rogerthat

Gen bezel was a rare Ebay find. Not found by me but another forum member. Price was reasonable so I took the chance, I have only once seen one other offered and it was 4x the price. I paid $300 and some change. Yes, that crack at the 1 o'clock marker is real and on the gen. Unfortunately that was part of the earlier downs of this whole project. The gen bezel insert cracked when removing it from the gen bezel. Happened months ago and I thought of scrapping the whole idea at that time but then decided even with the hairline crack it looks better than the rep insert.

No he is a well known modder on another rep form far away I trust him and am not implying a scam just anxious to figure out what happened since last email My first time using him

I have having a watch serviced by a known modder on another forumk. He has been a gentlemen with great communication so I have nothing but positives to say and he will remain nameless but I am starting to get worried that my watch may be in big trouble. I got an email on the 14th of this month. In that email he stated that my watch is fully serviced, running and after the night on the winder will be good to go. He will email me the total tomorrow and should be able to ship the watch out that day as well. There was a minor detail left to do but it seemed like a quick fix and was unrelated to the movement. I was amazed how quickly he did the work from receipt of the watch in his shop and was quite excited that everything seemed to go well. I think he had the watch in his shop for 1 week onlly, maybe 1 1/2 weeks. Since then: no communication. I have not paid yet so I know it was not shipped. I would not be upset if he emailed me and said "it was not keeping accurate time so he looked at it and saw I needed X part and that could be a couple of weeks, or something similar" I know watch repair takes time and you need to have patience in this hobby the time is not the worry. Just the lack of any correspondence since the last email is strange. I emailed twice to inquire that maybe an email from him went into my spam or maybe he thought I had the total and was waiting on me to make payment, it all is very strange. I don't want to bug him and [censored] him off, I know that he is around. I would assume he would want to get the watch out of his shop and get paid as soon as possible. Would you send more emails, try to get in touch in other ways or just sit back and wait for word. My fear is that my watch went bad and he cannot repair it, just strange that I would not get an email stating any updates.

Looks like Josh's traveling sales suitcase when he goes to visit his big clients, only difference is these are gens. Seems like a waste of money to me to have some many of the same watch, did rolex have a buy 20 get 10 free Sub sale or something that I missed.

The rep bezel insert is scratched to all hell and not ever usable. I had a spare case from another member here but that spare came without the insert or the crystal so I have no real useful spare parts remaining. The rep insert scratches very easily with a razor blade and will also sratch with even a sharp edge of a screwdriver tip. I used both when scratching mine. I am not sure if this means it is not real ceramic. Coffee mugs are ceramic right and I can sure scratch those with any thing sharp as well? I will try to see what appears if I scrape the bottom side of the insert, maybe it is just a coating on top of aluminum on the rep I am not sure. If I find out conclusively, I will post it or if you have any advise on how I can test it, the rep insert is useless so might as well use it for educational purposes. That said the Hublot ceramic bezels do seem much more "scratch resistant" than the rolex inserts. Even the gen rolex one I think would scratch, though I don't plan on trying that one out.

I think the butane torch style lighter is the key. I tried doing this exact thing with a regular Bic style candle lighter/flamer and could not seem to ever get it hot enough to take off. I have head soaking the crystal in 100% pure acetone in a sealed jar overnight will help remove the glue holding the cyclops as well, never tried that personally but as long as off the watch acetone cannot do any damage to the mineral or sapphire crystal.

I have had this project in the works for a long time and have had some bad news along the way, but the ending looks to be a happy one. Bought a gen rolex GMTIIc bezel and was hoping to franken my rep. Problem I ran into was that the gen bezel would not attach to the rep. It fits but won't stay put and I didn't want to epoxy it on. The rep shown in the pictures now has a gen bezel Insert installed and also Cheif's AR'd cyclops. To be honest I was hoping the cyclops AR would have come out better, Cheiftang's watch crystals are truly amazing and I am a proud owner of a handful of watches with them. The cyclops though does not have the same affect so that was a little disappointing. I no longer have anything to compare it to,though so if anyone out there can post if they see a difference in the visibility and/or magnification of the cyclops in my pics vs. their rep or gen it would be much appreciated. I did not use any photoshop editing on these pics just cropping and resizing. I wanted to keep the colors as accurate as possible to show the difference between the rep and gen bezels as they are very different. 1st picture shows gen bezel insert on the left and rep bezel insert on the right. I scratched the heck out of the rep trying to pry the f'er off the rep bezel. The pictures do not lie, the bezel font is very accurate but the color of the numbers is not. The gen is much whiter and the black ceramic has a little more sheen/shine to it. 2nd picture gen bezel insert on top, rep on bottom. 3rd picture, gen bezel insert on bottom, rep on top. Why was it so hard to get the rep bezel insert off, well look at this picture. Rep insert backside is covered with glue or something very sticky holding the insert on the rep making it very hard to remove. Keep this in mind if you think about doing a similar mod. Couple of pictures of rep watch with insert removed, looks strange this way! Watch is pre-cleaning in these 2 photos. Bezels ; metal portion rep vs. gen. Very little difference though the rep is softer and much easier to bend. The rep bezel pictured came off of a backup rep case I had. I was able to pry it off with aknife but I bent it beyond repair in the process. The size though is the same and the gen really does not look any better. Gen bezel on rep case, it fits, it fits!!! Yes, but unfortunately it falls right off and there does not seem any good way to attach. Epoxy I guess would work but I choose to use the insert only instead. The gen does seem to turn the same way on the rep bezel. So I added some small daps of Gorilla Glue to the back of the gen bezel insert and pressed it onto the rep bezel. That was the only easy part of this mod. Without further ado, some pictures of the finished product. Let me know what you think...about the gen insert, cyclops. Is the bezel properly seated, is the crystal? I am not very familiar with Rolex. Lastly a few comparison pictures of the rep bezel insert next to the watch. For the last shot I took from further away to try to show how the gen has a little more sheen/presence/shine, etc... Of course without having the two bezels to compare head to head the rep would be very hard to spot. Cheers,

Same advise. Turning the hands a few days together seems to get my GMT hand working in sync. If I don't do that my GMT hand will stop and lose time , otherwise it seems OK. I bought the "Swiss ETA" version but was told by a modder when he opened my watch that the movement is really a clone ETA not genuine ETA ; despite the premium price I paid. ICHS version is the one I own.

Amazing watch!!!

Guess you could run the chrono all of the time Not my recommended course of action As stated your watch is like all chronos not just Breitlings Personally all of my favorite watches are chronos

In the rep world, I think the Hublot Big Bang has been at least in part overtaken by the AP ROO seconds at 12. Likely has nothing to do with the gen world though.

Looks great, any chance to see a lume shot with the grey lume?

Why do many newbies think that most people assume a watch is a rep first? Most everyone you will encounter in your day to day life don't know an IWC, Hublot, AP, etc.. from a Timex. If you carry yourself well everyone will assume your watch is a genuine first. Sometimes with Rolex that might not be true.

In my experience, they can get the parts but rarely wish to sell just parts. Not enough money in it for them and I think they need to call in favors from their vendors to get it done which they will do when needed but would prefer not to do. However if you buy a watch at the same time, 90% of the time you can add parts like you want to your purchase. My guess you would pay at least half price of a new watch for a new movement, dial and hands. Not sure it would make sense for that amount of parts. Works better if you need a couple of screws, just a new dial, etc... Anytime I have approched a dealer with a part request paired with a new purchase I have gotten the parts that i wanted at a low cost, but again that was for screws, maybe a strap, etc... not the movement, dial and hands.

Impressive start!

I own 3 ( wife ) Broke my pin tool on the first went to a mall kiosk and they hammer away Best $5 I ever spent and no issues Went back there the other 2 times as well each time different $8 an hour employee too so I wouldn't sweat it This bracelet is just not worth the hassle to do it yourself let the mall kiosk folks do it I have personally sized all of my other bracelets but I won't touch these

I disagree with rolex on this one

hontwatch.com I believe, but he makes his home on RWI as a dealer there Mods, delete if not correct to post here, he is not a dealer on this forum.

My comment was definitely not aimed at you, just as you said a general statement. I think we are on the same wave length. If your local guy can service the HBB, he may prove to be a valuable resource for you. It is great to have someone local to be able to work on watches when needed. My experiences in the local search have not been too great, but that is not to say your experience may differ greatly. With a collection as large as yours, it may be worth it to give the guy a try and have him service the HBB and see how it works out. If you have many watches it does not make sense to service them all when a service costs more than the movement itself in many cases, I do find value in full servicing a watch when you absolutely love the watch and selected that watch and maybe a couple of others that you deem worthy. I also understand my some members would never service a rep.

Ryan, looking forward to your review. This model has always been one of my favorite PAMS. A real shame they always seem to make these with mineral instead of sapphire crystal that kills the watch for me more than the dial / number thickness. Maybe a relume from a pro like The Zigmeister or Vac could correct the number thickness? Plus it would glow like the gen which the rep definitely does not.

I have one on the way from Hont and it cost less than from this site. Also had to WU, but that cost me $12 I think.

My guess is that for a lower price you could have a new Asian 7750 installed but then you still have a dirty movement that will may crap out. If you have 20+ reps you are a fool to service all of them at the cost of a full service. I recommending selecting a couple that you love and want to keep forever and have those only serviced. Or a rep with a bunch of mods that would costly to replace. Anything $250 US or under is a fair price. $250 seems to be the professional average, of course if I have to shp back and forth than my goal would be to pay less than $250 Anything less than $175 US and I would slightly worry that it would not be a full teardown. And it goes without saying I would trust someone who has worked on the asian movements before more so than most that only have previously serviced ETA's. Most end users would not service an Asian becuase the service costs more than the movement. Non-chrono reps should cost a good deal less for servicing. Another point: if you may resell the watch later on, an asian 7750 rep that has been serviced by some watchsmith we don't know may command $50 more or so than an unserviced one, vs. the same movement that was serviced by a known modder on this forum would have a higher resale value. Just thought I would throw that fact out there the $50 you may save today may cost you more than $50 down the road.

Yeah I think the parrot is universally disliked! I loved the photo of that bird that I took at a zoo and wanted to work it in somehow. If anyone has any tips on how to blend in the layers without making the foreground layer transparent I would love to learn. That seems to be my biggest challenge, like on #1,#2, #8, #9 I only have had Photoshop for a few weeks, so I encourage criticism

Just messing around with some different backgrounds and Photoshop editing techniques,I am still learning, anyway what do you all think of these enhanced pictures? Cool, too artificial? Please let me know so I can decide to continue to tweak or scrap this idea entirely.

Wishing you the best and a speedy recovery. Does look painful!!!