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manodeoro

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Everything posted by manodeoro

  1. @madasboot ... @JSebWC .... come on guys ... I thought this forum was a place for friendly exchanges rather than fights? I know both of you and I'm sorry to read your messages, which are a little too brutal ... and then, as they say, each to his own 😉
  2. @Timelord Seagull ST16 movement ... so same dial feet positions than DG2813 ... Here's a comparative pic showing your movement and an ST16 I'm working on ...
  3. WRT (Watch Repair Talk) is a good source of informations if you want to learn how to work on watches ...
  4. [mention=795]Timelord[/mention] ... it's a DG2807 ... or Seagull ST16/2807 same dial feet position as DG2813
  5. After a complete service ... disassembly, cleaning, reassembly with lubrification (including automatic system) ... and regulation those movements can work really precisely (more or less 8s/d) for years.
  6. Don Aronow, an avid racer and New York businessman, founded Cigarette Racing Team on 188th Street in South Florida in 1999. Aronow's boats won over 350 offshore races and he was a two-time world champion and three-time U.S. champion. He has been elected to every powerboating Hall of Fame in existence and as stated above, he and Gar Wood were the only two Americans to have ever received the UIM Gold Medal of Honor. In 1979 a mini-serie of customized Rolex 5513 was produced for the "Cigarette 1" racing team ... some research shows they are only 50 in the world. One was sold at Christie's November 2005 and nother one in Geneva Octobre 2006. So .... Some time ago an Italian member on RWI contacted me showing me this MQ dial. I have never seen a Rolex 16800 with this dial and for me it is a fancy dial but I found the project interesting. Icing on the cake and to go further on the way of the fantasy, my Italian friend wanted the same dial for his GMT. I like challenges so I said "why not?" 😛 Then I followed the usual procedure ... First a first test print to set the dial design ... Then the final printing itself the painting of the GMT hand in red ... Lume work and the assembly on the movement ... And final assembly ... with 2 insert variants ... That watch is a fantasy one but I really like it ... letting it go to its real owner was a real pain 🤣 I hope you'll like it too ...
  7. So it's all about building a 6350 Honeycomb ... a long journey that started about 2 years ago. Many threads have been already posted here about early Explorers, so I wont write too much and will limit myself to the main informations ... 1 - The Explorer line was registered by Rolex in January 1953 ... 2 - The 6350s were the first Rolex to carry the "Explorer" on its dial ... 3 - The "honeycomb" 6350 ... this name referring to the specific texture of its dial ... is one of the most rare model ... I've been making dials for years and, if I remember ccorrectly, my first attempt to make a negative-gilt one was mid 2016. I slowly improved my skills along the years, modifing the technics I used, and always trying to do better and to take up new challenges. This until I felt, mid 2021, that I could maybe achieve to make a gilt honeycomb dial. I started to gather informations, pics and technicals details, read articles on the topic, and think about the difficulties I would have to overcome. At the same time I started to draw the outline of the project and quickly did my first print tests. And today, almost 2 years after I started, I'm happy to present the result I reached. What has been implemented to achieve that build ? 1 - An "Explorer" box from Raffles ... which I had to put through the worst torments ... I drilled the lugs to be able to use 2mm bars, but I also thinned them to modify their profile. I also rounded the caseback to get closer to the original "semi-bubbleback". And of course I engraved the whole thing, both between the horns and inside the caseback. 2 - 316 stainless steel, a precision lathe and … elbow grease ... Concerning the bezel, very particular on the Rolex 6350, I first thought about modifying the bezel of the Raffles case but I quickly realized that the only way to get closer to the original bezel was ... to make one. So I took the time to study the profile and draw it, some 316 stainless steel, a precision lathe, some files, a lot of sandpaper ... and I ended up with a bezel that, in my opinion, is totally credible. And frankly I am delighted with the result. 3 - 6350 "honeycomb" dial ... This was the central point of the project and what required the most patience and imagination. I won't tell you in detail how I proceeded ... there are some techniques that were obvious and everyone will guess it, and there are some little tricks that I discovered through mistakes, unsuccessful attempts, hesitations and then successes. I think my efforts have paid off and I am really happy with this dial 4 - 2824-2 low-beat and no-date movement ... I wanted a recent movement, which could receive a dial with dial feet (I don't like dial-posts) but I also wanted it to be low-beat and that the crown has only 2 positions (a no-date movement). I started with an Asian 2824-2 movement clocked at 21600bph ... these movements are reputed to be of "average quality" but once disassembled, cleaned, lubricated and reassembled they work very well and can even be regulated to almost 0s/day. On the other hand I replaced the keyless works parts by those of an ETA 2801, original no-date and of better quality. The result is a new low-beat and no-date movement. 5 - Some parts bought on the market to complete the project ... - T22 plexi - BREVET + crown - 2mm fat springbars - 6200 gold plated handset … just because of the specific seconds hand ... - 1016 gaskzts set ... And that's it ... I think I've done the trick. But "without pictures it doesn't exist" you might say, so I'll stop writing and let you make your own opinion ...
  8. Looks like a Foxter watch ... https://www.foxterwatches.com/sixties/40-montre-acier-sur-bracelet-acier-extensible-cadran-bleu-et-lunette-bleue.html
  9. Hi mate ... Thanks for the kind words [emoji16] Not a long shot at all though I've not been here for a long time ... I'm still making dials, Doxas, negative-gilts, Tudors and others, and since my last post I've improved my method a lot so they are better now ... so I'll try to update that thread as soon as I can ... In the meantime feel free to PM me about your Doxa project [emoji6]
  10. Hi folks ... it's been almost months since I haven't posted here ... I've had to put dialmaking and watchmaking aside and stay off from the forums for a while because I moved to a new house with my new GF and kids ... reconstructing a new family takes a lot of time. Then, early 2022, I had to take care of 2 old guys I love ... really close family ... One is almost OK now, though his brain is still so so ... The other one leaved our good hearth last week ... not in a starship I mean, he died after hard weeks of intensive care at the hospital ... Sometimes life is shitty and old age is not a bed of roses ... Now I start again working on watches and it proves to be helpful to avoid thinking about bad things ... so let's put sadness aside ... I'm happy to be back here ... So during the past week I 've been making some Doxa dials ... precision work was helpfull to sothe the mind ... Aqualungs ... one standard early Doxa and two from the Synchron era ... Blacklungs too ... not that much cause they require specific dial plates (I'm waiting for some more) ... Divingstars ... All Synchron era ... two standards and one "Poseidon" with that nice logo And two Sharkhunters ... those are not as popular than the others but they are really nice too ...
  11. just WOW !!! you did a great job ... Mine says hello ... I built it 2017 if I remember well home made Burford dial, fixed bars and 2 parts steel/german silver bezel ... a long journey ... it's been a box queen's for some years but now I've seen yours my wrist ask for it ...
  12. Back to the origins ... 1946 - Air Liquide founded "La Spirotechnique" to sell the "Scaphandre Cousteau-Gagnan", aka C45, aka Aqua-Lung ... 1952 - René Bussoz, Jacques-Yves Cousteau and Emile Gagnan founded U.S Divers Company ... 1957 - Bussoz sold U.S. Divers Co. to La Spirotechnique / Aqualung International 216 - Air Liquide sold Aqualung International to Montagu Private Equity ... Next ???
  13. Some weeks of friend of a friend sent me a pic of a rarely seen *doxa sUB 300 T dial ... something you'll certainly never se in real He asked my if I could print the same dial with some customisation. He is a former U.S. Navy Commander and his initials are H.G. ... so I worked on the design and made the print test below. The future owner said he wanted a dial to be more reddish than the "standard SUB 300 orange" So I sent him a color chart and made some color tests so that he could choose the color he wanted and here we are ... still orange but more close to red ... and ready for lumework 🙂 the orange/yellow dial with "la spirotechnique" logo on the background is one I'm making for my son
  14. Something special on my wrist today ...just finsihed that build around 7PM 6610 Explorer negative-gilt red depth dial
  15. Finished some more Doxa dials last week ... BLACKLUNG DIAL and HANDSET ... for NH35 SUB 300 T "NO LOGO" DIAL SUB 300 T "IRISHSTAR" DIAL I'm still waiting to hear back about the SUB 200 CORALLINE print test ... As soon I'll get a "GO" I'll resize the dial down to 17.5mm and proceed to lume work
  16. Thanks [emoji3526] I didn't had the handset while luming the dial so there's a slight difference ... But Peter said me it's soooo slight that not really noticeable ... I'll post some pics of a lumed BlackLung dial next week's ... I thought I could do that sooner but I've found a better way to make the yellow dot so I've decided to remove everything and start from a blank dial plate [emoji33]
  17. Irish Star shipped 02/03, received 08/03 and cased 09/03 ... a smoothly runnig operation Yesterday evening my friend Dr Peter Millar sent me some pics ... everything's ready for Saint Patrick's day
  18. Hi guys … some really good news today ... Members who check that thread from time to time have already read about my « Irish Star » Doxa project I posted here October 2000. The original Irish Star dial was made for Dr Pete Millar and was quite nice but, IMHO, it looked too much"modern style". So I decided to redo it, "vintage style" and with a real Irish shamroc, not a 4 leaves clover. Since then I’ve had too much work at the office and I postponed that project. But sometimes things catch up with you … Mid-September I received a PM from the Doxa guy himself … Dr Pete McClean Millar. For those who didn’t heard about him, Pete Millar has writen books about the Doxa subs, collaborated with the Company and is a(the!) specialist about those divers. You can check his website here http://www.doxa300t.com/ , his books about Doxas here http://www.thedoxabook.com/ an his last book about the Aquastar here http://www.adiveintotime.com/ ... I was really honored to read what Dr Millar wrote about the work I had already done on those Doxa dials, saying I had progressed to almost perfection … though I’m still far from it … We chated about Doxas, divers, dial-making, Oil & Gas industry, etc … and decided that the Irish Star project had to exist « in real ». First thing I did was to prepare a blank ETA dial plate to the exact dimensions needed to fit in the Doxa Sub 1200T case were it will be … no pics of that step as it’s standard work … The next step was to select the perfect « Irish » green I would apply on the blank plate. We agreed that « Mickey Finn’s Irsih Green Apple » was nice So I painted the dial using the same green, then I applied 2 coats of glossy lacquer While the final glossy coat was drying, I did a print test on a blank copper ETA dial, just to check that the position of the date window was good enough Everything looked OK … both for me and Pete, so I went to the print process and got that result Here we were really close to the end … But there was still the lume work to do and though the last ones I had done were nice they were not good enough … that one had to be as « close to perfect » as I could do… I wanted to achieve sharp angles on the white rectangles in daylight and on the lume in darkness … So I searched for a new method to apply the lume I searched and finally found the way to proceed … simple and easy, no expensive tools, just steady hands and some imagination … And today I’m glad to show you the result … The « Irish Star » is alive and glows in the dark …
  19. Thanks buddy ... Custom dial made by myself a few years ago ... Custom Burford dial, custom (and fully working) A/6538 german silver bezel, fixed bars, engraved midcase and caseback, etc ... almost every part of that watch has been custom made or reworked by me I took me months of work but that's one of the really few A/6538 Reps available ...
  20. The second one is a Blacklung dial with a custom handset ... Making that custom handset proved to be MUCH more difficult than I thought at first ... I designed the hands using Blacklung close-up pics, send that to my maker and waited for some weeks ... Just before New Years Eve the handsets arrived in my mail box and I was not that happy ... The hands were nicely cut but the finish was so so and none of the tubes really fitted to the movement So I decicde to rework everything : - remove the lume -nsqueeze the tubes on hours and minutes hands -nbroach the tube on the seconds hand - redo theblack varnish finish It took me hours but at the end I achieved ti get something I liked. So I just had to lume everything ... off-white lume with low-green glow ... Then I proceeded to the final mounting on a an ETA 2824-2 movement ... now it's just ready to ship ... BTW ... I have almost finished another Balcklung dial and handset, same design but made for a Seiko NH35 movement ... I just have to lume evrything so I'll post the result next week if everything goes well ...
  21. Today I'll post some news about those Doxa dials ... I have just finished 2 dials and handsets that will be shipped tomorrow to a friend ... I had already worked on a "sharkhunter" dial but the future owner was hesitating between that one and a "conquistador" ... So, after some emails back and forth, we decided to make something in the beteween ... So I'm happy to present you the "SHARQUISTADOR" - Black "sharkhunter" dial - "sharkhunter" handset - "conquistador" print That dial is for a Miyota 8215 so I've had to slightly modify the design to make it fit the dial size and the date window The handset is a white Soxa one for Miyota movements that I have partly painted in matte black to make it look as close as possible to an original "sharkhunter" handset The future owner wanted all that look "like it had been lost in deep water for years" ... I've made my best to match that description and we are both pretty happy with the final result ...
  22. Some news about my "now glossy" Doxa dials in progress ... I have 5 dials on my bench those days ... 3 gens specs for ETA movements and 2 for NH35 The dials for ETA are still waiting for varnish finsih but here are the 2 for NH35 ... Sorry for the bad pics ... I'll make better shoots when finished SUB 300 T Professional "no logo" ... waiting for lume work SUB 300 T "Blacklung" ... I still have to print the yellow dot and put the "Blacklung" logo on
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