World’s Lightest Mechanical Watch Engineered with Graphene

The world’s lightest watch has been created by the collaboration between University of Manchester and Richard Mille (watchmaking brand) along with McLaren (British Formula One Team). The watch was showcased recently at the Salon International De La Haute Horlogerie event, which will go on till 20th January, in Geneva. This mechanical chronograph was developed after pairing precision engineering with leading grapheme research.

Graphene, an allotrope of carbon, was isolated for the very first time at University of Manchester in 2004. It is the world’s first two-dimensional material which can pave the way to a large variety of applications including high-performance composites for the automotive and aerospace industries, flexible mobile phones and tablets as well as next generation energy storage.

Discussing the features of this ultra-light high-performance mechanical watch, its strap has been added with grapheme material in order to enhance its mechanical properties and its resistance to wear. Even with just 40 grams of weight, this RM 50-03 watch is highly durable and strong. The graphene composite utilised here is known as Graph TPT and is lighter than all other similar materials used in watchmaking.

Professor of Polymer Science and Technology, University of Manchester, Prof Young, stated about the collaboration, “The project with McLaren and Richard Mille involved an investigation into the possibility of incorporating graphene into components in composite watches to enhance performance with the view of saving weight.”