cougaree

I'm thinking you just make it thin enough, then sand it down after it cures. My other idea is buying 28 gauge steel wire (which is widely available in the picture framing stores, it's 0.1mm in diameter) and somehow glue/solder it around the case.

Yeah the SA hype... even I was thinking about one because I actually like SA dials more than Skyland... but I think it's just too big. And it has nothing to do with wrist size or overall size of the wearer... there is a limit for everything and I think 45mm is the limit for a watch to be balanced and good looking. Well, so far I haven't seen anything that would prove me wrong (at least from this higly subjective point of view).

46mm SOH is actually pretty decent. 47mm Fiddy / RXW is pretty decent also IMO. I think what "saves" them from being simply large is the fact they are thinner (i.e. thinner than SA). I see your point though.

Same one for two days now... I love it!

OH dear Cougaree.... different colored pretty underwear is for when the pants come down

Agreed on the feeling of incomplete and as a general rule, or rather IMO, hands are normally lumed slightly brighter than the dial...That's the way i do it anyway

That's true. Forgot about that part, pants do come down.

I've never been obsessed with the lume, either.

I'd rather take very well applied hour markers and zero lume than a torch that has half-assed and sloppy lume application. With reps you can rarely get both.

I agree with you there, BT. I'd rather to keep the perfectly applied wear lume than bad lume jobs anyday!

I use to believe the same thing, until I becomes more critical about watches. If you just wear the watch as it is, right out of the box, then you will be fine without having the watch lumed, but if you ever have your watch modded or movement serviced, without reluming your weak rep lume seems the job is not completely done. It's kind of like wearing underwears. Why wear underwear if you also have to wear pants? Why buy different color underwears if no one can see them? Most of us do because free balling feels... something is missing and because ourselves know how pretty our own underwears are without needing to show to others.

I think we all have something that drive us nuts. Perhaps this is the price to pay for being true watch collectors/makers/perfectionist. One other thing especially bothers me is that a watch that has stronger lume on the dial than the hands. In this case, I will have to get the hands relumed so it's at very least equal or brighter than the dial lume.

When you are done changing the case, please share some pictures with us! BCE is simply one of favorite watches all time!

I wonder if you can rebuilt the case so it takes gen bezel better. I've never done this, but what do you think about using FastSteel which is widely available in your home improvement stores. The stuff takes 4-6 minutes to harden 60 minutes to cure. I wonder if you are real fast, mix up that stuff, and then roll it into a small cylindrical shape and have it wrap around the case and shape it the way you want before it cures...

WOW! Those are SERIOUSLY SICK, Z is the man!!!

Congrats

Yep, you know it

Thanks Red and Gtanak! Gtanak is right. It's been thru Zigmeister's magic hands. The lume glows very brightly as well.

The SOSF gen dial was certainly a catch! There was another sold couple weeks later on the bay, but after that I haven't seen one since. When I won it, I felt like winning the lotto also. It's definitely worth it.

Looks like exelonman regrets about selling his SOH v2 to me. I can completely understand. SOH v2 in real life is pretty awesome. In the next several months, I want to swap out the asian clone movement with a gen ETA 2824-2 one, lume the dial and hands. The AR on the crystal is very nice, but I think it would be even better with Chief's AR job... but so far I have no plan of doing this. Yes, I'm planning on getting a decent mesh bracelet for this watch. My wife said this particular watch will only look good with something silver. Since she is quite an artist in the family, I will follow her advice.

For Skyland I prefer bracelet too, but I currently don't have one. That, I will wait. Maybe someday I will get one...

Sorry to hear that you are upset about this. Unfortunately, we can only hope people could get out of their way a little bit for the goodness of others. However, I encourage you not to lose hope of our board and its members as there are still few (at very least) who would know what proper ways of doing things are.

This is the latest info I got. Speaking of which, I will need to modify my sales ad.

The swiss fish dial is measured 31mm in diameter. I was informed that the asian fish's dial is larger.

Wow! Nice watches! Very Jealous!

Nice wristies too!

Thanks! I'm pretty much set for a while. Except I would really like to put a gen Swiss 7750 in SOHC v2 that I always wanted. Some day... not today...

Now, I have another franken idea...

Since I was told that Asian fish had smaller dials... does anyone know how small it is? My rep swiss fish dial is measured 31mm in diameter. What I'm trying to say is that there are couple Breitling WEMPE dials on the bay that's measured 29.4mm. I wonder I can put one of those into an Asian fish... any thoughts?

http://cgi.ebay.com/Breitling-2000s-Mens-WEMPE-1000m-Divers-Dial-New-OldS-/380238799303?cmd=ViewItem&pt=Wristwatches&hash=item5887ffa1c7

By the way, this was the seller who once sold a gen blue SOSF dial. I highly doubt he has more.

I have exactly what you have on your sa on my SOH v2. It's actually pretty good quality. It would look very nice on my Skyland v3. I also agree with Mickey that if I can get it, it's better to have the real croc.

What do you think those BOB straps for Breitling?

I hear you man. I've been thinking about getting a gen strap, but I also kind of like the look of the rep bracelet. How is the quality of the rep bracelet anyway?

Thanks BT! Just took these shots... much better.

Thanks for that...

here's my fish duo saying hi...

Hi:)

More light.

Try natural lighting outside... a balcony or something... it gives excellent results.

Ok, I will give it another shot later this afternoon. Thanks for the advice! It will be on my wrist with a gen Pro I bracelet

Beautiful pieces you got in there. Where did you source the fish gen dial? If you don't mind me asking.

The gen dials on the fish are amazing and its a big tell to the rep, the rep dial doesn't get anywhere close to the gen.

You are the third person ask about this. The fish dials are truly hard to find. Few months ago, there were two for auction on the bay. This one and a blue one, from two different sellers. This one came from a seller in Switzerland. The blue one were from Australia. There might be someone on this board who bought the blue one, but I'm not so sure. Keep an eye on the bay, that's what I would suggest. It can take days or years for the next one to show up. Good luck!

Thanks guys! Here are couple more. I wish I have BT's photo skills because they just simply look much better in real life. Especially for the SOSF, I don't know how I can capture that something makes it so special. Last pic is a quick lume shot, they could be brighter but I didn't really charge it.

Enjoy and have a great day!

Zigmeister does perfect job! This may be an understatement.

I got my babies back and they are looking great!

Franken BCE v3 - gen bezel, gen dial, relumed hands

Franken SOSF v1 - gen dial, pearl relume, gen swiss movement

Skyland v3 - dial, hands and pearl reluming, lume dot fix, movement service.

The results are great! The best one is the Franken SOSF. The stock AR is amazing, but looks even better with gen dial. The dial on BCE v3 is awesome, however the fitting of the gen bezel to the case is just ok (the grove for bezel spring on the case is slightly wider than I want, so the bezel is not pushed against the case tightly). The gen bezel fitting on my TT BCE v2 is much better. Word of advice, if you want to fit a gen bezel, get a v2 that has asian date font. Apparently, there are some differences between BCE v2 and v3 other than the upgraded fonts.

If you can get a replacement insert, get a replacement insert. Otherwise, just live as it is. It doesn't bother me much. Since these bezels are painted, over the course of owning the watch, there will be more scratches on this bezel, thus I won't really worry about it if I were you. Any attempt fixing it may make it worse, and that would bother me.

Well, if the date wheel from the asian clone doesn't fit an ETA, then I will be in trouble because the generic ETA font is different from Breitling's