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Hi all Firstly sorry for all of you that have probably seen this model of watch a million times and there's nothing new here for you, but every day there is new guys n girls joining our community who havn't, hopefully someone will gain some sort of knowledge through this thread like i did 3 months ago. I thought i would share my build of my planet ocean 45mm from the start. Alot of us these days are seeing the dreaded planet ocean stripped crown or tube threads or some sort of keyless works issue like i did when i first received my planet ocean 42mm, so what i did like most of us who have never stripped a watch or wouldn't have the bottle or patients to strip a watch is send it back to the dealer, in most cases this is on the other side of the world and is going to take possibly another 2 weeks!!!!!! so off it went my 42mm planet ocean back to a trusted dealer who i might just add has been amazing every time i have purchased a watch from him. luckily for me i managed to change the watch with the dealer and i requested a 45mm upo.... great now it's on its way to me...10 days later it arrives I pull the crown out and..............................it wont set the time or date!! so after hours of searching the forum and speaking to some long time members between us we worked out it was a keyless works issue. so do i send it back and wait another 3 week(2 journeys there and back) or do i bite the bullet and fix it? you guessed i ordered a tool kit from offshore at watchbitz.com which is amazing and started stripping it down. heres my link to the keyless works repair if you need any help with it. http://www.rwg.cc/to...__fromsearch__1 so now its working again i wore it a few times and cut a long story short ended up taking my watch apart about 4 times until i eventually found a broken part in the keyless works which all along was broken and i didn't realize!! below is a picture of the part which was broken, as you can see on the left the little post is snapped off which holds the setting cog next to it. every time i put my keyless back together i thought you put the post in the hole and then put the setting cog on the post, i did think every time that is a very poor design but carried on anyway.it only became aparent there was an issue when i spoke to a few members and they pointed it out. thanks again guys. so while i was planning on stripping my watch again i decided i would buy all the new keyless works parts and cogs from http://www.cousins.co.uk so i shouldnt get the same issues in the near future. yes and you can see from the pictures i thought i would grab a couple of new spring bars for my strap incase i broke one...i thought i ordered 4 but i got 100 !!! so if anyone needs a spring bar or two let me know i'm sure i have a few spare whilst i was taking my watch apart again i decided to upgrade to a gen crown and tube as i had previously seen so many posts and topics about the subject. heres a couple of pics of the parts if anyone needed the part numbers. and heres a couple of before pics of the crown well i found a few thread on replacing the tube on the internet and thought that sounds pretty simple. the only worry is you have to get the old tube out of the case without damaging it, it was a bit worrying as once you start theres no turning back!!! not good when it's your favourite watch which you've only had a couple of weeks and costs you a few hundred pounds, i mean come on you wouldn't buy a £300 tv and take it apart in the first 2 weeks! anyway heres a few pics firstly strip out the case back,dial, movement, take strap off and wrap in electrical tape to ensure its safe from pointy screw drivers and pliers!!!! Then remove the stock crown,now i started off trying to remove this with a pair of small needle nose pliers as shown in picture but got to a point where i couldn't get the tube out so i used my made shift chisel and hammer and simple knocked it out, just take your time and try not to damage the case or crystal.once its out then just file the inside hole to clean up edges not to make hole any bigger as the gen tube is smaller than the rep tube. now thats done i simply cleaned up the hole and mixed up some chemical metal and put a small amount in the hole and on the thread of the gen tube as pointed out with the toothpick. Then i insulated one side of the watch and one side of my g clamp to protect the watch case and tube. clamp it up and leave it for at least 24 hours. whilst that was drying i took a couple of comparison pictures of the gen and rep crown and you can also notice in the picture with the stem fitted how much more sturdy it is, as the stem in the rep crown is very floppy and lose. rep crown on the left and gen on the right. this is the end result of the gen crown/tube install now that was all back together i started enjoying my watch and actually wearing it and not using it as an experiment on how to fix something i don't know the first thing about ! Then came my next problem,during the many dismantles of my watch i managed to slightly damage the dial and scratch the hands from removing the hands to many times, mainly from trying to set up hands for date change at midnight, which i can say after lots of attempts my watch now flips date at 11:58 so i'm pretty happy with that, any way the dial and hands wasn't majorly noticable but i could see it, none of my freinds noticed but it bugged me. so luckily i met a new member on rwg who sorted me out a gen dial at an amazing price! thanks again buddy your an absolute legend! so now i've got the gen dial but due to its radioactive lume it has i had to invest in gen hands as it would look completely out of place. so thats what ive been doing today.fitting dial and hands. onto the pics. one last before pic with white numbers firstly out with the old heres a couple of comparison shots of rep and gen dial, rep with white numbers and gen with orange. to me the only obvious difference is the date window which looks amazing on the gen and the gen dial is more gloss finished and the rep dial being more matte finish.if you clean the rep dial with a polishing cloth it leaves marks whereas on the gen it cleans it up a treat. and one other difference being the dial feet, these are in the same place as the rep but are too short for the dial feet clamps on the movement,so all i did was put a couple of small blobs of super glue on the movement clamp to hold it whilst i fitted the hands.just enough so that it would be easily removed if need be. the lettering looks pretty spot on,great rep its just mainly the lume that lets it down. I apologize in advance for the next photos as my camera was playing up today and some pictures are not great, oh and the dust factor!!! Right onto the hand install,the easiest way to do this i found is to use rodico putty/blue tac to hold hands and then push on with hand tool. also make sure when you fit hands there is a good gap between the hands so that they don't touch each other or the dial,logo or hour markers because this with jam them up or damage them. heres a few comparison pics of the gen vs rep hands, again the rep hands are very good,they look pretty much spot on again the only big tell is the lume strength which isn't a major issue if your not fussed about it. Here we have the gen on right and rep on left. sorry about the seconds hand pic really hard to get both points in focus,even though the pics don't show it the gen orange tip really is alot brighter than it looks, i just didnt get a great picture. now thats all done onto the finished article and you can see how the radioactive lume wants to get shining in the next picture,this was just from working on the dial today in the light. And finally the lume shot i also got myself some dry chain lube in the week and cleaned and lubed my strap.which has made it feel amazingly smooth and silk like feel,a must mod to anyone with a stainless strap,i then went over it with a bit of scotch brite to polish out any scratches. heres a couple more shots And there we have it. hope you enjoyed my thread as much as i did building this watch.I must want to say a Hugh thanks to every one who has helped me with information or parts,I couldn't have got this far with out you or rwg. thanks for looking, and now onto the next project my upo 45 beater! Ryan

It seems like all the newer cars have automatic temperature control. I've been in a lot of cars where it doesn't work so well. However, mine is not one of those. My car's auto setting works perfectly. I hit auto and set the temp in my zone and i don't have to think about it at all. It does an outstanding job of regulating the temperature, humidity and airflow perfectly. But then my wife gets in the car, and cannot seem to leave well enough alone. She instantly takes manual control and manually sets the fan speed, temperature, AC, etc. It drives me nuts! Her car is one of those cars that doesn't work very well, but I keep telling her that mine works great, please leave it alone. I tell her if she's hot or cold, adjust the temp [censored] for her side and let the car do the work. But of course, she cannot do this. This morning we're driving and the windows start to fog up, I look down and she has the auto turned off and the AC is off. Then she asks me "why are your windows fogging up, I've never seen them do that before?" To which I reply "because you seem to think you are smarter than my car and won't let it do its job of maintaining the correct settings. Just let it do its job!" Anyway, I just had to vent. Does anyone else have this problem? P.S. She also hates using the bluetooth speakerphone in the car. She'd rather drive with one hand holding the phone to her ear. (The speaker and mic work perfectly as well). I love her, but she's insane...

Mountain hiking with my Explorer I today. Fantastic weather, Ice cold!!

I once had a Nav-B Chrono-II which was a very solid & well made watch. I got it because it looked like a mix of IWC 3717 and 5002, with gen quality and an ETA movt. The standard AR was crap to be honest, nowhere near as good as the sales pics. I modded it with Taka AR and it looked amazing. However, the 44mm case lugs sat too high on my wrist and wasn't very comfortable, the butterfly deployant wasn't comfy either, as it was digging in. I had to use an IWC tang buckle to continue to use the Pilot style strap. So, in a nutshell, I would've kept it if it hadn't been so clunky to wear.

This is a well known flaw in a woman's operating system.

Awesome watch and movement , phenomenal pictures dude , those really are top notch.

In addition, I don't accept previously worked on watches, no matter who did the work, without prior approval. In the case of certain modders, I won't go near any watch they have touched. And I only accept previously worked on watches with the understanding from the customer that a pre-work inspection will be done and all issues noted - BEFORE - any work is undertaken, and I retain the right to refuse to do any work if the inspection indicates serious issues. My experience shows an almost total lack of the very basic skills with many so called experts and modders (like blowing the dust off the movement and caseback), most have no idea of what is expected in terms of watchmaking quality, skill, care, ability, and workmanship standards. This is nothing new, it's been like this as long as the forum has existed...however if you read the forum carefully, all the information you need to make an informed decision is here. I have literally hundered's of pictures that serve as examples of the garbage that these people do, a real shame. And that, is all I will say about this topic.

I feel sorry for you buddy, but that watch is not going to cut it. the rehaut is woooky and the wall is not wide enough, the factories may think thaty we are stupid and desperrate. seriously return it and get something else.

The 2824's are missing too many parts unless you've got a non date use for it. Also seems to be missing the wheel for the hour hand.

Wife snoring, dog farting, music to some perhaps. I was just listening to Pink Floyd, "The Wall", bought the album when it first came out in 1980 and just got the CD to remind me of a different time, my youth. Funny how music and certain aromas can transport you back as effectively as any time machine might. Life is good indeed.