Seiko 5 Superior SNZ437K1: The tales of ugly duckling

Seiko Superior 7S26-00N0：我很醜可是我很溫柔

Yes ugly.... that precisely comes into my mind whenever I look at this Seiko Superior. If it is that hideous, why is it in my collection? The story started in the year 2004. A friend asked whether I want a newly launched Seiko Superior? She said it is totally different than average Seiko 5 and is with 23 jewels movement and sapphire glass. The price was friendly and reasonable. So without looking at the watch, I pressed in an order. 

True enough, it is not the average Seiko 5..... it has a space look; a watch from the future. The design is radical. My first impression with the watch was... It is really solid and heavy... Chunk of stainless steel.... In fact, this watch is weighted about 170gm. This is quite a big watch for people with smaller wrist. It measured at 39mm diameter excluding its crown and with thickness of 12mm. Despite the dial is round, I considered this watch oval and a bit oblongated shape. The case is brushed finish with mirror polished bezel.

Don't be deceived by the appearance. This watch has a very beautiful black glossy textured dial with fine crosshatch pattern. The hour markers are applied silvered baton indices with luminous dots at the end tips. The hour hand looks extremely awful. I don't know who designed this, but it looked like the hour hand has been chopped short. The white gloss hour and minutes hands are with luminous filled. The day and date disc of this watch uses the black colour background contrasted with white wording. This really match the black dial very very well. 

There is a black chapter ring that has a dash for every minute, which is a nice touch as it moves these hash marks from the dial and gives the dial a little cleaner look than being directly on the dial.  The outer most of the chapter ring is a 24 hour scale. A sapphire crystal is being used to protect this beauty dial and adding more value to this watch. At the bottom of the dial is 7S36-- COT4 R2; seriously I am clueless and I guess only Seiko understand what it meant. 

The crown of this watch has the distinctive Seiko 5 logo and is quite nicely done. This crown is the conventional push pull and adjust type. There is a curve on the case that housed and protected the crown. 

This watch has a solid stainless steel integrated bracelet with solid links. The bracelet is designed as an extension of the case.  I.e. this band is only for this watch and cannot be used in any other models. 

At the end of the bracelet is a double push button folding clasp. The clasp has the word Seiko engraved. 

The bracelet has the part number written on the first link of both sides.

This watch comes with the see through back case. This is just an ordinary mineral crystal. There is a gold colour Seiko 5 Superior imprint on the glass. I always think that Seiko should at least doing some cosmetic or beautification work or even plastic surgery on the movement before putting it on display underneath a see through case. No doubt, higher end Seiko like Spring Drive or Grand Seiko has hand polished movement that is among the industrial best. 

This watch employed the 23 jewels automatic 7S36 movement. Like 7S26, this is a non-hacking, non-handwinding movement with quickset day-date functions. The word Superior in this sense means the use of sapphire crystal, a 23 jewel movement, a solid link bracelet and uprated water resistance (10bars). Futuristic styling and lots of features combine to make this a watch which should last for decades to come.