I got an email once asking me if the Breitling Caliber 23 had a quickset date, and I replied that it did not. And, it doesn’t, which is odd, since the previous Caliber 13 has one. The Caliber 23 is used in the current standard Navitimer with the 3,6,9 subdial layout.

I got to thinking, about how some of the older non-quickset Navi’s had the ability to let you change the date by turning the hour hand back and forth over the 12 midnight marker and how you could advance the date much more quickly that way, and I wondered if I could do that with my Navitimer. I didn’t want to mess with the date since I would have to move it all the way around to get it back to normal so I tried to look it up online, and found that there were others with this question as well and no answers.

Well I have the answer, and the short answer is yes, kinda. The date can be quick advanced by moving the hour hand to about 8:30pm on mine, then back over 12am.. and the date changes. That is quicker than advancing it all 24 hours. Your watch may not need to go all the way back to 8:30, but mine is about that.