olreon Posted September 8, 2006 Report Share Posted September 8, 2006 As Ziggy has said - it's an assembly issue. Some are more prone to have interference between the hairspring and balance than others. And, as Ziggy has stated, it can be fixed IF it becomes a problem. yes that´s true. we fixed bigger problems than this, in the past. best wishes olreon Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pugwash Posted September 8, 2006 Report Share Posted September 8, 2006 I've tried to take pictures, but it's really hard to get the necessary depth of field, from the side, on full macro settings. Move out of Macro, take the pic, crop it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest avitt Posted September 8, 2006 Report Share Posted September 8, 2006 Move out of Macro, take the pic, crop it. Well, Duh! Thanks man...I didn't think of that. I'll try again tonight. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gattenda Posted September 12, 2006 Report Share Posted September 12, 2006 Yet another AMAZING post from the master- The Zigmeister... It seems that PAMs with this so-called "new eta 6497 movt" were released about 2 months ago, and the problems are only starting to surface now... Maybe we might begin to see more members with similar problems in time to come? Anyhow, one dealer I know (I'm not mentioning names, though) coincidentally emailed me today that he has reason to suspect that these movts aren't etas after all... Mystery...Mystery... my dealer confirmed that this is ASIAN. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
babola Posted September 13, 2006 Report Share Posted September 13, 2006 my dealer confirmed that this is ASIAN. How could he tell ?! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Linder Posted September 13, 2006 Report Share Posted September 13, 2006 How could he tell ?! It was stamped, "Made in China" Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
olreon Posted September 13, 2006 Report Share Posted September 13, 2006 i recived the "bad 6497" last friday. i inspected it and took a closer look at the hairspring. on friday everything was ok. i wound it up and let it work till today and still everything is ok, the hairspring is not bent. maybe it was realy a problem of the earlier "new bad 6497" that they have fixed in the later runs. best wishes olreon Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Watchmeister Posted September 13, 2006 Report Share Posted September 13, 2006 IMHO the bigger issue is that these are/were being sold as genuine ETA movements and they are not. I have no reason to believe that this is a malicious act on the part of the dealers. How would they know without taking one apart. But I will now always be wondering what movement we are getting in the next new "ETA" watch. Please tell me that this is not the same movement that was selling for $200 for movement only. A watch with this movement in it should be priced substantially less than a true ETA movement. I also would be curious whether the manufacturers are doing this to save money or because ETA parts are becoming harder to source. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gattenda Posted September 13, 2006 Report Share Posted September 13, 2006 How could he tell ?! donno... i'm just sharing what i was told... now, mine does have " (eta) " stamp on it like The Zigmeister showed. also it's been running pretty perfectly for the past week. i took a close look with my loupe, the balance wheel is spinning with enough clearance to stuff around and without wobbling. i'll keep monitoring... donno... i'm just sharing what i was told... now, mine does have " (eta) " stamp on it like The Zigmeister showed. also it's been running pretty perfectly for the past week. i took a close look with my loupe, the balance wheel is spinning with enough clearance to stuff around and without wobbling. i'll keep monitoring... hair spring looks good on mine too... may be i got lucky Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ryyannon Posted September 19, 2006 Report Share Posted September 19, 2006 Thanks for opening our eyes to this issue, The Zigmeister. I would never had a clue.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
V Posted September 20, 2006 Report Share Posted September 20, 2006 Same here.. Thanks Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
babola Posted September 30, 2006 Report Share Posted September 30, 2006 Took my new Fiddy from Andrew (Trusty) to my watchmaker for check-up & servicing if required. It cost me an arm and a leg but this is what he came up with ...and he's been in this business for over 30 years. - upon quick inspection thru the caseback crystal before openning it, he yelled straigh away - "Asian copy !" - then he had another look, again thru the caseback and said, hmm, this is interesting..."maybe not !" - I left him with my watch on Wednesday morning, asked for check-up of potential "hairspring and [censored]" issue and to oil it if required. - he calls me on Thursday afternoon - he said I will be in for a "surprise". Also, The [censored] and hairspring were all OK. The movement was oiled but only slightly, so he re-oiled it. - so, to cut it short, he told me the base movement was Swiss ETA - HOWEVER - a mixed pot of older and never ETA parts as well as Asian decorated bridges (well no surprise there we all knew about the bridges already) It seems like the balance wheel is real ETA (at least that's what he said) but taken from older style ETA 6497 mov't. He also pointed out that the finish on other wheels (sorry guys, forgot the name of those) was not as good as the finish we see on todays ETAs but the older ones did have this kind of rugged finish. The mainplate he says is OLD style ETA too, and that the ETA stamp is correct one - he actually compared it with an ETA mainplate he had from a 60 year old pocket watch, he said the stamp was the same. Other parts he said were the same as he had seen on new style ETAs. Screws were combination of old and new style. At the end of it he really got puzzled how the rep makers were able to find and combine so many "old' style ETA parts with the new ones in the same movement. Either that, or this is the case of trying to painstakingly reproduce the old style ETA mov't as Asian ETA 6497 replica, with the level of detail and finish far exceeding today's ETA mov't copies, but he couldn't see the point in that as it would be much easier to copy new ETA. So he confirmed it was ETA movement with mostly original Swiss ETA parts, excluding bridges and some other decorations. I guess I can rest assured now, at least I believe so :-) cheers, babola Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RWG Technical Posted September 30, 2006 Author Report Share Posted September 30, 2006 Great follow up information...thanks for the insight. RG Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
babola Posted September 30, 2006 Report Share Posted September 30, 2006 (edited) Great follow up information...thanks for the insight. RG Thanks Rob, on a closer inspection this is the link to the exact same 'Swiss ETA 6497-1' movement that comes in my Fiddy from Andrew: http://replica-watch.info/forum/viewtopic.php?t=3900 It had been offered by River for some time as a spare part. All the current Swiss ETA PAM127 Fiddy's come with this very movement in them. I examined the pics of 127s from Joshua, Eddie Lee, River, Andrew, Ruby, Sillix - just about all of our dealers, and they all come with this particular movement, same [censored] & bridge config as you've identified. The only diference is the case design (E0117/1950 or E0851/1950) and quality, and wheather the watch comes with Super Luminova and A/R sapphire or not. They (dealers) all refer to it mostly as "THE BEST", and price vary from high $200s to high $400s, depending on a dealer. These PAMs came onto the market roughly about the same time, beginning of July '06. The only exception to the rule is the latest Eddie Lee's PAM127 he adverised this week "THE BEST Sept 2006", that comes with slightly diferent 6497-1 mov't, but even he is unsure if it's genuine Swiss 6497 or not, although the ad says 100% Swiss ETA. Pics of the latest Eddie's Fiddy can be seen here: http://s39.photobucket.com/albums/e186/300...%202006%201950/ So, in retrospect, I guess we're either all 'doomed' with our Swiss ETA 6497 purchased from these dealers form July onwards, or we all got it right...only the time will tell...:-) cheers, babola Edited October 1, 2006 by babola Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RWG Technical Posted October 2, 2006 Author Report Share Posted October 2, 2006 More great insight. Good news is that the ETA balance wheel will fit on this model and correct the problem. Thanks for the update and research. RG Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Finepics Posted October 8, 2006 Report Share Posted October 8, 2006 Just to briefly ressurrect this thread I have just taken delivery of a 6152 with asian 6497 form Andrew. I just opened the back up to peek at the movt (which is like a plain base ETA with standard bridges and guess what - there is that same pallet fork [censored]! And I'm absolutely certain that the balance wheel is far from old ETA but actually very new asian which would also explain why there have been balance spring issues. Never come across that with ETA. The plot thickens. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gioarmani Posted October 8, 2006 Report Share Posted October 8, 2006 Hmmm--I wonder if my brand-new PAM005 logo watch from Davidsen has this.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
By-Tor Posted October 8, 2006 Report Share Posted October 8, 2006 This was one of the most interesting threads in a long time. Thanks to everyone who contributed. We know so much about these reps... the flaws, details, etc... but we don't know anything about where they're coming from... and who makes them... and how? It's all a big mystery, really. Another thing that makes reps fascinating. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
babola Posted November 21, 2006 Report Share Posted November 21, 2006 (edited) The Zigmeister, Mark and other watchsmits who have dealt with this particular "Swiss" E Series OPXI 6497-1.... can we get an update please ? Have you recently seen/dealth with any new batch of this movement type with issues, or was it the case of a dodgy early batch ? The reason I'm asking this is there are so many rep forum members currently "blacklisting" the particular movement, and giving thumbs down to newlyadvertised PAM reps containing one of these mov'ts. While a good part of them are noobs, there are also some longer standing members of these forums giving a bed rep to this mov't by simply relying on early finds by our resident trusty watchmaker The Zigmeister. I've been also exchanging a lot of PMs and emails with rep community members on this theme, but the general sentiment re this movement is not good. I for example have had two of these for few months now, both examined by my watchmaker...all OK so far, just as initialy reported in my previous posts to this thread. The Zigmeister, can you shed some more light on this movemen't if you may, and provide an update if possible. many thanks, babola Edited November 21, 2006 by babola Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RWG Technical Posted November 21, 2006 Author Report Share Posted November 21, 2006 I have since worked on a few more of these models, and none of them had the hairspring problem. I want to stress again, this is a hairspring issue ONLY, and easy to fix or replace the entire balance. I find it strange that people are blacklisting this movement, when it can be fixed easily, yet they still go out and buy a Daytona with seconds at 6, and all the UNFIXABLE problems that movement has...strange... RG Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Finepics Posted November 21, 2006 Report Share Posted November 21, 2006 I can also confirm that I have not seen anymore with any problems. My own has been running fine for several months now and I am very happy with it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
babola Posted November 22, 2006 Report Share Posted November 22, 2006 Thanks The Zigmeister and Mark, much appreciated ! :-) cheers, babola Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest avitt Posted November 22, 2006 Report Share Posted November 22, 2006 I find it strange that people are blacklisting this movement, when it can be fixed easily, yet they still go out and buy a Daytona with seconds at 6, and all the UNFIXABLE problems that movement has...strange... You shouldn't be surprised, The Zigmeister...Your word carry a lot of weight on these boards. Your initial post reported an inherent problem with this movement, and contained a warning. In the absence of other empirical data, I would say that is enough to change the buying plans for the majority of members. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vaccum Posted November 22, 2006 Report Share Posted November 22, 2006 I have serviced two of this movements and none of them had the Hairspring Problem. vaccum Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vaccum Posted November 22, 2006 Report Share Posted November 22, 2006 You shouldn't be surprised, The Zigmeister...Your word carry a lot of weight on these boards. You are 100% correct. First thing I did was to check the Hairspring. vaccum Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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