Let us assume we are late in the year 1988. IWC announced its new high-end Ingenieur and you got one.

It costs a serious price and soon you recognize the watch is very resistant to magnetic fields -- maybe -- but for sure very sensible to temperature changes, which happen often. Now, you are not the only one, as the developers at IWC recognize this as well. Besides the other serious problems that appear during production.

Well, overall this watch becomes a flop. Sure, who needs a watch that is resistant to magnetic fields but sensible to temperature changes and overall very fragile!? So the watch was in IWC catalogues until 1992 but sold like "sauer Bier" as the German says: less than 1'300 in steel and less than 140 in gold.

So, when it was a modern watch the impression you got was a failed model in this popular IWC line. Yes, but today the perception is different: the problems in the past, make it a very interesting watch nowadays. It is technical delicate and innovative. Very noteworthy in its appearance and finally made in very low quantities -- most not sold but given to friends & family. What more could you ask for as a collector of vintage watches?