archibald

Tourbillons. Sapphire dials. Movements (chronograph w/ calandar @ 6:00, above for example)....why even rep a gen w/ a transparent back they'll never get close? Why do a rep of a watch similar in style to 16 already well-repped watches, or a watch that only costs 2.5 times what a decent rep costs?

Here we go--Solid back. Asian 7750 would be a near 1:1 equivalent of gen movements. Aalmost identical cases have already been done numerous times to near perfection. Well known brand name. $8K plus gen cost would make the gen an excellent value. As big a Panerai. OEM dials readily available and a snap to drop in. Works as a dress watch as well as a sport watch. And, most important, a gorgeous out-of-the-ordinary design.

z9z.bmp

The canon pins are stepped. The hour, minute, and seconds hands have different hole diameters to match the steps, and that's what is being specified when you see 110/65 for example. Typically you buy the correct hands to fit a movement and the movement specs (such as ETA) specify the sizes. You *can* get into broaching the hands to fit a movement (when the hole diameter is smaller than the pin you want to fit to), but I'd say "no thanks" to that. Of course The Zigmeister would probably say "no sweat" to that, though. Here's a neat vintage hand broaching tool :

Thanks, chieftang. So, 110/65 means 1.1mm and .6mm. That makes it a snap.

BTW, probably this thread is famous among modders, but in case anyone is looking for the hole sizes of the 7750 variant's here's the link:

http://www.rwg.cc/members/index.php?showtopic=12309.

Does anyone have the sizes for the Lemania 1873 off the top of their heads...

I'm trying to buy some hands from an overseas seller--and on top of our language issues, we're grappling with my utter idocy when it comes to how watches actually work. I asume the fractional numbers on the cards I'm being offered (e.g. 20/100) have something to do w/ the pin sizes the hands fit on, but the seller says that as long as the hands are the right length, most of them will fit on almost any movement because they're made to be sized individually. So....what I'm wondering is: Do they make hands that are made to be individually sized? And is there a web site that lists the correct sizes for various movements, so I don't have to bother y'all anymore? Plus, the last thing anyone wants to end up with is a tube that's too small....

As always, thakns to the RWG brain trust for your help.

Here is the original Thread Topic Title & Description:

Beautiful Ultimate Planet Ocean Lite w/ BONUS

Here is my personal Ultimate Planet Ocean....It has a 2893 Asian movement.[ i]

Even though I wasn't clear on the whole "back-story," I still agree w/ r11co...most likely a mistake. I don't know the OP or what he's prone to do or not do. My defense of him notwithstanding, I was trying to make 2 points aside from his trade: First, that the source of the problem is false advertising on the part of major "collectors" since these "white lies" are bound to be repeated, knowingly or unknowingly, by people who resell watches and 2)that I see more serious--if more subtle--noob-fooling misrepresentations in members' offers fairly regularly.

Like has been said--match to the clothes and occasion. BTW, IMO wearing a dive watch w/ a suit is like wearing sneakers with a suit. Fine if you're doing some GQ magazine Ironic look thing, but no matter how much the Sub cost, real or rep, it ain't a dress watch.

I also think it's important to vary your rep purchases--If you have 5 steel sport watches w/ black dials it shouldn't be surprising that it's hard to choose. Get a gold dress watch, a steel dress watch, a 44mm PAM, a dive watch on rubber, maybe a more sporty gold watch w/ a black dial like the BB, a silver or blue dial watch w/ a bracelet, etc and you'll have a watch for every occasion with little overlap. Then within those groupings you can get watches w/ different dial colors, sizes, styles to mix it up.

For me, owning 10 watches at a time is about the right balance between versatility and agonizing decisions...LOL!

Guys, lets be fair to the OP. He posted a thread which referred to his own sale, complete with huge pics, trying to clarify false advertising on the part of whomever he bought the watch from originally, false advertising that apparently fooled a lot more people than him. Sure, you can argue that he should have immediately changed his ad on the basis of the responses here, but if I don't think anyone willfully selling a watch as something it's not would start a thread in DG calling his own sale into question. Besides, at least once a week, I notice far more egregious examples of misrepresentation of watches' original prices, rarity, cost of mods, and even movements on occasion from members who have been around a lot longer than the OP.

BTW, can one of the folks who know the DG movement well tell us how far off the date window on the DG2813 would be relative to the 2892?

This seller has a dial!!!!!!!!! He loves his dial!!!!!!! He loves exclamation points!!!!!!!!

http://cgi.ebay.com/PATEK-PHILIPPE-PERPETU...VQQcmdZViewItem

Sure, just ask the dealer if the plating is decent. Most will give you a staight answer. Careful about rose gold, though. It varies from decent to crappy looking copper-like.

BTW--can anyone direct me to a decent plating shop? I'm sick of trying to deal with Atrisan, who takes forever both to return emails and actually get around to doing any work.

With all the mods and OEM parts listed you probably spent around $600-700...? Am i right?

Let's see--

$250 base watch..

Cyclops--free since I helped organize the project. $35 value

Cyclops install: $40

AR--$40

Relume: $65 (cheaper than black dials because ther'es not much to do on the white dial...a few dots)

Used OEM strap, which I guess makes my watch a 049: $90

Deployant: christmas gift from the missus, or else I'd have just used the rep strap. Probably cost her $165 or so @ the AD.

Case rebrush: Boston Watch Exchange Brushing Pen $20

OEM Guard: $195

That's $700 ($865 if you count the deployant) out of pocket, about 1/5 of the lowest cost I've seen on a gen--just within my self imposed limit of spending no more than a quarter of the street price of a used gen. The only mods I would call a must, though, are the AR, Lume, strap, and cyclops which would run about $200-$300 Aside form the fun of comparing the rep and gen guards side by side, the OEM crown guard is not worth seeking out, IMO.

BTW, can anyone provide a verdict on the latest bracelet? Isn't the gen a tapered double deployant? Is that what the rep is being shipped with these days?

@ sssurfer: If I ever make out your way, we'll have to compare watches and leer at beautiful Roman women over a bottle or two of Falesco Lazio Montiano

... and crown guard mod.

What will you have done to the CG?

One CD set for me. Great idea, and thanks for putting this together!

Hi RT,

Thanks for sharing.

Particularly concerns on the polish finish parts of the bracelet. Do they have smooth mirror looks? Previous versions are poor on this part which ruins the elegance of the whole watch, and it is the biggest give away telling people it is a fake watch no matter how many mods of cross, ar coat etc..... are done to it. This stops me from wearing the VCO completely, not even once after I bought it for months.

Can you share more on this issue?

In my experience, bracelets are like straps. They need to be redone to bring them up to par--I'll rebrush/re-polish my silver dial version's case & bracelt along w/ an AR coar when it arrives.

All mods aside, fit and finish is always the ultimate difference between reps and gens and can never be fully rectified. The question is how many thousands of bucks you're willing to pay for that level of detail. In the case of the Overseas, that would come to about $7500. Not in this lifetime...for me, the rep's boat, date window bevel, and bracelet is well worth 7 grand left in my bank account.

I might avaoid AR coated fiddies. Both here and at Paneristi some say the AR coat on the rep is off--too blue, I seem to remember. The "117" case is better, no matter the other features. Personally, the movement is a non issue since any collector would spot the best rep movement in 1 second, and any non collector couldn't care less. Probably you'll want a cannon pin fix, relume, and nice strap no matter which version you buy. Maybe do an aftermarket Ar coat if you buy a non coated version.

Nice!

BTW, can any of our resident leather craftsmen reccomend a book or website on leatherworking--I'd like to try as well....

I am still quite confused with most of the replies here. NOTONCE DID I EVER MAKE MENTION OF THE DG2813 AS AN ETA OR SWISS OR WHATEVER OF THE SORTS...

Where does this come from, for Pete's sake??

Nowhere did I ever mention the acronym ETA in anything to do with the PO Lite. The Lite version of the UPO has a cheap ass Asian movement, most of us know that now. This movement I bought as a replacement is from the suggestions of Andreww over at RWI, and I verified that this movement shown here in the photo would fit into the PO Lite....

What does ETA have to do with any of this???

Not from me, for sure..... I kept everything Asian....that's it.

People are referring to the fact that some well known collectors still refer to this movement as "Asian 2892." It's part of larger issue than your particular watch/sale.

Just to ad my thoughts to the 50 discussion:

Re: old v new--The 50 I bought in October 2006 from Jos is just as good as my spring of 2005 51, and cam w/ the 28k A7750.

Shortly after I got my rep, I did a side by side w/ a friend's gen 50. To my eye, the A's on the rep dial suffer from the same too-low-crossbar issue as the 44mm. I always add a disclaimer: many do not notice this issue. Probably from many hours staring at fonts at high magnification in adobe illustrator, my brain "sees" the A on tiny little watch dial printing, too. On the 40mm pams the text is so small as to be a non flaw.

The Zigmeister installed a watchmen cyclops on mine, although it overmagnifies the date, I believe it compensates for the too thin date font on the rep DW to equal 1:1 mag.

I bought and installed an OEM guard on mine (reviewed somewhere on the old board, I think). Not worth the $$, IMO. It is interesting to note that the OEM guard does make the crtown look slightly thicker because of a slightly smaller "gap" than the rep guard. I do not remember if this is a plus or not.

The brushing on the gen is more aggressive than the brushing on the rep, as it is w/ most PAMs.

All in all, the 50/51 is the best out of the box--if you like 40mm.

I would also like to take this opportunity to offer my condolences to my favorite Italian of all time: I believe that w/ an OEM guard, watchmen cyclops, rebrushed case, The Zigmeister lumed dial and hands, OEM strap/deployant, and single sided AR to most perfect 51 rep in the world resides in the US, not in the land of its ancestors.

This thread is a perfect example of the cost of the little sematic games some dealers continue to play (my apologies to the "lost in translation" folks who apparently believe that the chinese characters for D and G can somehow be mistranslated to the Western letters E, T and A).

Hopefully any confusion is now laid to rest.

Paractically speaking, though, a little tidbit above is news to me. Can someone verify that the date position is "slightly" off in one of these versions? Is the date indicator of one of the DGXXX movement's position "correct" relative to the 2892 or are they both off?

I certainly wouldn't mind sporting a watch with an asian movement as long as it is advertised and priced accordingly, but not if it sacrifices accuracy as well as reliability.

Here are the caseback shots I posted a few months ago--I posted them as an example of why it's pointless to worry about these kinds of things.

It's utterly unrealistic to expect the back of a $275 watch to look like this:

archi, what do you think? Of course The Zigmeister did that outstanding work! I asked him for soem retouche besides the lume job. Great result isn't it?

Fantastic. Of course, I suspected, since there's only one guy on the planet who can do work like that!

All have tradeoffs--Davidesen has super lume, but a horrible dial font and hit and miss fit and finish.

Except for the bezel markers, I think the latest issues of the subs are probably the best out of the box--decent font and mag, AR, crowns. Anyone who knows what the bezel markers should look like are going to call you out on the cg, etc. anyway.

Absolutely. I have 3 gens and am down to about 6 reps that get wrist time, 6 reps in various stages of modding. A few $80 asian movement classics just for old times sake.

These days, I don't think to0 much about the Gens v. Rep discussions I used to get into. Are gens superior to reps? Yes, of course. No, are you nuts? Seriously, who can say? If you buy a gen Muller Conquistador, did you just throw 6 grand out the car window? If you just bought a rep Lange Chrono, did you just throw $200 out the car window? Depends of lots of personal beliefs and circumstances, no? Every time each of us pushes the "send money" button on Pay Pal, we answer these questioons for ourselves.

I only have 3 hard and fast rep/gen rules for myself:

1) Only buy gens that are highly unlikely to be repped, and which represent as much as a value as luxury watches can possibly represent.

2) Never post pics of reps on gen forums or vice versa--both strike me as unseemly.

3) If you're going somehere you'd like a zero % chance of getting called out--AD, important business meeting, etc.-- wear a gen.

Other than that, relax, don't worry, gaze fondly at your watch.

Here from an Austrian -

Blued steel hands - Gebl

I just had an email exchange w/ him. I suspect you're using the address I was originally using (from a google search) which does not seem to be working. If you'll PM, I'll shoot you the correct email addy I've been using.

Guten Tag, My brothas.

I think I've found a decent source for certain OEM parts from a german speaking seller, but google translator just isn't cutting it...

I should say gebl

Your new baby is looking great. Nice job on the extra tick, too, to whoever did it.

BTW, that pic of the gen shows that the "too thick" crown w/ the rep CG looks proportionate to the OEM crown w/ OEM CG if you look at the space between the the underside of the "bridge" and the top of the crown. The too thick crown + the too big gap in the rep guard nicely fools the eye into saying, "gen." IMO, 2.0-2.1mm crowns are the way to go on the rep guards.