Description
Depancel built its reputation on cars — specifically on the rectangular Série-R, a watch whose proportions and dashboard-style furniture borrow openly from mid-century racing instruments. In 2024 the French brand put an integrated automatic chronograph inside it for the first time with the Série-R Chronograph Tangerine. The new Série-R Chronograph Skeleton keeps that architecture and removes the dial.
What is left is the Peacock SL-4802, a skeletonised version of the SL-4801 calibre the collection already used, visible from both sides of a 36 × 40mm steel case. It is limited to 100 numbered pieces at EUR 1,595 / USD 1,595 / GBP 1,400, with pre-orders opened on 8 October 2026 and deliveries scheduled from mid-December.
At that price, a skeletonised integrated automatic chronograph with a column wheel and a vertical clutch is an unusual thing to be able to buy — which is the whole argument for this watch, and also the source of the only real objection to it.
Design
The case carries over unchanged from the earlier chronograph editions: 36mm wide and 40mm long without the lugs, 48.5mm lug-to-lug, in 316L stainless steel with alternating brushed and polished surfaces that pick out the rectangle's sharp edges. The one dimensional change is thickness — 13.7mm overall, or 12.8mm without the bevelled sapphire crystal, which follows the case lines and carries the Depancel logo on its upper surface. Water resistance is 50m.
The front is fully skeletonised, so the gear train, column wheel and transversal balance bridge become the design rather than sitting behind it. Depancel keeps the collection's signature "Dashboard" hands and indices in white Super-LumiNova C1 for legibility, and separates the chronograph information out in orange: elapsed minutes at 3 o'clock, elapsed hours at 9 o'clock, and the large central chronograph seconds hand. A sapphire caseback repeats the view from the rear, where the skeletonised rotor, mainplate and bridges are finished to contrast against the case. The strap is perforated black leather with orange stitching on quick-release bars, 22mm wide, on a steel pin buckle.
Specifications
- Model: Depancel Série-R Chronograph Skeleton
- Case dimensions: 36mm (width) × 40mm (length without lugs) × 13.7mm (thickness); 12.8mm without the crystal
- Lug-to-lug: 48.5mm
- Lug width: 22mm
- Case material: 316L stainless steel, brushed and polished
- Crystal: bevelled sapphire with internal anti-reflective coating
- Caseback: sapphire display
- Water resistance: 50m (5 atm)
- Dial: fully skeletonised, orange chronograph indications, Depancel "Dashboard" hands and indices, white Super-LumiNova C1
- Movement: Peacock SL-4802, skeletonised version of the integrated SL-4801
- Complications: chronograph — central seconds, 30-minute counter at 3 o'clock, hour counter at 9 o'clock
- Chronograph construction: column wheel, vertical clutch, transversal balance bridge
- Jewels: 41
- Frequency: 28,800 vph (4 Hz)
- Winding: automatic
- Power reserve: 55 hours
- Strap: perforated black leather with orange stitching, quick-release spring bars, steel pin buckle
- Limited edition: 100 numbered pieces
- Price: EUR 1,595 / USD 1,595 / GBP 1,400
- Availability: pre-orders from 8 October 2026, deliveries from mid-December 2026
What's Exciting
Skeletonising a chronograph is only worth doing if the chronograph is worth looking at, and this one is. The Peacock SL-4801 family is an integrated automatic chronograph — the stopwatch is designed into the movement rather than stacked on top of a time-only base — with a column wheel, a vertical clutch and a transversal balance bridge. Those are the features you normally start paying serious money for, and opening the dial turns them from a spec-sheet line into the actual face of the watch. Depancel's watchmakers in Besançon inspect and regulate each movement, which matters more here than usual: a skeleton dial hides nothing.
The honest counterweight is that the calibre is Chinese, from Peacock in Liaoning, and the price has climbed past what a closed-dial Série-R costs. Whether EUR 1,595 is a bargain or a stretch depends entirely on whether you value the architecture or the postcode it was made in. On the evidence of what is actually on the wrist — an integrated column-wheel chronograph, skeletonised front and back, in a well-finished rectangular case with a genuine design identity and a run of only 100 — the architecture wins. There is very little else at this price that even attempts it.
History
Depancel is a young French brand that has grown around automotive storytelling rather than diving or aviation, and the Série-R is its most recognisable line: a rectangular case with the instrument-panel cues of 1960s and 1970s racing dashboards, a shape that in watch terms puts it in conversation with the TAG Heuer Monaco at a fraction of the price. For most of its life the Série-R was a time-only proposition.
That changed in 2024 with the Série-R Chronograph Tangerine, the collection's first chronograph and the first use of the integrated Peacock SL-4801. The Skeleton is the logical next move: the same case, the same calibre family, but with the SL-4802 variant opening up the mechanism that was the point of the 2024 watch in the first place. Each piece ships with a five-year warranty and a travel case.
