capt_cope

Start with a cheap gen. Don't want your boss' taking notice of your spending habits now do ya? If your boss notices an IWC on your wrist, and asks about it you can have one of three options: tell him you made too much money at your last job and won't be happy here, tell him you live beyond your means, or tell him you could give a rat's ass about copyrights, and will probably use the company ip to upload your newwest torrents. Or you can start with a seiko, and work your way into your other collection. But not when all eyes are on you eh?

You forgot Mike, together they form a group of relatively uncommon people. All left a blemish on humanity. Demi... went from a "10" to a "0", Roger ruined bond (how you do that I don't know, but he managed) and dear old Michael... well aside from being painful to look at, he's one of those people that take the interpretive view of "truth." We'd all be better off if those three had been rounded up and caged from birth on. *edit to admit, yes I thought she was hot once. I've since grown and realized how sad she really is. Ashton Kutcher.... wow.... bad choices abound.*

John Wayne, my kind of movie star. Let me tell you, as a kid I had just about every movie he ever starred in, and just about wore the tapes out. I still love some of his classics, and The Shootist ranks up there as the only movie that has caused me to shed a tear. (aside from anything by that fat slob moore, or al gore, I laugh so hard I HAVE to cry.)

Don't send them too fast, I might need to buy a bracelet from ya first!

I hate a couple things. First and foremost the guy with the revolver who fires a rapid 15 shots without reloading. Actually any gun that shoots way too many times sans a reload pisses me off. Then there are the gunshot wounds that really don't bother guys so much. They take a round in the shoulder and it's "ah well, better wrap a bandage on it and keep trucking...." I've seen a guy who was shot, it was a .22lr and he was screaming bloody murder, begging the EMTs to cut his leg off it hurt so bad.

I took a small pin punch, and drove it out from the back (one tap) I then filed it flat, and polished it. installed it from the front using a piece of plastic to get it just a hair below flush.

Well my waiting is finaly over! Talk about suspense, I ordered it right before TWP went on vacation, so I never did get a tracking number. Arrived via EMS today labeled as "socks" lucky me the customs guys never bothered to open the package! On to my mini review: Right off the bat it looks great. the blue on the chrono hand is a bit odd, more of a metallic paint than the gen looks (though I've only seen pics of the gen) The other big flaws are the "L swiss made L" which covers too many sub second marks, and the font on the subdials, the numbers are too thin. I can live with those. I could NOT however live with the dimpled, inset cg pin, which I promptly fixed. Prior to fixing that however, the cg itself fell off! I'm a bit disappointed with the quality of steel used in the case, it's just too weak to hold threads. One lug stripped as I removed the rubber deployment (I did manage to get my favorite strap on, but it isn't coming off until I've got some screw shaped springbars) Back to the CG for a minute. The pressure of the lever on the crown is enough to strip out the threads in the holes holding on the cg. Being that I am impatient, and I always have some epoxy on me I proceeded to give the inside of the stripped holes a coat of epoxy. I coated the screws in some of my wax polish, and let them dry before this, so as to act as a release agent. Once the holes had a bit of epoxy in them I screwed on the cg and let the new threads dry. Problem solved. If you aren't the type who enjoys tinkering just to make your watch wearable, I'd advise caution (or get TWP to QC it first. I did NOT do that in the interest of saving time.) I've allready received my acrylic crystal in the event the one on it cracks, so I'm set there. In all honesty I'm sort of bummed. I got a good hours worth of tinkering done, and there isn't anything left to do. my 90 is still in progress, and my 111 is in pieces. But now that it's happy, and on my wrist... it looks amazing. By far one of the best looking and feeling pam reps I own. It's legitimately the first rep I've seen that I absolutely couldn't tell is fake on someone's wrist. It has plenty of visual flaws, but the physical size of the flaws, and the limited nature of the watch mean that on a wrist (assuming the person attached to the wrist isn't comatose) they are all but impossible to spot. Never again will I have to rip off my PO or my 111 because someone enters the room wearing a real one. (yes I've done it before, and yes I'm getting pretty damn good at swapping to my BM in the blink of an eye) Oh yeah, and just in case you felt like asking... NO the 7750 doesn't flyback. Shame really. I'll work on some pics tomorrow at work.

Just going to say: not a fan of the strap. But if you are, rock it out. I don't wear watches to appease others, I wear them because I like them. That said... that strap looks as though it were dragged behind a car. Repeatedly. My personal way of "distressing" a watch band goes as follows: wear it in the shower, (if your watch can't handle that, get the band wet, then install it) and wear until dry. I then scuff the finish a bit with some green scotch brite. Follow that with umpteen coats of shoe polish.... and you've got a winner. Looks like a well used (not abused) band. can be done to the most inexpensive bands too, makes them look as though they belong on a pam.

Another update: I made a boo boo: I stripped the threads on the cg screws. But being that it's a cheap watch (and I can pry it off if need be, had to once allready) I epoxied the cg on. Looks real good now, better than I expected. Since this is turning into a frankenstein, I figured... what the heck, why not go balls to the wall? I'm currently testing some different solders to see which one polishes up most like the case material. Guess where I'm going yet? If you answered "why cope you're going to fill in that ugly hole in the side of the case!" you're right. More to follow once/if I find a good match.

The Zigmeister comes to mind. You also should ask yourself how much sentimental value is worth, as servicing/repairing a movement can be pretty expensive. In some cases it's cheaper to just buy a new one.

HA HA! Success! Alright it's not perfect... yet. But belive me it's damn close. I got to thinking "man you're so damn good at everything chances are you can whip that 111cg into shape and fit it onto that 90 case." so I took out my needle files, a tube of flitz, and some auto body sandpaper (1000 and 1200 grit) and voila. In the time from my last post to now, I've managed to enlarge one of the screw holes (the one UNDER the lever, to hide my nefarious activity) polish the brushed cg, and trim the cg to fit the case. Now I've got the big, fat, flat, flush pin in my cg, and it's polished. I need a bit more trimming to get the cg completely flush, but it's close enough you wouldn't notice until I hand it to you. Just thought I'd update you all before I take it apart and keep filing the cg. just a side note: whatever pot metal these cg are made of, it files like brass and aluminum. Which is great if you use hand tools, and it polishes up incredibly easy. But if you try a dremel ... be CAREFUL!

Thanks for the answers SS. I think I'm going to end up botching this together using some hand tools

Ok in the land of firearm sights, there are both tritium and luminous paint types. Meprolight and Trijicon both have tritium powered sights. if you break the glass vial you won't get any glow. The vials have a coating (I forget right now, but it's some type of phosphor) and that coating is what get the tritium gas to glow. No coating, no glowing. I'd be real wary about messing with radioactive material (here in the US at least) and be real real sure about the laws.

Oh heck no. This cg is the ugliest, cheapest looking/feeling one I've ever seen. It's got sharp corners and a tiny pin. It's really the biggest flaw on the watch. (Maybe it's just me, but something like that I can spot on someone's wrist, date-font, the shape of the A in Panerai, those things I can't see on a moving wrist, so they aren't terribly important to me.) I'm close to drilling out the hole and fitting a larger pin, and I'm real close to griding on the cg itself to make it more appealing. If I could get away with it I'd find a way to fit the 111 cg on it, it's already a far better shape, and has the right pin, but alas the holes don't line up, and the cases have a different curve. Surprisingly the crown is pretty nice. too few teeth, but very good bevels on the side of the teeth, gives it the impression of being quite fat, much like the gen.

I'll have to look into it. Does anyone who owns a 27 from sillix happen to know if the cg holes are the same as other pams? Is there a "general" size for that? That and the date pusher are the two HUGE problems with this watch. The dial looks pretty nice from what I can see, but this case is just laughable. One of those "decent rep, terrible watch" kinda watches. My 111 was a terrible rep, but an excellent watch.

35.9918 mm.

I hate to say it, but it really isn't possible to make SS look like Ti. You can make it look MORE like Ti (and glass beading it at a very low psi is the way I'd recommend) but it doesn't really look anything like Ti. Kinda like brass and gold. Sure the brass can resemble gold, and there are things you can do to help it, but it will never look anything like gold.

Right, so I picked up a 90 recently with a busted stem (fixed with a little help from my dear friend Dacron 5 min epoxy ) and while it's a great looking watch, the case and CG are ridiculously cheap looking and feeling next to even my Asian 111 from Andrew. Now I already tried swapping the parts, and nothing fits (the 90's got a larger crystal, differently spaced holes for the cg, and a different threading on the case back.) So does anyone know of a good way to fix this up? Or am I going to have to take matters into my own hands (meaning my hands, holding a dremel, file, and sandpaper?) Oh yeah and this stupid button for quick-set date makes me want to shoot whoever thought of it. I'll take good old slow date before I take another hole in a pam case, thanks.

Don't sand it. I did that. screwed up a perfectly good set of hands (anyone have an extra set for a 111?) and [censored] myself off. I guess, if all you're worried about is the cannon pin being flush, then yes you can achieve this through sanding. HOWEVER if you expect your watch to continue to run beyond any point where the two hands cross... then you have to bend the hands, which looks ridiculous. And when you bend your hands back to normal... they break. I've got the higher canon pinion and hour wheel in my latest order from CousinsUK, we'll see how tough it really is to do on your own. It's cheap enough, that's for sure.

Not too shabby. Just remember this simple rule: The angle of incidence is the angle of reflection. If you take a piece of paper and get it's reflection into the angles not covered by the background or the light, you'll have one pro looking shot. Just think of light as being a stream of water, and bounce it from the angle of the bezel (or whatever) into the lens. Kinda like playing pool. Oh yeah and a quick trick to make the crystal look "deep" reflect a piece of black paper into it.

Correct spacing on the L swiss L as well. That is one hell of a good rep from what you can see.

I don't get it. Not even a little bit. I thought DSN Pams were "custom" doesn't that imply he at least looks and perhaps touches the watches in question? If so, why are so many people finding it necessary to keep sending watches back. You aren't the first person I've read about that needed THREE watches to get a decent one. If he isn't looking at the watches then explain how it's a "custom" please. And then there's the dial. It's terrible. We can nit-pick slight variations in font and the width of printing on the dial, but those numbers look as though they were cut out with tin-snips. Maybe you can toss a regular rep dial on that, it'd be a vast improvement. You'd think DSN would just buy standard rep dials and superlume them, his... I don't know the right word, perhaps "a-game" watches would be great then. Needless to say I won't be chomping at the bit for a DSN in the foreseeable future. He clearly knows what people expect out of his custom watches, but either doesn't care, or assumes most people are too stupid to realize he's sent a dud. And as to the $600 plus for a better rep... based on the pics I've seen, the modded ones TWP has look to be head and shoulders above that DSN. And they're only $500. Who pays for the EMS every time a DSN isn't right? If the customer has to... that watch just jumped in price by $90, not to mention the WU fees from the get go. I need another beer.

Thanks Turbo. Looks like I made the right choice then. After my edit I stared at the two (192 and 253) and realized that there were just too many flaws on the 192, so I took the plunge and ordered a 253 instead. The older case (Ti) looks much better than the new case, but the old dial is missing the lume by the subdials (they are too close to the edge of the dial) the caseback says stainless steel, and the pushers are polished. The new one is ss. So it's just plain out of the question. The 253 is pretty darn close. Couple small flaws, but you need to hold it, or have a photo of it to notice (I can't count how many markers L Swiss L spans on someone's wrist, and without a gen to compare it to (absurdly unlikely, there are only 500 of them in existence) the sub-dial font is pretty tough to call. Not to mention if I sold all my belongings I MIGHT be able to afford a 253, but there is no way in hell I'm picking up a 192 and still coming to work clothed, and in a car. Now I'll have some competition against my Boss' Gen Daytona. He's started to warm up to reps as well, and wants a rep of his watch to wear while traveling abroad. Gotta figure out if anyone makes a good rep of a TT pre-2000 Daytona.

So I've spent the last half hour searching through old threads (made it back to april of 06) and have yet to find any real input on the 192. Specifically the ones offered by TWP. I noticed the dials are different between the one on leather and the one on the bracelet. I'm having some real trouble finding any images of GEN 192s, but from the tiny image I did find it appears the leather model is more accurate (fewer markings on dial) Do any of you more knowledgeable types know which model is correct? Should I avoid the 192 and stick with the 253? I'm jonesing for a new pam, and the chrono models are really looking appealing. The Titanium would be pretty darn cool (IMO) which is what's drawing me to the 192, but if it's got glaring flaws (aside from the street price of $27,000) I'd probably stick with the regetta flyback. Edit Ok I finaly dug up a nice pic of the gen. Looks like the dial is pretty close, with the font on the subdials being too fat. The L Swiss L is better than on the 253 (it's too big on the 253) and the pushers are polished, but should be brushed. I can live with those small flaws. I think I'm going to go pull the trigger.

If you are asking for the best looking 111h you will be happier if you save up the cash and spring for a NICE one. If you jump the gun, and buy a half-assed rep, knowing full well that for a little more you COULD have gotten a 99%... you'll kick yourself, and likely buy the modded watch anyways.