txcollector

in my experience only people that deal with reps tend to try to call out others. Most gen owners are oblivious and the rest can only notice you are wearing some sort of watch.

again you are missing the point. It reminds me of child molesters that offer candy to kids to lure them into their vans: "but I was just offering candy, nothing against the law with that". Most of us with lots of experience in this hobby can spot a mile away when this things start to go south: 1) makes a splash with great offers at great prices 2) starts to sneak in cheap parts but who would know since he has (1), 3) introduces a shilling persona (in this case G.S.W.) to bash competitors and boost his builds, 4) start scamming people and membership starts crying why the admins did not prevent this. Once you see the plot many times you don't have to watch the movie to know the ending.

well said.

Agree, and the sad part is the ending is always the same.

why? that's fugly

Where do I start? 1) Crown in the right misaligned position. With the AP ROO the chrono module sits on top of the movement hence the chrono pushers and the crown should not align. Only gens and well built franken achieve that. 2) Due to (1) the DW is sunken 3) The DW font 4) DW distance from the tachy ring 5) Case thickness 6) Case back thickness 7) Case back engraving

Gen or a very well built franken. Most likely gen

well the problem is most 1950 case models are display case back and many are in house complications (3 and 8 days, GMT, etc.). Like you mentioned the 312 and 320 are not really close. It's unlikely you will find any good replication of the auto in house movements any time soon. The 312 would be your best bet for now. The 127 and 217 are not flawless but good reps for the money. The Noob 243 is excellent (with an impressive well built case).

I've done 9 (ALWAYS carry on) domestically and international. In some airports the security guy just wants to see what's in the box. I open, they say wow nice, and I go on my merry way.

Be prepared to mess up and throw away the watch. Buy a cheap replica (~$100) and some tools to start playing with it. There are online watchmaker courses out there to help with the basics too. Some if not all the tasks require a lot of patience and a firm hand. Those are skills you gain with practice. Like Andy said, start small. The Portuguese (based on the A7750) is not a good starting point.

I think the worst part was to attack another member's work with lies just to make his builds look better (and yes, I agree with Wolf that his builds were stretching the truth and were heading to a bad outcome). Ban was very appropriate. Good job admin team.

I bet this quote came from Josh or Andrew since they have a beef with the Noob factory You make it sound almost like counterfeiting luxury items is an honest business.

Funny, folks complaining because rep factories decided to do proper QA and not sell watches with defective dials. In the past we would be happy to get defective watches so we could try and mod them. People are really getting spoiled.

That's a rep. Have you reported?

I'd definitely go with the IWC 371401 Portuguese. It's a very classy watch and very distinctive. It has the right amount of gold (hands and indicies) for me. Pictures really don't do justice to this one;

one thing is for sure, you don't get these gray market pieces out of some rep website.

This is good distinction. The rep market is designed to build pieces that cost 10% of less of the original. The gray market deals with prices that range from 40-50% of the gen. The materials, suppliers, etc are all chosen with the intent to fool even ADs (that goes for papers, etc. and the use of OOR to avoid issues with serial number databases). The base cost of a rep should be in the low hundreds and these gray market watches start at $1000 in parts and labor. Those are still not official products and enjoy no warranty from the manufacturer but if you build a Cartier Santos with gen like parts and the right stamped movement Cartier will take your $800 and do the service. They wouldn't do it with the current batch of reps.

This. We usually don't get to see those. A number of OOR serials are made this way.

Those came out of that gray market process but they were not perfect enough that's why they went to the dealers. BTW: those were not made with gen parts.

There's a regulation to what can be called Swiss Made. Swiss Made Defined by Law Swiss watch A watch is considered Swiss, according to the Swiss law if: its movement is Swiss and, its movement is cased up in Switzerland and; the manufacturer carries out the final inspection in Switzerland Swiss watch movement A watch movement is considered Swiss if: the movement has been assembled in Switzerland and, the movement has been inspected by the manufacturer in Switzerland and; the components of Swiss manufacture account for at least 50 percent of the total value, without taking into account the cost of assembly. If a watch movement is intended for export and will not be cased-up in Switzerland, but it otherwise meets the criteria to be considered a Swiss movement, the watch may say "Swiss Movement" but it may not say Swiss Made on the watch case or dial.

there are super reps in the gray market that are made with higher quality processes and cost 2-5x more than regular reps. They use the same Swiss AR processes (done in China), case materials, etc.. It's not impossible to do just very expensive but if you are replicating a $10-25K watch, $1K is a small investment. These gray market watches go for 40-50% of the current market price of the original. Most of the parts are manufactured in China but I don't believe they are assembled there. It's too risky. Also you can't just go online and buy one. You need to have the right contacts to deal with them and they only sell lots of 10 or more.

I think the crystal needs some single AR. The crystal hides the beautiful dial. Not sure where to get it done though.

Apparently this kind of tactic works. The funny part is being a rep there's always some sort of flaw they can claim similar issues. The V3 is orders of magnitude better than the V2 and I agree with you, the H factory has never produced an ROO and give the complexity of the case construction I'm not holding my breath for a good V4. I'm quite happy with my v3. The Zigmeister can always get the lume correct and I may go to Uwe to redo the AR on the cyclops.

V3 is far superior to the V2. Here are a few differences: Crystal - V3 comes with clear AR, V2 does not Cyclops - V3 comes with blue AR (not great) but the V2 is so reflective you can't see the date. DW cut out on the dial - V3 is gen like, V2 is too small Rotating bezel - V3 has the right font size and comes with lume. V2 font is too large, unlumed Caseback - V3 close to the gen V2 pattern incorrect Strap - V3 gen like with the right rough texture, V2 is smooth (incorrect) and stiffer. Rubber on the crown better on V3 Overall the V3 is much better. Well worth the wait. A relumed V2 doesn't come close.

There are no tells from the pictures. It looks gen but the price is too high for a 90% (which with all those AR scratches it's more like 80%) without box and papers.