archibald

I know an (unscrupulous) coin and antique collector who "tones" coins that way. Believe me, you can smell the finished product for some time. He says the smell goes away after a few months but the color remains. I wonder if some coats of oil paint, umber/ brown/yellow etc, lightly apllied then rubbed off w/ a rag will do a more accurate job. For the case you might also want to read up on some of the techniques antique and coin doctorers use to to give metal an age patina.

I bet gen, based on the interior finishing of the guard, which I've never seen on reps. I think OP is taking great pains to make their guards more difficult to rep, while keeping their manufacturing costs below $300.

MWAHAHAHAHA!!! YESSSS!!!! After spending over grand on gen dials for watches that never get repped, I finally guessed one right! I saw a dial a couple of months ago and thought, I wonder if they'll make this one..." so I bought it. I presume I'm going to need to get a swiss 7750 w/ day and date to make the dial work? If the factory spent this much on a gen to copy, might I suggest something else, that I think would sell bigtime based on threads I've seen over the years? Asia 7750 would work with:

I want to clear up a few things, technical and rhetorical. 1)Ok, I'm not a communist. 2)Since the "stickers" are, in fact, images of OEM datehweels that are tranfered to a proprietary material selected and modified to exactly duplicate the look of a real datewheel, and since the images are "printed" at a "resolution" (even theough the strict definition of "resolution" does not apply to the technology we use) so high that a human eye cannot discern any difference from screen printing, a watch with a watchmiester wheel will look identical to a watch with a screen printed date wheel, especially once it has the dial on it. Anyone who doubts this can hop over to ubi's thread and see if they can tell the difference between a watch with a watchmiester wheel and a watch with a vintage wheel installed. Even the flaws in the vintage printing were reproduced to a thousandth of a mm. 3) Since we have comissioned and recieved the basic material and since the graphics work is complete, the image transfer takes 24-48 hours depending on the workload of the shop. I don't feel compelled to rush, but as per the paragraph above, we're at the point technologically and logistically where we can produce these at any time. We are making some aesthetic decisions (involving perhaps making the wheel look better than a 1:1 wheel on cyclopsed reps) which the technology affords us the luxury of making. We'll take as long as it takes to compare and decide, then we'll produce, install, and post pics. In the meantime anyone can produce and offer any product they want. 4)I'd be happy to discuss this with kruzer and ubi, but my vote is going to be letting Mark and Lello settle the 2892 problem between themselves (I plan on ordering 2 of mark's even though I could produce my own for personal use at a fraction of the cost even in a run of 2) Individual members can decide whether they want to honor their commitment to mark, or hope for a price war between lello and mark. I'll also reccomend that we not double up on lello's 2892 or 2893 while he decides whether or not he wants to make wheels for other watches. If he decides to offer asia 7750 or asia 21J, I'll just assume this is a business, not a community effort of watch improving--which means providing our fellow RWG "consumers" with a choice: Screen printed numbers or numbers that look the identical but which were purchased for a fraction of the cost of producing screen printed wheels. One thing lello said does need to be answered: Lello compared Palp putting out crowns to his putting out 2892 wheels. If lello's crown actually worked on all watches (see The Zigmeister's thread on the old RWG) without radical modification to both crown and watch, if they did not need to be chrome plated to match the reps' metal, and if they had the correct # of teeth and the right bevel, I doubt Tommy would have felt the need to produce his crowns. If mark's 2892 wheels wind up being as flawed as lello's crowns, lello has a pretty good point. If Mark's wheels work and look fine, lello the analogy doesn't hold water.

And keep in mind that the gens are also more expensive than a lot of gen watches--5k for a few pieces of leather that have Hermes stamnped on them are more expensive than a steel JLC with complicated manufactre movement. There was a pretty funny article about handbags in the New Yorker a couple of weeks ago. Their status-based marketing is even more cynically brilliant than the high end watch induistry's.

The Chopard LUC Pro Diver is hands down the most beautifu sports watch made--clean but interesting, as elegant as any Cartier but w/ no ne of the fussiness...a perfect design, IMO But its beauty depends on the bezel and flawless fit and finish, neither of whcih could ever be repped at any price we cheapskates would ever pay. So I voted for the Lange which just might be simple enough to get damn close to on-the-wrist perfection with some professional polishing and a decent replating job.

I think everyone is entitled to make whatever they want to make and then offer it up for sale--as long as they understand that if they offer the same product that someone else has put just as much time and effort into, they're going to have to compete. I'd never presume to speak for any member other than myself, not even for my fellow "watchmiesters" (the totally unserious name a couple of other members and I call ourselves when we put out stuff to improve watches). But I can speak for myself. We never even considered competing with Mark because, having read the forum over the last few months, we realized he was going through a nightmare to put out a product that would make everybody's watches better. And he's a cool guy whom we like. And we're afraid he won't PVD any more watches for us if we [censored] him off. Lello says he wasn't around to be aware of Marks work, and, far from showing up to make a couple of bucks selling date wheels he finally got close to correct, he's returned to complete a job he started long ago. I'll take him at is word. Since all of the "watchmiesters" are more or less gainfully employed, we didn't think a few hundred bucks was worth undercutting the efforts of a fellow RWGer. So we decided to put out the 7750 and Asia 21j instead, even though we, you know, "got lots of requests" to put out a 2892 and 7753 while people were waiting. Basically, we decided to do th vintage wheel ubi posted while Mark finished up. As I posted earlier, we're sort of non-serious guys when it comes to hobbies, so we'd prefer not to treat this project likesome sort of business. But we do have a good bit of time and money invested, and I'm the only communist in the group. So here's how it's going to be: We recognize lello's or any other member's right to put out a 7750, Asia 21j, or any datewheel he wants. Maybe we'll put out a different wheel, maybe move on to another watch.....but we really do hope nobody gets angry if a 2892, 2893, Asia 21J, Asia 7750, Swiss 7750 wheels are released that look just as good (if not better based on the picture above) and are offered at price less than what it costs to make a silk screened version.

Yeah but it looks like a Seiko...Nobody can take a great watch and make it look utterly artless and characterless better than Seiko can.

Does this have real or fake hex screws on the back?

Man, aside from a few minor fit and finish issues (the crispness of the cts in the bezel screws, dial print color saturation, date window and pusher finish, less aggressive brushing on the rep, etc) there is not one single flaw on the front of this watch. A rebrush and some hevy dty poishing and this is as good as out of the box reps get. I'm starting to believe the "Golden age of reps" schtick... Whichever factory did this did a great job. I hope they decide to do more nusual watches.

Interesting. Not made by one of the usual high end PAM/Rolex/IWC factories, i bet. Fit and finish is more like the nicer "day-date" chronos we've seen over the years--like the Le Plongeur Chrono, the FM Ronde chrono, and the Brieling Monbriallant. All heartbreakers because they were all sweet reps aside from the idiotic movement. I wonder if this is a watch that a year or so ago would have been released as a day-date chrono, but now the asia 7750 is cheap enough to use instead...I sure hope so because that would mean that the days of wasted-effort phony chronos and if-you-want-a-nice-rep-you-better-like-PANERAIIWCOMEGAROLEX days are over.

We have a chance to call a rep, and Rolexes, Omegas, and IWC's are as interesting as we can do? I believe I'll take a nap. Don't work that left brain too hard, guys.

The long answer: The problem is that either the printing or the cutting technologies (or both) we're using eliminates almost all types of material we can use to apply to the wheels--the range of products that can be used with both is very limited, and most of the possibly usable ones have to be custom made. There are a few characteristics of the vintage silver wheels that make it even harder. We're working hard trying to make something work, but it's going to take some time and a lot of trial and error...and even more money and time than we've already spent. The short answer: Our goal is to put the proceeds from these wheels into trying to make the holy grail--a silver wheel that works on stock movements--but we're not sure if it can be done. And even if it can, it's going to be a while. If I stare at another flat top 3 blown up 800X in an Illustrator window for another minute my head will explode.

Looks great! wear it well!

I think people like chinese movements in the subs because they beat at 21k, which is more similar to the old Rolex movements than the 28k ETA 2836. P.S. I like reps too!

Nouns, I can find your other post about the bezel. Could you post a link or go into more detail ghere about the prob? Did you or a watchmith try it? Do you think there is a way to mod the bezel and/or the watch (al la the TW best Sub case) to make it work? BTW-making rep cases 1 friggin mm different from gen is a common issue. Nearly every muller model (except for the conquistador and casablanca) has a case 1mm too big for OEM dials.

It will fit any watch with a swiss 2836 movement. We know that many vintage watches are powered by miyota and other asian movements both because some folks want the slower beat and because of the number of intro- level vintages. If there is enough demand (say 30 people), it would be an easy graphics job to size the existing wheel to fit.

All my comments are fact, phoband. Seriously, I know mark provides AR for about that price, my local eyeglasses shop is slightly lower than that, and there is a thread for a new source floating around somewhere.

I sent him a message telling him the back shot of his 183 is a rep and sent him a link to paneristi so he can at least post pics of (probably) gens--we'll see what he says. The above poster is right. Lot's of legit sellers are just dingbats and figure the pics on Google are less time consuming to get and better than anything they could take.

I'm a total RWI noob, so i can't comment on anything they do over here. As far as RWG goes, I was as skepical as anyone when the "big switch" happened, and I was less than pleased about some aspects of it's execution. But that said, I've yet to encounter a better managed, more efficiently and fairly moderated, technoloically stable, and comparatively jackass-free (yours truly notwithstanding) board than this one--and I've been active on various hobby/political/professional message boards since I conntected @ 900 baud to Dial-up BBS's, Usenet, and Compuserve. I'd bet my entire collection in a heartbeat that we'll never see anything that even appears as though there is any collusion between dealers and the Admin/mods. Relax. It's just not going to happen.

I can't see any rep maker taking the time to cut a trapezoid or whatever shape the OEM uses on the window either. I think I remember someone saying they did do the Silix transplant, and someone obviously has done an OEM transplant. I wish they would post pics...

Guys this is a great effort. (Modders can get any AR shade they want for 60 bucks). I hope they do do a ultimate 42mm, which I'll buy in three seconds, especially if they raise the HE valve position a tad. It's hard to see in jos's pics because both bezels have been turned slightly, but the He valve is still a tad low on the rep, but that's a side by side "tell" only.

I think Richemont has already answered this question...and I guarantee they have the marketing studies and sales figures to answer the question definitevely. They've developed one manufacture movement and claim to be moving toward all manufacture movement. Their watches are becoming increasingly complicated, with various sizes and shapes of guards, crowns, etc. They've started buying ads in publications I've never seen panerai ads in previously. I think that they'd tell you that, yess, panerai is still very hot, hot enough for them to spend a ton of RD money at, and hot enough to sell with less of a discount than even Rolex. But I think they all recognize that, probably sooner rather than later, people are going to stop paying a 800% surcharge on stock movement, easily copied, stainless steel watches for the cachet of their brand name, especially when all the celebs move on to a different "celeb watch." So they're moving toward harder-to copy, high end movement, more heavily advertised watches.

I really hope all of us who have committed with Mark come through. Please remember that this is a hobby and Mark and others have put in time which, even at minimum wage, would make these items we buy to improve our watches cost hundreds of dollars each if they were produced by a real business. If anyone does insist on viewing this as some sort of samll-time moneymaker and starts releasing the same improvements to which hobbyists have taken on the effort and cost for all of us, might I suggest you make sure your costs are very low...you may find yourselves being way undercut on price.

Awesome job! I noticed on ebay that someone is selling a gen Overseas chrono dial with only the cross removed...hmmmm....anyone care to fess up that they had a brilliant idea? In any event, whoever makes a dial with the following changes will make a mint: 1)correct date window shape 2)correct cross 3)excellent lume As far as the finish goes, you'll never get 1:1 finish on any rep--we're talking about $200 watches here. But, who's going to see your watch close enough that they will be able to call you out on fraction of a mm fit issues? My guess is that most of us will stretch credibility not because of minor fit and finish issues but because nobody will believe we've shelled out 10 grand for a vacheron...