In the landscape of pure “tool watches”, there remains a brand that hardly ever gets its flowers —  and that brand is Sinn.

Founded by Helmut Sinn in 1961, the eponymous German watch manufacture would go on to design some of the world’s most utilitarian chronograph and dive watches for specialized purposes. With a strong focus in pilot’s chronographs, Sinn has developed some of the most underrated tool watches in history such as the Reference 156 Military Chronograph and the Reference 140, which accompanied German astronaut Reinhard Furrer into orbit on the Spacelab D1 mission in 1985.

It’s the aforementioned, robustly made chronographs that laid the groundwork for modern Sinn’s such as this pilot’s chronograph, a Reference 130 ST TY. Between its triple register chronograph display, a day-date function, tachymeter scale on the dial’s periphery and a shockproof case — there’s seemingly nothing this Sinn chronograph can’t do. 

Its 40mm polished stainless steel case features a pair of barrel pushers and a large screw down crown protected by a set of crown guards, an acrylic crystal, a matte black dial, crisp white luminous Arabic indices,  a matching ‘syringe’ handset and a solid screw-down caseback. Powering this chronograph is the venerable automatic-winding Valjoux 7750 movement.

Fitted to a black leather strap with a signed stainless steel buckle, this Sinn Reference 130 has all the honest character you would want from a well-worn tool watch.

From our collective experience at watch meet-ups, the person wearing a Sinn is probably one of the more interesting people in the room — be that collector today!