# Impressions of Citizen "Sailhawk" JR4045-57E



## conjurer

I've been hankering, for some obscure reason, to get a yachting watch; perhaps it's just the WASP in me...










_Spaulding, get your foot off the boat!_​
Why? I have no idea. I don't own a yacht, nor will I ever. I hardly even go out on the water due to very fair skin and a healthy fear of drowning. Not a lot of companies make them, due, no doubt, to a pretty thin market. However, this particular one popped up for sale and I jumped in with both feet:










It's from Citizen, the world's largest watchmaking company, and surprisingly, this is the first Citizen I've ever owned. It's also a quartz, and those who know Conjurer know that Conjurer seldom plays well with quartz. However, it's cool, it does a lot of goofy stuff that I'll never need, and--well, it's cool.

Like pretty much every other Citizen on the planet, this one uses Eco-Drive, Citizen's solar technology to keep the power up on the watch. The dial is a solar collector, and through some whiz-bang Japanese technology (remember that?) it turns it into electricity and keeps the power cell topped off.

Let me rattle off what the Sailhawk does:

You get, of course, your standard time:










This is displayed in the two little windows at the bottom of the dial and, also, by the hands, which are set and adjusted by the digital portion of the watch. I have it set in 24 hour mode, but 12 hours is doable as well. Also, with the pushers at the two and four o'clock positions, you can toggle through all 24 time zones (the city shows up in the eight o'clock window.)

Here's your calendar feature:










This is also changeable via the pushers.

This is the yacht timing function:










This is a countdown timer (with flyback). I have it set to thirty minutes; the little subdial at the two o'clock position shows the 30 minute mark as well. When the timer is activated by the pushers, the main seconds hand starts timing _counterclockwise,_ which is pretty damn neat, and the small minutes subdial counts backwards as well. Apparently, this is important to guys racing yachts.

There's also a standard chrono:










And yet another countdown timer:










There are also two different alarm settings, which I haven't used yet. The subdial at the six o'clock position tells you what mode you're in, and is set by the main crown.

Other attractions on the dial include the almost-useless but present on every Citizen 24 hour dial, as well as some cool yachting terminology along the chapter ring:










What this all means I have no idea, but perhaps is used in conjunction with the bidirectional bezel that has both elapsed time divers scale and compass headings, which might come in handy if Buffy spills her Mai-Tai on your GPS unit.

There's another pusher at the eight o'clock position which, when pressed for a couple of seconds, moves the standard hands out of the way of the digital displays. Another neato feature is when pressing both the two and four o'clock pushers together, the watch will swap the digital and analogue times, a nice feature for travelers.

This is a big watch; 45.7mm across, 48mm with the main crown, and 14.5mm thick. The bracelet is about 22mm at the lugs and tapers slightly to 20mm at the clasp. The clasp is nicely machined:










As is the case itself:



















The caseback is engraved and mirror polished:










The bracelet also has solid endlinks and has a minimum of rattle. It's put together with standard friction pins. The clasp has three microadjustments, which makes it easy to size. The crystal is mineral. There is no backlight to the digial displays, and indeed, they turn themselves off in the dark, and PDQ, too. Going under the cuff of my jacket for thirty seconds will turn off most functions, which spring to life as soon as light hits the dial. The hour and minute hands continue to operate, however. The lume is pretty good:










And just barely passes the patented quick-glance-inside-a-dark-car Conjurer test. The hands hold their lume for awhile, and are still pretty legible until early in the morning.

Accuracy is as one would expect from a quartz timepiece; pretty much dead on in the few weeks I've had it, perhaps a second or so slow. The seconds hand with the deadbeat quartz tick hits the seconds markers precisely. 
The watch wears comfortably on my 6.75 inch wrist:




























And is well balanced and, like watches from all decent brands, feels well-made and designed.

I have a few beefs with the Sailhawk, firstly with the pushers. It's rated WR is 200 meters, but none of the pushers or crown screw-down, so I'm a bit dubious. However, it's been my experience that when the Japanese slap a WR rating on their watches, they generally mean it. The pushers are also quite sensitive, and it's easy to muck things up simply by wearing the watch. The main crown is also a bit difficult to use while the watch is on the wrist. I'd have also liked to have seen a sapphire crystal. The bezel seems a bit loose and too-easy to turn, but I've used the elapsed time bit of it, and it seems to hold fairly firm once it's set.

The street price of the Sailhawk is around $300; as far as MSRP goes, I've seen a bunch of numbers, from around $500 up to an Invicta-like inflated price of around $900. They're not all that easy to find, at least in the United States (is this a JDM model? I don't know, but you'll have to shop around to get one. (I bought mine, BNIB, from a collector in Australia.) At three bills, the Sailhawk is a steal, and very cool.

Now all I have to do is send Porterhouse to get my yacht out of drydock.


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## pantagruel

Very thorough review. Nice job! I love the clasp on the bracelet.


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## conjurer

pantagruel said:


> Very thorough review. Nice job! I love the clasp on the bracelet.


Thanks for the kind words, pantagruel!


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## Dangermouse

I agree, nice write up and that clasp is really nice and chunky looking........over Seiko clasps


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## conjurer

Dangermouse said:


> I agree, nice write up and that clasp is really nice and chunky looking........over Seiko clasps


Thanks, Dangermouse! The clasp is certainly well made, and much better than one normally finds in this price range.


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## serdal23

I don't even need to have a manual now, your review covers how to use this gorgeous timepiece, as well. Very well review, Conjurer! 

Case and lume are awesome! And the bracelet looks very solid and comfy, as well.

Wear your beautiful timepiece in the best of health . . .

Capt. Serdal


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## conjurer

serdal23 said:


> I don't even need to have a manual now, your review covers how to use this gorgeous timepiece, as well. Very well review, Conjurer!
> 
> Case and lume are awesome! And the bracelet looks very solid and comfy, as well.
> 
> Wear your beautiful timepiece in the best of health . . .
> 
> Capt. Serdal


Thanks for the kind words, Serdal!


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## kennylorenzo

Very nice watch. It's something a little different and I'm sure you will get quite a few compliments on the watch. Good luck with it.


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## mikeynd

A nice and detailed review for a cool Yacht timer.Here is mine,and i don't own a yacht either.


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## roadie

:-!Excellent write up and review! Beautiful pics too. I used to own the older model. https://www.watchuseek.com/f21/citizen-sailhawk-358774.html


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## Sackett

I think the watch is beautiful. Who cares if you never own a yacht. I will never be a pilot


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## conjurer

kennylorenzo said:


> Very nice watch. It's something a little different and I'm sure you will get quite a few compliments on the watch. Good luck with it.


Thanks, kenny!


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## conjurer

mikeynd said:


> A nice and detailed review for a cool Yacht timer.Here is mine,and i don't own a yacht either.


Thanks for the kind words, mikeynd!


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## conjurer

Sackett said:


> I think the watch is beautiful. Who cares if you never own a yacht. I will never be a pilot


Thanks, Sackett! I bought it mainly for the looks, actually.


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## Sackett

conjurer said:


> Thanks, Sackett! I bought it mainly for the looks, actually.


I would too. This is the first time I have seen one of these and I quite like it.


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## GTR83

Is this one from the Sale forum (f29)? I think I also saw the listing but passed. Anyway, excellent review and seems like a great watch. Citizen has always fascinated me for being able to make analog watches that has high-tech look & performance. Seems like they are not the largest watch manufacturer for nothing...


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## conjurer

GTR83 said:


> Is this one from the Sale forum (f29)? I think I also saw the listing but passed. Anyway, excellent review and seems like a great watch. Citizen has always fascinated me for being able to make analog watches that has high-tech look & performance. Seems like they are not the largest watch manufacturer for nothing...


Thanks for the kind words, GTR! I believe this was up for sale here, but I saw and bought it on another forum.


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## jmmayer

Great review, thank you. The sailing jargon (and the bezel) are to remember what heading you are sailing on a given tack. In other words, if your mark — the buoy you have to round — is at 0 degrees, the wind is probably at 0 degrees too, and on port tack you'd be sailing ~45 degree, while on starboard you'd be sailing ~315. But the wind always shifts, so if you're sailing 38 degrees on port, you've been lifted 7 degrees (meaning you're making more progress towards the mark on the port tack than you would on the starboard tack, where the same shift results in you being headed 7 degrees). So with this watch you still need a compass, but I imagine it's for old guys with bad memories and old one-design boats that don't allow many instruments besides a compass. This way you can set your bezel to remember what heading you were sailing, and then check back in with it to see if you're getting a persistent lift or header.


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## CandyHands

Enjoyed your review of a watch I don't wear often enough. The counterclockwise seconds hand in countdown mode amazes my non watch friends.


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## broonzbane

Looks like this thread didn’t get moved when the Citizen threads all got moved over to their own forum. I have asked the mods to move it...


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## bloody watches

Love the watch, Brilliant review, can you post a Photo of Buffy ?


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