A record quantity of 5.8 million of these calibres was produced from 1958 to 1969 (with their 600/610 self-winding versions) and they are among the brands most precise, most reliable and most renowned movements. However, the success of this family is not attributable to the perfection of its self-winding mechanism alone, but also to its extreme reliability, ease of assembly and maintenance, as well as highly ingenious improvements such as the mobile balance spring stud holder invented by Jacques Ziegler in 1959.

In 1969, more than half of all chronometers manufactured in Switzerland bore the OMEGA label. Nearly all were equipped with these calibres. It was the same case in 1965 for the famous series of 100 000 certificates, all of which were obtained with merit after achieving particularly good results for standards that were twice as high as those for official chronometers which did not obtain merit. These performances were essentially due to standards of quality hitherto unknown in the large-scale production of individual timepieces. The performances were also due to the use of ultramodern machines such as the Omegametric (invented by Pierre-Luc Gagnebin in 1962), an unprecedented system for measuring the torque of the balance-spring, which would from this point be adopted by all high-precision watch manufacturers. The watch has a bicolor design with stainless steel and 14K gold capped case nr.168.005. Note the famous observatory logo on the back of the casing.

movement production year list

Omega calibers list by category

Constellation case-caliber reference

Constellation Case Study