Pugwash

On the upside, I fixed both of Mrs Pugwash's watches yesterday. She's so happy she can wear her Radiomir and Crazy Hours now. I'm so happy that neither movement beat me. Anyway, have you shown Her Indoors the Chanel j12? She's bound to 'settle' for one of those.

I know what you're saying and I'm saying you CAN fit the new Asian 7750 movement's hands on a genuine Swiss 7750 if you know what you're doing. The Zigmeister does it all the time.

The fact that he'd need to give TTK a delivery address would suffice.

I don't get it. The unreliability is due to moving the seconds from 9 to 6. The Venus copy is the same as the 7750 and would need to be made as unreliable to copy it. Also, the Venus is a handwind and the 7750 is an Auto. Unless you're talking about the old Newman Daytonas that are already available from every dealer with the Venus in them.

That's the Froglish going on. I don't lume my Vintages. What I was saying is that there is a valid debate, not a definitive answer.

It has been made clear where the hobby stands on that. We are happy to take one in the ass every now and then rather than offend our dealers. Let's be honest, we had our opportunity, twice. We, as a community, decided we didn't care.

Yup, but Pix meant the first charge lasts 25 years to Superlume's hours.

Reading back, I forgot to say "great post". Great post! It's good to have something this complete.

Tritium paint is mostly no longer used, to the best of my knowledge, but you can still get new watches with it. Also, some watches, like the GST Chrono, are marked Tritium even though they are Luminova as the T SWISS text is on the chapter ring, not the dial, and the watches were made during IWCs transition from Tritium to Lume. It's tricky to say who has tritium paint as when manufacturers run out, they can't get replacements. IWC ran out around 2001-2001, for instance. However, I saw some brand new Fortis watches in Thailand with Tritium paint dials. My Fortis is second-hand so I can't tell you when it was made.

The debate is over whether or not your rep is a rep of back then or of now. I'd relume my 1665/1680.

Tritium is a radioactive form of Hydrogen. Rather than bore you with the science, I'll gloss over it in a way that would make both your chemistry teacher and physics teacher blanch with disgust. However, your biology teacher will put a pencil in her mouth and look on longingly over her glasses because she's a dirty minx! Sorry, I got sidetracked there. Tritium replaced the bone-meltingly lethal Radium as paint on watch dials and is the T in T SWISS MADE T, the circled T on Military dials and the T in T < 25. It is used in two types of modern watch dials, with paint and with tubes. Oh, and it's a WMD. No, I'm not joking, it's the kind of thing countries get invaded for not having. While it's replaced in more modern thermonuclear devices with Lithium Deuteride, it can still be used by developing nations to make sure their neighbours are less developing than them. Still, the radiation it gives off is rather gutless and limp-wristed. The crystal of a watch, even an acrylic crystal, blocks the harmful rads, meaning you'll not be gaining superpowers unless you eat your watch dials raw. Anyway, back to watches. Being scarily atomic means it has a half-life, in this case one of 12 years - as in it decays to half its radioactivity every 12 years. Yes, this means a 1971 Rolex has 8 times less lume than it started out with, making a Superlume relume rather inaccurate looking. Tubes, you say? Ah yes, Tritium gas is put in tiny glass tubes lined with fluorescent paint. These tubes are glued onto hands and dials and glow, whether you want them to or not, throughout their life, until they decay to nothingness. No charging needed, open the watchbox and there it is, glowing away. So, to further the lesson and wrap it up so I can see what the Biology teacher has on her lesson-plan today, here are two pictures from my collection, the first of a watch with tritium tubes, the second with tritium paint. Drop, 'em, blossom! For further reading, try http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tritium and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-powered_lighting

If we're guessing, I'd guess no.

Old: New:

Be aware that this is a Seagull ST18 and spares are not the same as the Venus. The Seagull may be a copy, but it's not 100% parts compatible.

For me, I had to either duct tape a tuna can to my wrist or wear this. Easy choice as I didn't have any tinned tuna around.

You can do it yourself if you follow my tutorial. If not, The Zigmeister can do it for you, but he's in Canada.

An impressive haul. You must have got a lot out of your system by now, so I hereby recommend a shift in purchasing. Slow down and get better quality. I see you're aiming at a DSN Fidsworth, which is the right direction. Damn, it's good having you here as at my most excessive, I wasn't as bad. Now I can point to you and say "See? I wasn't that bad" next time Mrs Pugwash rolls her eyes at me.

It's the uPO factory, so yes, I have high hopes.

I have a $20 standing bet it'll be under $300 within the first week of release, so I believe so.

It's a conversion of an HTML document I made a while ago, but people didn't seem to be able to find that, so I forumised it.

Bell and Ross make some imposing watches and the duff Asian movement they use shouldn't crap out in the first few weeks. I find the Fiddy is a good choice for imposing, but when it comes right down to it, you can't beat a Panerai 187. It's like duct taping a can of tuna to your wrist, only with steampunk styling.

Well, different size (42mm, no, not the same as the 44mm Cousteau), different caseback, different strap ... Oh, and different manufacturer. This isn't from the Cousteau/HBB/SFSO builder.

True. However, the Aquatimer Chrono is being released by a different 'factory'.