Seiko's First Solar Analog
Yes, that's correct. This is the first solar analog made by Seiko, back in the 1977. This should be a 1978 model. However, up till today, I can't find a trace of any advertisement and catalog to show this. Thus I can't find how much this thing they asked for back in those days. I do believe it is not cheap as it's something new to the market.
They have the solar panels, totally there are twelve of the, somehow smartly integrated to the dial, as part of the design. The panels will then charge up the built-in capacitor, which is the same size as a regular button cell, except it got two extra wires from the battery hooking up to the inside of the movement. As time had passed, the capacitor can no longer keeping any charge. The sad thing is, the capacitor can no longer be sourced nowadays. A fix for this, is to disable the charging wires, put in a regular 1.55v modern silver oxide button cell instead. It works fine that way.
There is a silver stainless steel variant, which is equally rare in the market. And also, the movement 4826, was only known being used in this model, and this model is the only watch that Seiko had the name 'Solar Quartz' put on. I could be wrong, but somehow over the years I haven't found any other watch using this movement and this name. If you do have more information, please let me know.
