This article first appeared on uhrforum.de, May 5th, 2021 and is an unaltered customer review by Wilhelm S from Germany. Team Formex met Wilhelm at the Watchtime Show in Düsseldorf in 2019. He has been one of our first pre-order customers of the Essence ThirtyNine. When he explained his first impressions in the forum, we had to ask if we could share this with our community. We wish Wilhelm (and his crew) many more great adventures with his new daily wrist companion. Thank you for sharing the love!
FORMEX? Who is FORMEX?
I don't know exactly when I read about FORMEX watches for the first time, but it must have been a long time ago and I didn't pay much attention to them at that time, because they didn't strike me visually and the sizing was just too large. I am a friend of smaller and more classic watches.
But that changed at the Watchtime 2019 in Düsseldorf, when a coincidentally met watch friend dragged me to the booth of FORMEX.
There I discovered more about FORMEX in a nice conversation and learned that the brand was founded in 1999 but was taken over by the current owners a few years ago. One of the owners is Raphael Granito. Through his father, who owns a subcontracting company ( www.dexel.ch ) for the watch industry, has access to the components that are manufactured there. But still the FORMEX collection did not have a model that triggered a must-have-feeling in me.
That changed, however, when a smaller model of the quite successful FORMEX Essence was presented in late fall 2020. ThirtyNine was the model name and the watch, as the name suggests, has a 39 mm diameter. That was something for Wilhelm, especially because of the summer green dial version that just really caught me eye. I quickly pressed the order button so that I was still one of the buyers of the first round of production, which should be delivered at the end of February 2021.
Now the ThirtyNine has arrived at my place and I don't want to withhold my first impressions from you. You can look at the ThirtyNine and especially feel that those are first class components. Then the ThirtyNine has some features that I would like to mention in particular and they are:
Patented case suspension
Patented fine adjustment
Strap change without tools
How these work is nicely illustrated on the FORMEX website ( www.formexwatch.com ).
But now the basic data of the ThirtyNine.
Caliber: COSC certified Sellita SW200
jewels: 26
power reserve: 38 h
Winding: automatic
Case: stainless steel 316L
Dial: green, vertically brushed with horizontal lines and BGW9 Super-LumiNova on hands and applied indexes.
Strap: stainless steel with butterfly folding clasp and with micro extension.
Crystal: sapphire crystal on both sides with anti-reflective coating.
Crown: not screwed
Water resistant: 10 bar / 100 m
Diameter: 39 mm
Height: 10 mm
Lug to lug: 45 mm
Weight: 135 gr. with steel bracelet, weighed at 20 cm wrist circumference
But now to the pictures. The delivery of the watch was announced to me by Formex and I was able to track the shipment at UPS. Since I was not at home on the day of the scheduled delivery, I had the package redirected to a UPS Point.
Due to this, the package was provided with so many additional stickers that it was not possible for me to open the package and have therefore instructed my construction crew to open the package, which also worked well.
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Then looked at the contents of the box.
And out came the green ThirtyNine with folding clasp in wrapped condition.
Removing the film didn't work the way I thought it would, so my construction crew had to go into action again.
That didn't work right away on the first try either, but on the 2nd try the guys were able to remove the film from the glass after all.
Aha, and this is how the ThirtyNine looks without the film protection.
And on went the removal of the protective films on the folding clasp.
However, this was even trickier than expected and the colleague with the mining hammer had to come.
Finally, the watch was freed from the protective films and of course had to immediately go on the wrist.
When ordering the watch, you could specify your wrist circumference and the strap/bracelrt was then adjusted accordingly by Formex.
It's a great fit!
The dial is also a special feature, because the horizontal lines are milled. Due to the sharp edges, the color tone of the dial changes depending on the angle you are looking at the watch.
Now more detailed photos of the ThirtyNine on which you can see well how different the green tone of this dial looks at different exposures.
At night, the indexes and hands on the ThirtyNine are not gray, but due to the applied BGW9 Super-LumiNova on the hands and indexes, they glow in a turquoise hue.
Now let's move on to the steel bracelet, which is of excellent quality.
Not only the very well-functioning strap changing mechanism stands out here, but also the fold-out micro-adjustment located on the flat butterfly clasp. If the band, as it often happens in the summer, is a little too tight, it can be extended by folding out a link by about 5 mm.
The band itself consists of screwed links in a length of about 6 mm and is therefore very flexible and comfortable to wear.
In the following shot, you can clearly see the micro extension of the strap. The clasp itself is opened by pressing the round pushers.
Now we come to the quick-change mechanism of the strap. Simply press the oval pushers towards the center and the spring bar retracts, allowing the strap to be easily mounted or removed. It couldn't be easier.
So there is no need for a pickaxe, as one of my construction crew members said.
It continues with the case, which has a patented case suspension. How this works is well explained on the Formex website.
"A beautiful back can also delight" and here this one turned out particularly great. Where on most watches the case cover or sapphire crystal cover is simply round, on the ThirtyNine this is adapted to the case shape and thus exudes a certain elegance. At least that's how I feel about it.
The clear skeletonization of the rotor harmoniously matches the design of the back.
I ordered a matching green leather strap for the ThirtyNine, but it was not yet available.
I have already received the corresponding carbon fiber buckle with fine adjustment and would like to show this also just briefly.
On the second picture, you can see two small metal sliders on the right side to which the hole part of the watchband is attached.
So attached to the watchband, the length can be changed by pressing on this fine adjustment.
Also, the operation of this carbon fiber clasp is nicely explained on the website of Formex.
Thanks for stopping by.
Did you enjoy reading this customer story and would like to share your own? Please send your personal impressions with your Formex watch to info@formexwatch.com. Thank you and see you soon.