archibald

Guys, I have no idea what to do next! Some bald guy has erased the part of my brain which stored information about where to buy replica watches! Next thing you know he's going to use the economic might of the Swiss luxury watchmaking industry's trade association to force China to make producing Big Bangs as subversive as practicing Fu Lin Gong--the Faux Lin Gong Proclamation of 2094. On second thought, as long as he doesn't do something really stupid such as producing a manufacture movement that the chinese can't copy, I'm not really worried about this thing. Admin, what about the ISP's that tell Sony, Paramount and Rupbert Murdoch to go [censored] themselves? I wonder if they're going to worry very much about

There are all kinds of low-tack materials available--frisk-it seems to be a little on the strong side. But, if you guys who have experience w/ it think it will work, I have 2 1/2 sheets of it on my desk right now. I can cut to within .008mm of accuracy, provided I do the Illustrator file--which I'd be happy to do as long as someonce can verify that a stencil accurate to a hundredth of a mm won't end up ruining my 111 when I try luming for the first time. Also, even if the stencil works perfectly aren't there all kinds of potentially disasterous procedures needed to mix and apply the lume?

Aside from the movement, don't you guys feel bad for the unlucky bastard who bought the #888 gen?

Even a Paneristi would notice the fit and finish difference between rep and gen many seconds before any of the flaws we obsess about (aside from the joke of a crown guard the chinese insist on putting on the H series reps). I know it's a bummer, but fit and finish is the easiest rep/gen tell and it's the flaw that will never get fixed. The upside, at least when it comes to PAMs, is that 99% of the humans on earth can't even pronounce the brand name let alone assess where the L-Swiss-L is supposed to go. Flav bought the gen because he knows it's a gen which, IMO, is the only reason to buy a gen. A rep will fool everyone who doesn't know anything about watches, and nobody who does. Wear it well, buddy!

Kudos to Davidsen for trying, but his work ends up making me scratch my head---anyone who's ever worked with the software and printing technology knows it takes just as long and costs just as much to do it wrong as it takes to do it right. The correct number thickness, the exact font, and the right color lume costs exactly the same and takes exactly as long to produce as a dial with 1/4 scale numbers, Jokertman BT font, and pink lume. Clearly , the people doing the work for Davidsen have no clue what they're doing, or do it wrong on purpose. Can you inagine the profit Davidsen would make if he could find someone who had the bae minimum attention to detail needed to actually do these projects accurately? Wouldn't cost him a dime of overhead extra.

I may be able to be helpful creating a template, but I need to know the following info: Would +/- .008mm be a tight enough tolerance for the openings on the template? Is clarity of the template an issue?--I'm thinking you don't want it clear to make alignment easier. I do know of a clear material that won't remove any paint--it's made specifically for masking. Can someone verify that there is a material used by manufaturers as a template?--I assume lume is applied this way at both rep and gen dial factories....

Great link--Tourneau's site has a similar feature n some watches, BTW. Below is my favorite pic, which lays a couple issues to rest. --the lack of shadows on the DW suggests either a photoshop job or hublot's use of 7753's as oppose to their own version of the asia 7753 technique. --check ot the quality of the screen printing and alignment on the DW. It seems to me that some demand too much perfection from rep DW's. This is an 8k watch--you'd assume that the level of printing and fit are up to the industry standard. Not to blow our own horns, but both finepics and Watchmiester printing nd alignment is a good bit better...

I leer at high end goods on the Web all the time--watches, women, even Barker Black shoes on occasion--but I'm leery about buying from sources I don't trust.

I'm in for a ceramic bezel if the price is $350 or less from a non-conspiracy theorist dealer, which apparently excludes Jos. A significant number of customers smashing watches? Shyeah, right. A significant number of the world's postal workers? Maybe...

I love it when a luxury goods CEO acts surprised about the existence of reps. How'd these guys get to be CEO's of luxury watch companies? They don't understand that their business model relies on huge investments in brand ID and small investments in craftsmanship and materials? [censored]. That bald guy knows full well that his markup stems from ads in Town and Country and boat race sponsorships --not his workmanship, materials, and and actual innovation. If he really is surprised that the Chinese can make 95% copies of his products and sell them for 1/15 the price, his shareholders ought to be very nervous. Wonder how the Chinese bureaucrats are treating their lawyers these days. The good news for luxury goods companies is that there will always be people rich enough or stupid enough to just walk into a store and buy a gen, and the rest of us who would gladly pay $250 for a big bang, spend our "genuine watch" money on watches made by companies serious about craftsmanship, movement manufacture, and relative value. JLC is my fav, but there are many others. Hublot isn't one of them. None of this changes the fact that posting reps on on gen boards or walking into Ad's with reps on means you are chump.

I haven't been to moscow since 2001, but I have a client who travels there frequently. During a recent conversation about watches and reps, he said in passing "oh, you can get those on every street corner." I assume he's talking about the same reps you can get on every street corner in DC--the lowest of the low grade. To be honest, I think street prices tend to be higher and I've never heard of anywhere outside of China where you can get high quality reps at lower prices than our dealers sell them for. Out here there are a couple of fake purse guys who occasionally get a decent ladies Chanel J12, a noobmariner level sub or a venus powered Patek 5057--they try to get $300 for them. Probably the same in Russia and every other city where dudes try to nab tourists.

Bundling the business practices of 1/4 of the Earth's population into one half-glib sentence was unhlepful, but it accidentally raised an important point: Acceptable business practices may be different all over, but everyone in question by now ought to understand from long standing practice what acceptable bvusiness practives are here. . Kudos to our top-notch admins and mods for moving quickly to codify them. It's going to make things better for everyone. I'd also urge everyone who's worked with a non RWG they have come to trust to introduce them to RWG. I know a totally trustworthy guy who sells parts and a few reps on the side and have just emailed him--I haven't done so before because I thought we just about had it covered over here, but now I say the more the merrier. After all, as effecttive as the amin's new enforcement will undoubtedly be, the best way to end price fixing is good ol' fashioned competition.

They have a word for the texture of cooked dried jelly fish--"Q"--which, having tried cooked dried jelly fish, I assume translates to "Imagine you're eating a combined bite of snot and gummy bears."

Haven't they had that service for, like, 5000 years? If they had anything decent (notice that reps exist of almost all of those watches?), I'd rent one and take it down to the CNC shop, maybe.

I've been messing around with a new DW overlay making setup--trying to see if I can produce a passable overlay "on demand" in short runs. If you;d be willing to participate in the experiment, go ahead and buy the ofrei wheel if it doesn't work and you can provide a high quality scan, I bet can make you an overlay that will fit your existing DW and look pretty damn good.

Jaysus H, I go away for a few days to get some friggin work done and this place actually starts to get fun! Freak shows in every subforum, and now perfect reps again. Is it still worth mentioning that people who just chuckle and shake their heads when they see the words trustywatchguy and perfect in the same sentence are no longer trustwatchguy & co's taget market? We don't bat an eye except to laugh when a noob mentions idealwatches.com. This is my last time wasting bandwith talking about ideal's new competitors....

Like the NRA says, "Guns don't kill people, people kill people." Know what I mean? RWG I, II, or MCLXII--doesn't matter, if the folks mentioned above are actively posting, it ain't going to be sweetness and light. Some people just aren't happy unless they're stirring up some 8th grade [censored], and they tend to congregate where 8th grade [censored] is allowed to be stirred. Better there than here is what I think.

I hate to be a skeptic, but the lesson I take away from that story is the same lesson I learn whenever someone posts an AD story: That it's really just pointless to take a rep into an AD. Unless an AD salesperson completey clueless, they'll spot all but the best and most thoroughly modded reps in three seconds. But because they understand that embarrassing a potential customer is not a good close, they pretend they're fooled. Wouldn't you? I just don't understand the need to take a rep into a a place where people feed their kids by selling gens--what good can come of it aside from some a brief and mild feeling of having put one over on someone? More likely you'll end up making two people uncomfortable. Plus, I hear a lot about "AD reps" but I've never seen one in person. The only watch I've seen that I'd ever consider taking into an AD is my 18k Muller w/ gen strap...but sincew the hands aren't perfect I'd never take it into a Muller AD since it would be a clear tip off side by side w/ a gen.

Paying a premium for discontinued models seems OK to me--I wish I had one of the good 36's, 186's, or swiss Conquistadors to sell at the moment. I've also paid a premium for a watch with no other work done aside from a movement service by one of our well know smiths...after verifying that the work was actually done. But I usually laugh when I read the "I serviced the movement!" offers--like I'm going to pay more watch that has been taken apart and put together by someone who's watchsmithing experience is finishing 2/3 of the TZ home study program, or more likely by no one outside of the seller's imagination. Like any other purchase, the buyer always needs to do thorough DD. I'd say if a seller can't prove the service was done by trusted smith the buyer should make a counter offer for a reasonable used watch price. If that's rejected just move along, buy new, and take the watch to your own smith when you get it. Then ask $780 when you resell.

LOL! My brothers, I'm a little embarrased to admit that since I knew nothing about Adobe, printing, or vintage DW's when I started I spent 80% of my non-work/non-family time for 8 months staring at little numbers--but looking at these pics of unbelievable accurate vintages makes it all worth while!

I'm in for 2...thanks chieftang!

US Rep collectors are definitely getting screwed by the weak dollar crowd running America, but I really feel sorry for Zimbabwe-based rep collectors...

LOL! lots of bids by ebay names I recognize for an obviously fake crown. I've always thought they were aftermarket, but since they look about as fat as the aftermarket crowns we can otherwise get, I figure what the heck as long as the price doesn't go above what Tommy sells them for...

I've had as many as 35 at once but am now down to 4 gens and 6 sweet reps. I'm much happier @ 8-10 watches at a time...I hated having to choose from 30 watches all of which I love, plus It was getting boring telling people I had 30 $5k+ watches because 27 of them were fake. Making myself to get rid of a watch for every new one I buy has improved my collection considerably by forcing me to be more selective (if it aint moddable to damn near perfect, I don't buy it) let's me justify spending big mig money on mods I never would have done before, has stopped frazzling my little brain so much in the morning, and increased the liklihood that the people I work with think my watches are real. BTW, kruzer00 has 3 times as many watches, most of which are top notch reps, as anyone else I've ever met or heard about. If watches were shoes his user name would be Imelda00.