Logan

I saw a genuine royal oak clock on a local auction site recently if anyones interested. Price was around $900us roughly though.

Yes theres a few of us Kiwi's here. I've had zero issues with customs over many years collecting, just order away as normal and you shouldn't have any issues.

Lathes and Mills are a lot harder to operate than they look. Especially for complex 3d curved shapes like watch cases. No offense... but it sounds like you're miles out of your depth if you don't even know how to use the machines.

Looks like it would benefit from some refinishing around the clasp parts, but all reps do. A Dremel or similar and some rubber grinding and polishing wheels do a great job of this. Otherwise an awesome rep. Can't see a link to the DG movement version on ET site.. anyone point me in the right direction quickly?

Removing the bezel won't help with the lume dot, there is no hole in the back of the bezel, You'd need to remove the triangular bezel marker, or perhaps drill the existing lume out from the front without removing it. I removed the markers using heat (gas burner) to weaken the epoxy holding them in place, then broke the markers out from the glue.. but I was doing this on a throw away case.

The bezel fits using the usual wire retaining ring, but its quite heavy so takes some serious force to remove it. The bezel markers are all glued in place including the 12 with the lume dot.

I assume you have the seconds at 9 version? I have one of those apart. THere are three main parts, the Bezel, the bezel mounting ring, and the case. In addition the inner bezel ring (printed) mounts in between the Bezel and the bezel mounting ring. The visible rubber gasket is just an o-rong which is put on after everything else is together Everything is glued together.. So to take thing apart you need a small press. Its only low grade glue so mine at least came apart pretty easily. Sorry I don't have any pictures. I used JB Weld to reassemble mine along with the o-rings which were fitted.

Some of the fakest people I've ever met have been the ones who brought the most expensive watches in an effort to impress.

Due to the dimension of the Rolex 31xx movements vs any of the clones or Eta's you can have the correct rehaut depth or the correct crown position and guards or the correct case thickness. You can't have all of them, The non-rolex movements just don't allow this. The winding stem on the Rolex movements is substantially closer to the dial then any of the alternatives. If we ever get the long rumored / wished for 31xx clone movement or another movement with the correct stem position then we'll see these issues solved, until then don't hold your breath, you just can't do it.

In parts of europe where reps are actually illegal to own (Italy and Switzerland specifically) its common for AD's to confiscate watches, as the owner can't exactly go to the police. Where I live the AD would be on court in theft charges if they tried that. Only the importation of rep's for commercial purposes is illegal here.

Oddly attractive.. and I'm intrigued by the quartz / fake mechanical movement concept. I'm tempted to grab one just for curiosity value

Great to hear, My U2 should be here in the next day or so.

A lot of fights with dealers on the boards have started from stuff shipped back to China, its not very reliable it seems. If you have the option to have the watch repaired locally I'd do that in preference. If you do send anything to China be very clear about the address, and if possible have the dealer send the address in Chinese to attach as well as the english version. Use tracking.

I don't think Hublot has shipped any genuine King Powers (based on reading the gen forums), so this must be made from Photo's which would explain inaccuracies. Actually it looks pretty good to me, but I really don't get into the King Power design so I'm no expert

Great tutorial thanks. Another trick I use is nail clippers !! The sharp blades and the blade shape often allow then to grip even if only a tiny amount of the broken part is protruding.

I would be VERY surprised if our chinese friends have managed to make a rattrapante movement.. but never say never when it comes to reps. The pics do appear to show two separate seconds hands mounted on different levels but I suspect the movement is still a regular 7750 and that moth second hands are fixed to the regular seconds post. It does look very well made even though the design doesn't do much for me.

I've been doing this far to long.. I started out reading Andre's board, I guess that must be around 1999 / 2000 / 2001 or so?, I really don't remember the year. Later on Repliacollector.com was formed and we all joined up there and started posting properly. After TRC I've mostly been posting here at RWG, although I drop by the other forums from time to time. Happily I avoided the scam sites early on, nearly dropped $1200 but something didn't feel right so I passed. My first proper rep purchase was from a dealer called Wade, a Seamaster, I still have it. After that I brought from River for ages. Since I've dealt with pretty much all the guys. TTK stands out, he rang me a few times, we had a great chat about all kinds of stuff. He may have been high maintenance as a dealer but he was a very interesting guy. I often wonder how he is these days? His health wasn't that great last I heard. I'm also happy to say I've never been seriously scammed, in fact I think a couple of small parts are the only things that have never arrived. As for the watches.. well that have been a few... I guess probably near to 100, I still have all the good ones, about 40 in the collection now. I'll post some picture one of these days.. should make some of the newbies jealous I expect... The cost? Well I could certainly own a decent big name watch for the money, but I would never have had as much fun or satisfaction, and I couldn't go a month with a change ever day!! I also wouldn't have taught myself the basics of watchmaking on a genuine Patek or AP. I'm sure I'll keep doing this for a while yet, although I'm pretty fussy about what I order these days. If I can say anything about the rep history, its that the newbies have no idea how great they have it. no idea at all. The Quality and attention to detail today blows me away ever time I open an EMS package.

Nice review.. I'd never really considered Sinn watch before this rep came out, but this is definitely a rep purchase for the near future.

I've never owned a gold watch.. the entire collection is steel, titanium, dlc coated, ceramic etc

Its nice to see a few of these make it out of the safes and onto wrists. So many got locked away from new by speculators hoping for a huge profit. Clearly that hasn't happened as suddenly they are easily found at pretty much RRP or even slightly less. I passed by the local AD here today and was amazed at the selection of previously impossible to find models sitting in the windows. Greeen subs, Deep Sea's, Steel Daytonas.. etc.

Theres a spring inside the clasp which is also the part that locks onto the mushroom shaped part on the folding arms of the clasp. Often these spring need a bit of tweaking to get them to align properly. To get to that you need to push out the pins holding the cover plate inside the main clasp body. Use a normal bracelet adjuster to do this. Sorry no time to do pictures.. hope that helps..

Great story. It just shows that 99% of the general public know nothing at all about watch's apart from how to read the brand name.

I wear my reps everywhere with only two exceptions: 1/ Critical business meetings where the consequences (however small) of being called out over a fake are not worth the risk. I own some gens anyway for these days. 2/ Visiting high end watch stores where theres a higher chance of a rep being spotted. Also I think its bad manners to wear a fake to an AD anyway.

Solder will be far to soft.. I've made them in the past from 2mm stainless rod. A proper watch makers lathe would be ideal, but I used a dremmel type tool and ground the ends down to flat with a grinding stone. Hole the pin in the dremmel chuck, manually hold the stone against the spinning part.

Yes mine works as a 24 hour clock, as the real one does. Its one of the older ones on the chrono avenger Ti