# 24 hour dial, 24 hour bezel



## PulpMysteryFan

How do you set-up the bezel on your watch?


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## Zennmaster

Good question!

In general, the "Proper" way to set a 24 hour watch with a 24-hour bezel (I suppose we can call it an "Airman Type" watch), is to set the dial to Zulu time, and spin the bezel to local, wherever you happen to be. I have friends who do this. 

Personally, it's more important to me to know how close it is o my kid's bedtime, regardless of how far away from home I am, so I leave the dial set to Pacific time, and the bezel on Zulu, and when I get where I'm going, I set the bezel to local.

Of course, that's just me...

-Michael


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## Dennis Smith

Good morning all!
As usual, I agree with Michael.
A globe-trotter will usually set Zulu on the inner dial and just spin the bezel around for local time as he's busy jet setting through timezones.
As a lowly helicopter pilot who's not really sure what "jet lag" means, I set local inside and use the bezel for a constant zulu reference.


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## PulpMysteryFan

I'm new to this 24-hour dial thing, but I can't get over the feeling that the cardinal points of the day -- midnight, 6:00, noon and 18:00 -- should be at cardinal points of my watch face, and that the subjective day, meaning where I am right now, should be the focus of the watch. And even though some of my daily interaction is in zulu time, my brain is still tuned to local time. So it seems strange to rotate the bezel for "the time according to here" and end up with noon and midnight off at some crazy angle. Admittedly, setting the watch to a new time zone by pulling the stem, and rotating the minute hand around a few times, if more awkward than simply moving the bezel, but the result seems more natural.

(Off topic: Mr. Smith -- I am getting fixated on your avatar.)


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## philden

I have them set the same, as the only watch I have with a bezel is the Dolphin. Here the odd numbers are on the dial and the even numbers are on the bezel.

Phil.


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## martbroad

My Glycine ith the bezal on EST and the hands on GMT.

Martin


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## PulpMysteryFan

martbroad said:


> My Glycine ith the bezal on EST and the hands on GMT.


You're the first one who doesn't set the hands to local time. Except your profile says "London", so maybe GMS is local time for you.... Where does EST fit in?


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## pegase747

martbroad said:


> My Glycine ith the bezal on EST and the hands on GMT.
> 
> Martin


Martin,
I see that my ex-Glycine Airman 9 is well worn by you. It is good because it desserves more wrist time than I gave her.
How do you enoy it so far ???

Cheers / Pierre


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## martbroad

PulpMysteryFan said:


> You're the first one who doesn't set the hands to local time. Except your profile says "London", so maybe GMS is local time for you.... Where does EST fit in?


Hi

Greenwich Mean Time is local for me in London England but i make a lot of calls to the USA East Coast so thats the EST reasoning.

I know to deduct 5 hrs is not rocket science but i love 24 hr/ GMT watches:-d.

Martin


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## martbroad

pegase747 said:


> Martin,
> I see that my ex-Glycine Airman 9 is well worn by you. It is good because it desserves more wrist time than I gave her.
> How do you enoy it so far ???
> 
> Cheers / Pierre


Pierre

Love the watch always been a big Glycine fan and i like the size and heft of the 9.

Martin


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## PulpMysteryFan

martbroad said:


> I know to deduct 5 hrs is not rocket science but i love 24 hr/ GMT watches:-d.


My motivation is this: I've always like the logic of 24 hour time pieces, but what pushed me over the edge was getting a pilot's license. It's a symptom of my inexperience that converting that weather briefing to local time is a bit of a chore. With a 24 hour watch (and 24 hour bezel) it's a snap. If I were a professional pilot, or perhaps had been in the military, I'd probably be used to it, and ironically, wouldn't need get as much benefit from the watch.


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## Zennmaster

PulpMysteryFan said:


> My motivation is this: I've always like the logic of 24 hour time pieces, but what pushed me over the edge was getting a pilot's license. It's a symptom of my inexperience that converting that weather briefing to local time is a bit of a chore. With a 24 hour watch (and 24 hour bezel) it's a snap. If I were a professional pilot, or perhaps had been in the military, I'd probably be used to it, and ironically, wouldn't need get as much benefit from the watch.


For what it's worth, I've been a pilot for over 20 years, professionally for 11, and I've NEVER been able to do the Zulu time math. Flying around in multiple time zones, and in and out of Daylight Savings Time just makes it worse!


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## uktrailmonster

When I'm travelling I always reset the hands to local time, as it's the most natural to read quickly. I set the bezel to GMT (my home time in the UK) for reference when making phone calls etc.

I know it upsets the purists, but I also prefer the 12hr/GMT version of the Glycine (like the one pictured above) as the hour hand reads far more naturally.


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## KXL

I avoid all the problems by having a watch that gives me all the time zones 










My Aviator doesn't have a bezel :-( so it's always on local time. This is a lume shot of it I took this morning...










I had my Zinex put a "pepsi" bezel on my Orange PVD Trimex so I could have 3 time zones. The 12 hour dial is local time [JST, Japan Standard Time today but it will be PHT, Philippine Time next week, HAST, Hawaii Standard Time the first week in Dec followed by ICT, IndoChina Time when I go to Thailand for Christmas.....:think: Maybe using the Bezel for local time isn't such a bad idea ;-)

I've just never been able to do it and invariably change the hands...:-d

Anyway, the inner immovable dial is always set to Zulu time. The Bezel is set to Eastern Standard time as that is where Headquarters Marine Corps is [and my mom!].


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## Dennis Smith

Three very cool watches there!
Yep, I think when guys are traveling a lot across timezones, the standard is to keep Zulu inside and local outside (easier to adjust by simply turning the bezel to local). It would take some getting used to


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## whifferdill

As a heli pilot that stays mostly in 1 time zone and like many - I set the hands to local and use the bezel for Zulu ( or for keeping track of duty hours ), but if visiting another time zone for a short time - a day or two, I'll keep the time on home / GMT ( Based UK ) and put the bezel on local - for longer trips, I set the time to local and put the bezel on home or GMT. Great thing about the bezel set up - you can swap and change as the circumstances suit.


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## bearwatch

Hello- being new to this forum and 24-hour watches, I have a quick question about bezel usage when traveling. I travel and change time zones frequently for work, and I'd like to be able to use the bezel to change time zones quickly when I arrive at my destination. To accomplish this, I would need to set the GMT hand to Zulu and change the bezel to the appropriate marking plus or minus GMT. Now I would be reading local time off the GMT hand. Is there anything I can do with the hour hand at this point, or do I just ignore it? This situation, where the goal is adjusting the local time quickly, rather than keeping track of another time zone, is actually where I could see a 12-hour bezel being in some ways more convenient than a 24. Thoughts? Am I thinking this through correctly, or am I missing something? Thanks - nice to meet everyone.

-dino










Citizen Eco-Drive 180 GMT BJ9080-52E


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## whifferdill

Hi bearwatch - welcome to the forum! I'm not sure how the Citizen GMT works, but I suspect that it might have a 'quick set' hour hand? If so, you can quickly change the normal 12 hour hand to the new time zone and leave the GMT hand in home or GMT as you wish. You will then have local on the main, hour hand and Home or GMT on the GMT hand.

If it doesnt have this feature, you can probably 'quick set' the 'GMT' hand to read off your new local time, instead, leaving the main hands of the watch in your home time ( this can be done without having to stop the movement ) - you then don't need to rotate the bezel or can use it to check the time in other time zones ( business calls for example ) by rotating it ahead or behind your new time zone. i hope that's clear as?:-d:-s

Alternatively - if youre used to, and happiest with, using the bezel to set your new time zone, then a Glycine Airman type watch in true 24 hour set up ( normal hour hand rotates the dial once in 24 hours and there is no GMT hand ) would probably really suit you. You have the time on the main dial set to your home time zone and then you can whirl the bezel to read off your new local time as you cross time zones. The above is the system I use with my Glycine Airman Special II and operates essentially the same way as you describe with a 12 hour bezel, only you have the advantage of being able to read and set 24 time zones!

Hope that helps?


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## bearwatch

Thanks, Whifferdill. Yes, the Citizen 180GMT does have a quickset hour hand. Looking at some excerpts from the Rolex GMT Master II manual, it appears the method you're describing of setting the hour hand for local time and keeping the GMT hand and bezel for secondary time zones is the intended method of using a watch of this type. (One with a 12-hour face and 24-hour bezel.) I have to say that I still do like the idea of being able to use the bezel for local time in a 12-hour setup like a Marathon Navigator, for example. 
I'm going to be doing some traveling starting in the next month or so, and although it's just US travel, it'll be interesting to see what method of multi-time zone time keeping is the most natural and usable. Thanks for your info!

-d.


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## whifferdill

bearwatch said:


> Thanks, Whifferdill. Yes, the Citizen 180GMT does have a quickset hour hand. Looking at some excerpts from the Rolex GMT Master II manual, it appears the method you're describing of setting the hour hand for local time and keeping the GMT hand and bezel for secondary time zones is the intended method of using a watch of this type. (One with a 12-hour face and 24-hour bezel.) I have to say that I still do like the idea of being able to use the bezel for local time in a 12-hour setup like a Marathon Navigator, for example.
> I'm going to be doing some traveling starting in the next month or so, and although it's just US travel, it'll be interesting to see what method of multi-time zone time keeping is the most natural and usable. Thanks for your info!
> 
> -d.


Glad to be of help - that's a great watch you have there. Enjoy it on your many travels


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## HappyJack

I think the answer, at least for me, would be to have the 24 hr hand always set to Zulu, whilst the bezel is used to adjust for home-base time, and the "quick-set" 12-hour hand is reset to local time wherever I am.

Unfortunately, since the $300 Citizen BJ9080-52E shown above is no longer available anywhere, that just means I'll have to buy a $4000 Rolex GMT Master II. Oh bother...


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## bearwatch

HappyJack said:


> Unfortunately, since the $300 Citizen BJ9080-52E shown above is no longer available anywhere, that just means I'll have to buy a $4000 Rolex GMT Master II. Oh bother...


If you're interested in a Citizen BJ9080-52E, I'd encourage you to do a little looking. I found mine for $200 after only a month of searching on eBay. I just love this thing- it's great looking, well made, and is very functional; definitely worth the effort. Good luck with whatever you decide to purchase.


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