I was thinking of buying IWC because the recent launches featured beautiful images. I'm thinking it will be a Big Pilot or another pilot watch, given IWC's pilot watch heritage. It'll probably be a Top Gun watch, honestly, and I love the look of the black and mojave desert Top Gun watches. The Top Gun watch launch in 2022 was beautiful (except the blockchain portion was so badly done and painful, I was made to download an app and keep trying to refresh it for 30 minutes because some idiot required a faulty captcha before some blockchain token could be downloaded).
I am having trouble finding any kind of discussion on how to choose a Big Pilot, and can someone point me in the right direction?
The models I like the most right now are the Top Gun Big Pilot Perpetual and the Top Gun Double Chronograph. I should probably pursue the Double Chrono first, because the perpetual is a much larger financial commitment and the 46 mm watch is quite a jump (even compared to the 44 mm double chrono).
Then, I'm wondering whether it should be steel, ceramic or ceratanium. I was thinking of skipping steel as there are so many steel watches out there. I like the look and feel of the newer ceratanium watches, but saw so many comments on various fora that it is just a gimmick material and who cares about ceramic coated titanium. I saw the same comments say to just get ceramic.
The current double chrono is limited to the Top Gun black ceratanium, but you can always look around for secondhand ceramic double chronos. For the latter, I am not sure how to decide between the original 2007 model, or the 2019 model.
So to summarize the questions:
1) Literature on how to choose a Big Pilot
2) How to choose between Top Gun Big Pilot Perpetual and the Top Gun Double Chronograph
3) Between ceramic and ceratanium
4) Between 2007 Top Gun double chrono or 2019 model