In Depth · Hanhart

Does the Hanhart 417 ES Steve McQueen earn its name?

Beyond the signed dial, the 39 mm flyback chronograph makes its case through a red HyCeram pusher, a fluted bezel and a full leather cuff.

Hen & Mills Editorial · 4 min read · 4 October 2026

• The Hanhart 417 ES Steve McQueen Limited Edition No.1 pairs a hand-wound flyback chronograph with a 39 mm steel case and a 300-piece limit.
• A red HyCeram pusher, rotating fluted bezel and Shell Cordovan cuff give the watch more character than its signed black dial alone.
• Hanhart lists the edition at €2,890 including VAT in its German catalogue and currently marks it sold out; no Australian list price is confirmed.

Celebrity signatures on dials usually ask the buyer to supply the story. The useful question is whether the watch beneath the signature still makes sense once the familiar name has been taken away. Hanhart's 417 ES Steve McQueen Limited Edition No.1 gives us a proper test: a manually wound flyback chronograph, a red pusher and a full leather cuff, all details that can be considered without pretending to have worn the watch. The name may draw the eye first, but the case proportions, chronograph layout and visible mechanical details give this reference an argument of its own.

The cuff changes the whole silhouette

At 39 mm across and 46 mm from lug to lug, the stainless-steel case uses dimensions many chronograph wearers can picture without imagining an oversized instrument. Thickness is the more revealing number: Hanhart quotes 13.3 mm including the high-domed crystal and 11.55 mm without it. The crystal's rise is therefore a visible part of the profile, not a footnote in the dimensions. The case uses a convex sapphire crystal with an internal antireflective coating, plus a screw-down sapphire caseback and a stated 10 bar water-resistance rating under DIN 8310.

The dark brown cuff strap uses Shell Cordovan leather from Italian tannery Comipel and runs beneath the case. It is not merely a wider strap: that extra layer of leather changes the separation between metal and wrist and makes the whole object read more like a period chronograph. Hanhart specifies 20 mm between the lugs, so the watch itself is not unusually broad at its attachment point. The cuff is an expressive choice, and a polarising one. It also gives the watch a broader silhouette than its 39 mm steel case alone, bringing leather into the visual outline rather than hiding it behind the lugs. I would want to see the watch both on the cuff and on an ordinary strap before deciding which version of its character I preferred.

The red pusher and fluted bezel

The red lower pusher is one of the details that ties the watch visually to Hanhart's chronograph language. Hanhart identifies its material as HyCeram, and adds a red insert to the continuously rotating, bidirectional fluted bezel. Neither change asks the dial to carry the whole story. The pusher stands out against the polished and satin-finished steel, while the bezel's single insert gives the wearer an orientation point without crowding the black face. The case has functional timing hardware even before the chronograph is started.

Look closely at the dial and the signature sits beneath a two-register layout rather than replacing it. Hanhart uses its historical logo above the centre, with small seconds on the left and a 30-minute counter on the right. The Arabic numerals and hands use a warm-toned Super-LumiNova treatment that Hanhart calls Light Old Radium GL; that is a colour designation, not a claim that the watch contains radium. The dial is black, and its legibility depends on the contrast between that surface, pale markings and clean central hands. The signature is visible, but it need not be the reason to read the time.

The hand-wound Sellita AMT5100 M runs at 28,800 vibrations per hour, or 4 Hz, with 23 jewels and a stated 58-hour reserve after full winding. Its flyback function is the meaningful mechanical feature: one press resets and restarts a running chronograph, rather than asking for a stop, reset and start sequence. The seconds-hacking function helps with setting the watch, and the sapphire back lets the owner see the movement. Those are concrete reasons to care about this reference beyond the association on the dial, even if the same calibre family appears elsewhere in the 417 line.

Hanhart numbers the screw-down caseback as part of a 300-piece edition. The presentation box adds a signed card from McQueen's grandchildren and a small bottle of red nail polish, a nod to the red pusher's visual importance. Those extras make the collector brief explicit, although neither affects the watch on the wrist. The stronger argument for this edition sits in the way its chronograph, cuff and red control work together. The signature identifies the association; the hardware gives the watch its own shape and use.

Hanhart 417 ES Steve McQueen Limited Edition No.1 pricing and availability

Hanhart's German catalogue lists the 300-piece edition at €2,890 including VAT and currently marks it sold out. A confirmed Australian list price is not published in the official material reviewed. The exact product page offers strap-length choices, so prospective buyers should check stock with Hanhart rather than assume that the presence of an Add to Cart control means a numbered watch remains available. The strap-length choices matter with a cuff that wraps much more of the wrist than an ordinary strap.