pezzy

i reckon you can get away with a cheapo pad printer. the most important things that i can think of for detail would be the quality of the print plate, that rubber squishy thing, and to a lesser extent the ink/paint. the contraption itself is just for alignment and transfer of ink so i can't imagine you need something very nice if you're just banging out low volumes. i suspect a lot of the rep dials you find from asia are made using cheap tools as well. especially vintage dials that arent very complex and often arent perfect anyway. theres also screen printing. i didnt look into it in detail because i couldnt find much info about creating stencils with details as small as the ones you find on watch dials. i just read it was difficult. but if you can create them, then i can see this would be a much easier entry to creating your own dials.

to be honest, i have very little idea lol. i just know the process goes, make print plates using a laser etcher then use a dial pad printer to transfer ink from plate to dial. all the other nits and bits i was going to leg it through trial and error. iirc theres a bible size book just on printing itself. i cant remember the name of it unfortunately. if you youtube dial pad printing, you can find some videos on what the ink transfer is like. and also alot of sellers of generic and rep dials on aliexpress will do customs. if you dont mind them stealing your drawings then its probably the easiest way to go.

sometimes you can find a rep dial dealer on ebay who does customs. when i was looking to do this, i wanted to do a 1016 dial since all the ones at that time were junk. i ended up not going ahead because i was afraid they could use my drawing and improve on the junk they were selling (and yes i see the irony here lol). if you are going to draw them, then think about doing the whole process yourself. i had access to a laser etcher/engraver to make print plates so that particular aspect (the most difficult imo) was out of the way. you can buy dial pad printers on aliexpress. the rest is all just trial and error i think. the idea was to burn money perfecting one, then mass produce to sell hopefully breaking even.

wanted to report back for future reference. it was much easier than i expected. here's a pic of the tools i used and the finished job. i removed 2 links, one on each side. it's not perfect, but i think it was a pretty clean job. here are the steps i used. - use the pin pusher tool to insert it in the gap between the links, like you would if you were to push out pins. - when inserted, use the pin pusher tool to pry it up a little whilst inserting the bezel removal tool from the top view. the bezel removal tool has a fine enough tip for you to easily push it in. when inserted enough, you will have enough leverage for you to use the bezel removal tool to slightly pry it open even more. - when there is enough space, use a pair of fine needle nose pliers (i used xuron's fine nose smooth pliers) to open it even more. at this point, it's very easy to open the mid link. you just need very little force and fine tinkering to get it open enough for you to remove the whole link. the trick here is to open it enough so that the single link you're trying to remove can move 90 degrees from the bracelet (the mid link is opened at about 30 degrees). - to close it up, wrap the bracelet with a cloth and use a pair of stronger pliers to crimp it down. i hope this helps anyone in the future :). also, this was a cartel 7836 bracelet. looks like it's the same as mary's. not sure if i want to replace the figure 8 connecting link. that one looks to be a little more challenging.

^that sounds like a good strategy. will keep that in mind. not looking forward to doing this. i had sized a generic one recently that are held with removable pins and that was already a pita.

the hand pullers dont bend/snap? ive just bought some tweezer size pliers. will report back. there seems to be a tool for everything watch related. except for rolex folded links :P.

need to resize mine. any tips on how to bend out the mid links? i'm guessing a pair of fine needle nose pliers shoved into any gaps i can find?

here's a start. each seller have their goods and bads. unfortunately you will have to spend some time to read about them. the worse thing in the rep world is consistency. hence there's a lot of information, some current, some outdated you will need to sift through. ndt ming quy phong ruby's (not sure if they are viet sourced. i vaguely remember they are)

are marys 7836 the same as cartels 7836? cant get a hold of mary so thinking of just buying from trusty. edit: damn the bracelets are sold out. did you buy the whole lot lol?

are any of the swiss fakes still out and about? that is some great provenance.

ah ok. i'll let you guys work it out

^his case sets include the bezel as well. god bless that man.

found some quality control pics from jmb in my inbox, and the bezel is shaped like the gen. i've always wondered why his bezel was praised so much, now i know why. imo, if you're that adamant about the details, i'd just buy a gen. to get it looking gen, you're going to be spending some $$$, probably in the vicinity of $2k or more unless you can diy everything. you can find them for around $20k, which is not a lot of money if you consider how much you'll be dropping towards a watch that is at the end of the day a rep. plus the time spent sourcing and modifying everything can use be used to save up the dough for a gen. this was my thought when i was building mine.

never really paid attention to the bezel. but the gen does indeed look to be flatter in profile. will have to look at my jmb one tonight to see if it's shaped like the gen.

have you looked at the ruby vietnam dials? they look pretty decent imo. probably better to get one of those than to butcher a gen dial. and watch out for the current yuki 1016 eta dial with the white markers. crappy looking font. the one with the yellow markers is still nice. but you'd be hard pressed to find nice hands to match that yellow. i went with raffles orange hands. the colours are pretty close, but the hands are pretty fugly lol.