Nanuq

Easy peasy. Put a leather pad down, get a couple good strong flat blade screwdrivers and one long thin "punch" with a strong needlish tip. Band face down on the pad, push the tip of the thin punch into the gap in the middle link where the short and long folded halves come together right at the corner. Get the tip in there a ways and pry up the long folded half a little. It will look tweaked and twisted. Now get the thin screwdriver in there just a little ways and TWIST it to apply an opening force to the long folded piece. Bingo here she comes up. Keep working it open more and more until the opened flap just comes out over the rod that connects the side links. Do your thing, add links, remove links, whistle Dixie... whatever blows your skirt up. To reassemble slip the long opened flap in over the long connecting rod, and use your flat screwdriver to push the flap down again. You'll get it most of the way by just pressing. To really close that sucker, it gets tricky. I use the thin punch right at the corners of the flap where I first opened it, and holding the punch in place with one hand, I smack its butt with the palm of my other hand. Yeah yeah yeah I know... save the pron comments for later. Be careful, you do not want the punch to slip and create a convex dimple on the outer face of the band by going too far. Give it a couple tentative whacks and see how you're progressing. Go just far enough to make the inner face of the band smooth and flat. No more.

One thing about the Yuki pieces, the metal in the central folded link is pretty stout stuff. I've opened and removed/inserted then refolded lots of those links and only 1 or 2 have any visible dimples on the face at all. The others you can't tell they were ever touched. For genuine pieces, yeah they get bent on the outer/visible faces way too easy. Best let a pro do it, and even then he's going to tweak a few. My gen 9315 was done by a certified Rolex watch smith and you can pick out every one that he worked on.

Another idea, this is Mary's 7836 with a little lovin' thrown in. To the band, not to Mary.

Hey! Look who's back! It's nice to see your shadows in these halls again.

Hey you guys go take a pic in front of the Cake Boss Bakery! What a hoot, don't moon Buddy or he'll remove it.

Adrenaline

So go digital ... they go lots lower!

Nice! More more more!

Here are the sunset and moonrise pics I got. There are two volcanoes in the first photo, Mt Redoubt and Mt Iliamna, 200 and 300 miles away. The ocean is starting to freeze up already.

Thanks guys! I was taking pics of the sun going down over a couple volcanoes and happened to glance down and see my watch lit up by the alpenglow. What a glorious climb! It was -6F and bluebird skies and not a breath of wind up there! Funny thing, as I was taking the sunset photos (anyone notice it was 3:45PM?) the moon was coming up behind me. By the time I got down it was dark and the dogs were freezing, but wow what a glorious climb!

It's the old "spanking vs tough love" thing.

Cleared up, all is well.

I have gen movements that when wound feel like I'm rubbing dry beach sand between my fingers. Smooth, very low resistance. Other gens feel like coarse rock salt rubbed between my fingers. Some feel "rubbery" from the stem seals fighting me, they're all different. When you wind it does it start to run? That means the winding is working.

Hmmmmm. Tell me about the OYSTER-hyphen-DATE dial? I remember reading something about that years ago.

And meanwhile here in the mountains of Alaska and my radio wave Internet connection (seriously) it seems........ the same. I'm sure the troops are digging the new speed, Boss! Nicely done.

Hey look who's back! Welcome home.

Certainly some better pictures would help, but the layout of the dial looks very good, the coronet looks very good, the fonts for the word Rolex and everything else you can see look very good, and from the top down the shape of the CGs is correct. Also the tip on the small arrow GMT hand is equilateral, and you wouldn't necessarily see that on a rep. It gets my vote as a gen.

(shouting off screen) Hey Boss, do we still give away free VIP access to people that send us chocolate? Oh, oops... sorry. I was busy, um, doing something else.

Roger that. I don't know if anyone remembers but Lanikai wanted an orange SUB 300 "no T" Professional in the worst way. I eventually found one for him, but it was missing the bezel. He bought it anyway, leaping right into the deep end of the Impossibility Pool. Well, the mighty RWG machine sprang to life and in a month we'd found a bezel for him.... AND IT FIT. IIRC, Lani was Sainted by the Vatican for that miracle. Luckily, this BL needs no such Divine Intervention.

When I first hearkened to the Call of the 'Flake, the Yuki parts were fine. After a year of wearing it and looking at photos of gens, they became *cough* less fine. By then I could tell at a glance they were aftermarket parts. Arms length. It's pretty stark when you get used to how they're supposed to look. A gen dial can be had for not a lot more than a Yuki, but try to get a 9401/9411 (newer) dial. Mine is a 7016 "leprosy" dial, known for falling apart and blistering and flaking off pieces. The newer generation dials are much more stable. Like the man said above, the CWP hands are pretty good. I've written a couple explanations here about how the geometry of the hands is supposed to interact with the dial markers, to know they hands are the correct lengths. Bottom line: build up a nice Yuki, enjoy it, in a year sell it along and use those funds to get more accurate parts.

KingK, yes it's at the far end of Doxa pricing. The only Doxa I'd consider spending more on would be a Sub 300T Conquistador ... possibly more rare than the Black Lung. The one I listed has no aftermarket parts (I don't believe that's a sapphire crystal). The bracelet is disposable; the head looks to be authentic, complete and original. It's rare enough that every time one shows up the old timers on WUS perk up their ears. It seems everybody's heard of them... time will only increase their desirability. The price is acceptable; I paid slightly less for mine 7 years ago. I've seen them go for $4,000 in worse condition than this. Yes the markets are soft now, but items this collectible aren't really affected that much by the markets; there will always be a demand. As always, YMMV.

Minutes hand should be ever so slightly narrower than in Phong's picture. The long tail on the seconds hand is good. I'd like to see a photo of those hands installed to a movement wearing that dial. Then we could tell better. The "hooked over" 6s in the depth are correct but the spacing is slightly too close together. All in all a darn good dial. Leap years better than Yuki's. Another comparison for you, notice how mine looks "less bold" than TMG's does in the sheild and fonts. Both are gen.

Dial looks good.... not so sure about the minutes hand.