alligoat

E, check out CousinsUK- they have two sizes for the 116 crystal- ID on both is 28.9mm but OD is 30.0 on the smaller one and 30.2 on the larger one. but cyclops position is different. Might want to check their Rolex cyclops page in their catalog.

Flex, this gen 16800 gets the most wrist time, it's on my wrist today and was also there yesterday It's an 8.1mil SN with a recent tritium dial replacement. I got it for a good price and bought it as a 'beater'. Second in terms of wrist time is the relumed franken noob (it does the dirty work) and third is the matte dial gen. I prefer not to tear up the matte dial gen.

The gen on the left no longer glows, but the relumed gen dial on the right glows like a champ The watch on the right is a noob case w/ drilled lugholes, gen dial relumed by Ziggy, old style DW, gen crown and tube and a gen 93150 w/ 593 ends. I wear it more than the gen. It's WR and a great beater. The gen dial fit in the noob case just fine. This all happened after Tribal fit a gen dial in a noob, or was it Stephane... Anyway, I do think the noob case is great for a 16800 rep and relumed dials are the cat's meow.

Only drawback is there's no bezel to go with it.

Looks great. I could never argue with a relume in a case like this and a period correct bracelet is de rigeur.

BKLM1234 has the basic TW Best, maybe he'll sell you one w/o the mods. Yes, WM9 is gone, but the PT WM9 case was an early case, v1.5, which came from TW. George's WM9 v2 and v3 were improvements on the V1 and v1.5 and are only around on a resale basis.

Breguet Type XX w/ the Valjoux 23 movement, circa 1970.

Chrono pushers are definitely a weak link. I've broke gen and rep pushers alike and w/o much effort and sometimes didn't even know when I did it. After 8 months, it's probably a little late to be expecting Josh to warranty it. It can be repaired by a watchsmith, possibly. If it matches up w/ some of the pushers that Ofrei sells, it would be an easy fix. First order of business is to uncase the movement and then remove what's left of the pusher and measure it w/ some calipers. It cost me $120 to have a pusher replaced on my O&W Mark III. Good luck

Heck, I just put a WM pearl in the noob insert and it worked fine- just had to enlarge the pearl hole a little bit w/ an x-acto knife and glued the pearl in. When you get a JO insert, you have to file the edge to make it fit in the noob bezel and it helps to file the backside so it will sit lower in the bezel also. The JO insert has the old style 4 in 40 which is fine for an older sub, but the noob insert has the correct triangular 4 for a modern late model sub.

M, it's the Type XX that I was after- c. 1970 w/ a V23 movement. Bidding didn't go up much from the opening bid, so I guess I was lucky... http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=160615407662&ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT

Got a new watch this week, actually it's an old watch- 40 years old

So do I, then I go back and double click on the link again and get the specific watch. I agree with Teejay- get the bracelet and then order a $20 nato strap.

this is for any of the lurkers- houston gtg- saturday july 23rd...

Paul's end links are three pieces, it just doesn't show in the pic. His bracelet is going to be the same as all the others, but I did swap a full gold YM oyster bracelet on my watch to give it a different look- I'm just not a Presidental type of guy. I've never heard of sewatches. It's up to you if you want to take a chance. The thinking around here is stick with the trusted guys. You may have to become a supporter to gain access to the dealers on this forum.

Looking good M. That lizard looks nice. But I thought the 16014 case took a T135, not a 114 (which would fit a 1600 case, I believe).

LOL, I didn't pay attention to the crystal- the sloped crystal with the cyclops. I had a bxxxx of a time getting the bezel off. Finally ended up using a diffrent case- made it into a big crown GMT, sure wish it was WR

Nice JB. Finally a 1675 without the Date after Oyster Perpetual! And I'm partial to the black bezel myself, good job and do tell us more soon.

You can find gen inserts on ebay sometimes- you have to know what you're looking for and expect to pay between $75 and $100 or more. Also, Vintage Rolex Market and the Rolex Market at the Rolex Forum are good places to look. Yes, it'll fit, but it might need to be modded slightly or glued in. @ Eiderdaus, please don't copy people's original post, especially when it has alot of pictures. We can all read the original post, it eats up bandwidth which the forum pays for and it's not necessary.

T-19 or T-39 work since the 1680, 5513 and 1665 all have the same bezel and retention ring.

I agree with Bytor, it's not a great rep and it certainly doesn't look like the early noobfactory YMs. But for $118, it's not terrible, it's an economy rep. The one thing about the rep market is that it's in a constant state of change. And with the demise of WM9, there's really no great YM rep out there at this point that I know of. But you can certainly try Josh's rep and take your chances- it could easliy turn out better than the pictures- Josh's photography isn't the greatest either. Maybe some others are more up on the YM scene and will chime in. I own a couple, a white dial black markers ss beater ($100) and a full gold white dial black markers asian 21j ($150). They're both shirt sleeve reps- they look good from a distance. Good luck.

BK never fails to amaze me. He just keeps turning out great subs. I remember the early noobs which he modded to a high level. That was 4-5 years ago. Then the WM9 came along and now we're onto the TW Best. The only thing I'd do to this present model is install a gen insert. Granted these watches aren't cheap, but the level of quality is superb. And 82KUBA, given the fact that they copy the gen construction so well, I'd figure they're WR for swimming, etc. But it's always a good idea to get it tested first by a watchmaker.

1,500 x $200 = $300,000. Cost would be more like 1500 x $50 = $75,000. Almost $1million! Media hype/Customs hype

This is true, but I wasn't going to get into a discussion on the differences between the 16550 and the newer 16570. The older 16550s are tritium dials and there's no decent rep of that watch either- tritum- Swiss T < 25 -dial and lugholes in the case. Here's a late model gen w/ black hour surrounds, it's a 16570- no lugholes in the case Here's a cream dialed rep w/ lugholes but the dial says 'Swiss Made'- oops, this would be a 16550 but the dial is incorrect

What I'm talking about is the hour marker surrounds. On the Explorer II, the metal around the hour markers should be black, not silver. This is the metal surrounding the luminous material at each hour marker. This is the problem with even the noob factory Explorers- the wrong color metal surrounds. keep looking and maybe you can find one with the correct black surrounds. Maybe Trevor over at RG has them.

I picked up that model 4-5 months ago. Angus was out of the SSDv2 as are most of the other dealers that I know of. This watch is an SSDv2 with the correct SN- Z549117, and I've been happy with it so far. But I modded mine. First off, I had jmb drill the lugholes and bracelet for 2mm springbars. When I got the watch back I realized that it was a solid mid link bracelet, the earlier SSDs had the correct hollow mid link bracelet, but things are always changing over in China. Also, the bracelet has polished sides, but I'll brush those out some day. The Rolex emblem on the clasp sucks, but for now I'm just wearing it. I might swap in a noob bracelet at some point. Mine came with the asian 2836 which was working fine, but I swapped in a swiss 2836 which came out of an old Paul's DRSD. The cool thing about the movement was that it has a silver datewheel w/ open 6's and 9's. I've seen early 16800s which had the silver DW, kind of a carry over from the old 1680s, so I figured it would work for my 16660 which is what I'm trying to build. This week I installed a matte dial from Yuki. I'll probably get the dial and hands relumed- to a less yellow color, install a gen bezel insert, trim the cgs some more and install a gen crown and tube. But it's a work in progress so for right now I'm just enjoying the watch. I don't know if it's WR, but I'll get it tested at some point. I'll probably epoxy the HE valve as a safety precaution anyway.