Pugwash

So, we have Paul doing some crappy advertising in which he posted the wrong prices to get us all salivating (Bait and switch in the true sense of the word) on one side, and on the other, we have trusted sellers like TTK and Jos Nana. People, you can vote with your wallets and your voices. I know where my opinion lies. Bait and Switch: A bait and switch is a form of fraud in which the fraudster lures in customers by advertising a good at an unprofitably low price, then reveals to potential customers that the advertised good is not available but that a substitute good is. The goal of the bait-and-switch is to convince some buyers to purchase the substitute good as a means of avoiding disappointment over not getting the bait, or as a way to recover sunk costs expended to try to obtain the bait. It suggests that the seller will not show the original product or product advertised but instead will demonstrate a more expensive product. Once more jeopardising my chances of winning the superb best post of the month prize.

I'd buy an Aquatimer for $79, right here, right now.

He's started correcting the posts so they're less ambiguous. The IWC ad no longer states $79, it's $79-$249. So, crazy, but not crazy enough to tempt me.

So, is the IWC Aquatimer that's listed at $159 on the site actually $79 as advertised here? Your response to my enquiry email seems to contradict this, merely pointing me at the IWC section of your site. I will wait to see if there is any change on your site over the next few days. If your advert is misleading, however, could you please clear up the ambiguity before we start hounding yuo for false advertising. Edit to say Paul has corrected his advert. It's no longer stating the aquatimer is $79. "This post has been edited by 00-Aspire eshop: Today, 11:55 AM"

I think we're missing the fact that he meant to say from $109 for his Rolexes and from $79 for his IWCs. His unusual grasp of English is all that's making us a little mad.

Funny, I was thinking the exact same thing.

Yet his $79 IWCs are not $79 on his site.

I saw IWCs discounted.

My first IWC GST Chrono was great, then the chrono didn't return to 12 and it got worse and worse. Eventually, the watch just stopped working. The dealer, PT, replaced it and the replacement arrived, but didn't keep good time at all. Rather than bother PT again, I opened it and set the +/- myself, only I took bad advice on what to change and the beat is now off. It's booked in to The Zigmeister's.

Get both.

$79 for an Aquatimer is too cheap. I will buy one if this price is verified. Yes, I will buy from Paul. For that price I can chance it.

Sichuan is selling them for $100 plus shipping. Buy two, get free shipping. Looks like a price war has started and we're the benificiaries.

If he enters, I'll come back with another.

Yay me and Cwai!

Looking through his history, he's showing all the signs of an eBay scammer. First load of bids are for cheap stuff like eBooks and the like with private bidding and sellers who are no longer registered, which gets him a positive rating. Then, he sells loads of lighters, one of which has an unstamped waranty, and he buys a rolex warranty card. Maybe he's about to move into selling rep watches as real? I wouldn't touch the dealer with a barge pole. With my limited knowledge of spanish, the bad review he had was someone calling his lighter [censored] and getting refunded, and the complainer states he didn't get the refund. The lighter may be genuine, but the dealer seems to be a fake.

That's ok. You need to be careful using the "Swiss" distinction in replicas. It's commonly used by scam sites to make something sound better than it is. Here, where we actually care about what goes inside the reps, we talk about specific movements as opposed to blanket terms. You will find no reference to A1+ Swiss replicas here, and no-one will claim their reps were made by an off-shoot of Rolex using back-door surplus parts or swiss technicians. Inseat, you'll find ETA2836, ETA2824, Asian 7750@21, 7750@28, Asian 21j ...

I give you three options and you say "yes, that one" ... ps. Welcome to the forum. Pack an umbrella.

If by swiss you mean "swiss" as in the swiss-vs-asian distinction in replicas, then yes. If you mean "Made in Switzerland" then no. If you mean "Made for a Swiss company" then yes.

"Ah, putain! C'est beau! What ees ze make? Paneuraye? I have ze nevaeur 'eard zis." Yup, it was spotted at work, and the viewer thought it was the prettiest watch he'd ever seen. He'd never heard of Panerai. Today, it's wearing Il Mupetto, like in the pics.

is it someone's birthday?

Of all the watches to replicate, they chose that one. Why, for the love of $DEITY, why?

I bet it costs more than 20€ ...

They have a Gaytona...

I'm glad you think so, as it's aimed at someone with a little less experience than you.

Old Faithful meets The Legend in a stand off battle! Before we get into the pictures, this is not a superbly technical discussion of the two watches, it's merely an opinion and some smashing pictures of two of the most popular watches on the replica scene. I am avoiding history and the like because it's been done by better men than me. I do pictures, not words. Both these watches cost just over $100. In my mind, the pair of them represent the best value for money available to the new (or seasoned) replica collector. The Sub was my first buy, back in Feb and the 111h is my most recent, in ... um, last week. The Rolex was bought from TTK for $120 and is an Asian 21j. The Panerai was $110 plus postage and WU from Silix-Prime and is a chinese copy movement. The strap on the Panerai is a Toscana "Il Mupetto", available from TC Straps for $119. For the price of a single replica watch, you can source this whole package and kick-start any collection. See your favourite dealer for details. Add my Precious Time IWC GST Chrono TiBot and you have the core of my collection. So, The Sub and the 111h. What are the differences? The obvious difference is the size. The Panerai is huge, especially if you've never worn anything bigger than 40mm. When I first got my Sub, a 40mm watch, I thought it was large - very large, in fact. But owning a Panerai has made me see the Sub as normal-sized - the size by which other watches should be measured. Then, obvious time again, the Sub is all steel, and the 111h is steel and leather. One of the advantages of owning a Submariner is that it polishes up really nicely and just looks the business, but the Panerai, with its changeable straps, gives you options and choices. In the morning, you have to decide if you really want options and, if not, the steel banded Rolex wins. If you're fickle though, Officine Panerai's big metal plug gives you so many ways to spend money it's dangerous. On a more technical note, the Rolex Submariner is an automatic watch, meaning it winds itself up as you wear it. The Panerai 111h is a manual-wind, which necessitates a ritual of windings, either upon waking up or just before sleeping. Most 111h owners take the watch off and look in to the viewing panel in the back to see the cogs turn as they wind the watch. Rolex have naver made a display back watch to my knowledge. The Sub tells the date, the PAM doesn't. This isn't a big deal, but the date can be a useful feature. Neither watch tells the day, unlike my IWC GST Chrono, which has proven very useful on some days when I have literally forgotten what day it is. Neither of these watches is accurate. If you're new to mechanical watches, you need to know right here and now that a $20 quartz keeps better time than a $20,000 Rolex. The same holds true for replicas. A few seconds either side each day, you soon learn how accurate your watch is. How easy are these replicas to live with? I'd say that both of them are very easy, but I've not owned the Panerai long enough to see how it fits in to my life. Tomorrow will be the first day I've worn it to work. I'm going to waste at least 5 minutes tomorrow morning deliberating over which strap it gets, and I'm almost certain it'll get noticed. The Sub, however, is very well behaved. No-one notices it and no-one would ever doubt its authenticity.