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It’s not a KOTRT theme without a Group shot:

I’ve just wrapped up (for now) another one of my ongoing projects - a 1680 Red Submariner. Inspired by some of the mid-70’s versions I’ve seen on Chrono24, etc I imagine this was a fairly well care-for watch serviced several times with a replacement, service dial and insert. Case isn’t too beat up and isn’t over-polished. The specs on the project: - JK Factory Case, Caseback, 93250 Bracelet, Open 6/9 Datewheel and Dial (purchased from TrustyTime) - Clark’s 25-127 Crystal - WSO Bezel Assembly - Athaya 702 Tube and Crown - WSO 580 Endlinks - Sellita SW-200-1 Movement - Raffle’s Time Hand Set I relumed the hand set, pearl, and dial to match. Pearl was lumed then finished with clear coat of binder for durability and gloss. Like my other vintage project, I went for a vintage tone lume a high-intensity, green glow. Insert has been very lightly bleached, just enough to eliminate the gloss finish. Crown guards have been squared off in the front, case was lightly aged via a tumble in a bag of screws, all exposed edges were eased, and case was repolished. Athaya tube installed with Blue Loctite and tube hole countersunk to ensure tight fit of crown when screwed down. SW200-1 was purchased from a fellow member but needed the keyless works to be repaired. I repaired the keyless works then installed H5 second wheel, minute cannon, and hour cannon along with a date wheel from an ETA2836-2. Dial was fitted with a slightly thicker dial spacer. This modification allowed me to fit the slimmer SW200-1 into a case designed for an ETA2836-2 while maintaining stem alignment. Everything has been installed as friction fit, gaskets sealed and siliconed. Bracelet has been minimally aged. Sometime in the future I will likely swap out the DW Overlay and Dial for better quality. Working with a Ruby’s Watch dial on my 1675 project, the quality difference is super obvious. I should also get around to doing a water resistance test - I’d like to know how water resistant I’ve built this. I honestly worry the most about the crown tube since I countersunk the top edge but otherwise feel good about things. Here’s some pics, thanks for looking!

I just harvested a Swiss 2836-2 based 3135 clone looks great for the 16200 build

16233 Nice! That would be the next build I think the total cost is around $325 so it’s a cheapie nice beater I think i will upgrade it with a gen 2836-2 in the future

Nice! Yeah, the newer DJ 41 is too big for my small wrist, and I love vintage watches. They are the unique watches you can find, and probably the best! I don't care if people said they out-dated! The newer model just not quite as good as the old one. Here is the picture of my watch:

"...buying a VN caseback probably will cost more than your JKF cost. There's probably other improvements that you could make to improve your JKF that would give you more bang for the buck than changing out the caseback." "The caseback does seem to be an odd area of the watch to spend serious money on." Agree. Many of the cartel submariner/SD casebacks are made for cases with the gasket mounted in a groove in the case. This is correct for a 1665 but all genuine spec 5512/13, 1680 casebacks have the gasket mounted in a groove in the caseback. All six (6) of my Raffles submariner type casebacks have 30.43 to 30.45mm OD threads (measured with a precision digital caliper) and are made for cases with gaskets mounted in the case. All are 35.45mm OD or very close. Afaik the OD of a genuine 1665 CB is 36.9mm, do not know the thread size, probably the same but it's a guess. The CB gasket size is 32.5mm x 1.0mm, same as 5512/13, 1680, 1655, 1675 (oem spec 1655/1675 case gaskets are mounted in the case). Raffles site shows the thread size to be 30.3mm on their submariner type casebacks (30.3mm ??, all mine are 30.43 to 30.45mm). Almost all Raffles casebacks = cartel type parts. I used 'almost' as a disclaimer because I only have six. The main outer difference between oem spec casebacks and most cartel casebacks is the cartel casebacks are made for cases with the gasket mounted in the case and are a little thinner around the outer edge than oem spec submariner/SD casebacks. The outer profile can vary from close to oem to not so close.

That would be correct. Different subdial spacing.