selected. The hands and hour markers were designed expressly for this watch, and additional layers of SEIKO’s Lumibrite material were used. The dial is now at least three times brighter than a normal luminous watch.
Maximum ease of use
Richard’s hands will be protected, of course, by thick gloves. He therefore needed the buttons to be over-sized so that they can easily be used and they are placed at the top of the case to be more readily accessible.
The harmony of space travel and Spring Drive
In addition to all the technical attributes which make the Spring Drive Spacewalk the prefect watch for the mission, there is a profound harmony between the essence of Spring Drive and the whole arena of space and space exploration. With its glide motion hands, SEIKO Spring Drive is the only watch to reflect the true, continuous nature of time. It measures time without ‘ticks’, and the perfect, uninterrupted motion of every part of the movement is in perfect harmony with the eternal, continual and precise motion of the planets. There can be nothing more appropriate than the arrival of the “quiet revolution” of Spring Drive into space. SEIKO is deeply grateful to Richard Garriott and to the Space Adventures Company for the opportunity to contribute to this thrilling mission by bringing the beauty of glide motion closer to the stars.
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