My Planet Ocean 45mm damaged to franken the story so far

[the_rymeister]

Hi all

Firstly sorry for all of you that have probably seen this model of watch a million times and there's nothing new here for you, but every day there is new guys n girls joining our community who havn't, hopefully someone will gain some sort of knowledge through this thread like i did 3 months ago. I thought i would share my build of my planet ocean 45mm from the start.

Alot of us these days are seeing the dreaded planet ocean stripped crown or tube threads or some sort of keyless works issue like i did when i first received my planet ocean 42mm, so what i did like most of us who have never stripped a watch or wouldn't have the bottle or patients to strip a watch is send it back to the dealer, in most cases this is on the other side of the world and is going to take possibly another 2 weeks!!!!!!

so off it went my 42mm planet ocean back to a trusted dealer who i might just add has been amazing every time i have purchased a watch from him.

luckily for me i managed to change the watch with the dealer and i requested a 45mm upo.... great now it's on its way to me...10 days later it arrives I pull the crown out and..............................it wont set the time or date!!

so after hours of searching the forum and speaking to some long time members between us we worked out it was a keyless works issue. so do i send it back and wait another 3 week(2 journeys there and back) or do i bite the bullet and fix it? you guessed i ordered a tool kit from offshore at watchbitz.com which is amazing and started stripping it down. heres my link to the keyless works repair if you need any help with it.

http://www.rwg.cc/to...__fromsearch__1

so now its working again i wore it a few times and cut a long story short ended up taking my watch apart about 4 times until i eventually found a broken part in the keyless works which all along was broken and i didn't realize!!

below is a picture of the part which was broken, as you can see on the left the little post is snapped off which holds the setting cog next to it. every time i put my keyless back together i thought you put the post in the hole and then put the setting cog on the post, i did think every time that is a very poor design but carried on anyway.it only became aparent there was an issue when i spoke to a few members and they pointed it out. thanks again guys.

so while i was planning on stripping my watch again i decided i would buy all the new keyless works parts and cogs from http://www.cousins.co.uk so i shouldnt get the same issues in the near future.

yes and you can see from the pictures i thought i would grab a couple of new spring bars for my strap incase i broke one...i thought i ordered 4 but i got 100 !!! so if anyone needs a spring bar or two let me know i'm sure i have a few spare

whilst i was taking my watch apart again i decided to upgrade to a gen crown and tube as i had previously seen so many posts and topics about the subject.

heres a couple of pics of the parts if anyone needed the part numbers.

and heres a couple of before pics of the crown

well i found a few thread on replacing the tube on the internet and thought that sounds pretty simple. the only worry is you have to get the old tube out of the case without damaging it, it was a bit worrying as once you start theres no turning back!!! not good when it's your favourite watch which you've only had a couple of weeks and costs you a few hundred pounds, i mean come on you wouldn't buy a £300 tv and take it apart in the first 2 weeks!

anyway heres a few pics firstly strip out the case back,dial, movement, take strap off and wrap in electrical tape to ensure its safe from pointy screw drivers and pliers!!!!

Then remove the stock crown,now i started off trying to remove this with a pair of small needle nose pliers as shown in picture but got to a point where i couldn't get the tube out so i used my made shift chisel and hammer and simple knocked it out, just take your time and try not to damage the case or crystal.once its out then just file the inside hole to clean up edges not to make hole any bigger as the gen tube is smaller than the rep tube.

now thats done i simply cleaned up the hole and mixed up some chemical metal and put a small amount in the hole and on the thread of the gen tube as pointed out with the toothpick.

Then i insulated one side of the watch and one side of my g clamp to protect the watch case and tube. clamp it up and leave it for at least 24 hours.

whilst that was drying i took a couple of comparison pictures of the gen and rep crown and you can also notice in the picture with the stem fitted how much more sturdy it is, as the stem in the rep crown is very floppy and lose.

rep crown on the left and gen on the right.

this is the end result of the gen crown/tube install

now that was all back together i started enjoying my watch and actually wearing it and not using it as an experiment on how to fix something i don't know the first thing about !

Then came my next problem,during the many dismantles of my watch i managed to slightly damage the dial and scratch the hands from removing the hands to many times, mainly from trying to set up hands for date change at midnight, which i can say after lots of attempts my watch now flips date at 11:58 so i'm pretty happy with that, any way the dial and hands wasn't majorly noticable but i could see it, none of my freinds noticed but it bugged me.

so luckily i met a new member on rwg who sorted me out a gen dial at an amazing price! thanks again buddy your an absolute legend!

so now i've got the gen dial but due to its radioactive lume it has i had to invest in gen hands as it would look completely out of place. so thats what ive been doing today.fitting dial and hands.

onto the pics.

one last before pic with white numbers

firstly out with the old

heres a couple of comparison shots of rep and gen dial, rep with white numbers and gen with orange. to me the only obvious difference is the date window which looks amazing on the gen and the gen dial is more gloss finished and the rep dial being more matte finish.if you clean the rep dial with a polishing cloth it leaves marks whereas on the gen it cleans it up a treat. and one other difference being the dial feet,

these are in the same place as the rep but are too short for the dial feet clamps on the movement,so all i did was put a couple of small blobs of super glue on the movement clamp to hold it whilst i fitted the hands.just enough so that it would be easily removed if need be.

the lettering looks pretty spot on,great rep its just mainly the lume that lets it down.

I apologize in advance for the next photos as my camera was playing up today and some pictures are not great, oh and the dust factor!!!

Right onto the hand install,the easiest way to do this i found is to use rodico putty/blue tac to hold hands and then push on with hand tool.

also make sure when you fit hands there is a good gap between the hands so that they don't touch each other or the dial,logo or hour markers because this with jam them up or damage them.

heres a few comparison pics of the gen vs rep hands, again the rep hands are very good,they look pretty much spot on again the only big tell is the lume strength which isn't a major issue if your not fussed about it.

Here we have the gen on right and rep on left. sorry about the seconds hand pic really hard to get both points in focus,even though the pics don't show it the gen orange tip really is alot brighter than it looks, i just didnt get a great picture.

now thats all done onto the finished article

and you can see how the radioactive lume wants to get shining in the next picture,this was just from working on the dial today in the light.

And finally the lume shot

i also got myself some dry chain lube in the week and cleaned and lubed my strap.which has made it feel amazingly smooth and silk like feel,a must mod to anyone with a stainless strap,i then went over it with a bit of scotch brite to polish out any scratches.

heres a couple more shots

And there we have it. hope you enjoyed my thread as much as i did building this watch.I must want to say a Hugh thanks to every one who has helped me with information or parts,I couldn't have got this far with out you or rwg. thanks for looking, and now onto the next project my upo 45 beater!

Ryan

[Adeodatus]

Absolutely fantastic. This is a must read for every PO owner.

[Jkay]

You are headed straight onwards towards Rookie of the Year ... to come in here, a straight up noob, learn about the models, buy a watch, fix it then mod it ... I'm very impressed.

[miagi]

Great build and awesome documentation of it !

[bamcky2k]

Superb! Lovly to see my old dial put to such great use-you were great to deal with bud and the end result is something to be proud of, aint nobody gonna call you out on that not being gen!

Looking forward to seeing the beater come together next!

Stay cool and wear that watch like a good 'un!l

[specialvat]

Great write up, enjoyed the journey

[ryaku]

That's what I call a great post bud,

congrats, you got serious skills now

[Original Scope]

Wow,great job. Great post.

[asf]

excellent post. you make me want one now!!

[paule12]

Excellent work story and pictures

[Logan]

Great work, and thanks for taking all the pictures to share.. we need more of those kind of reviews.

[the_rymeister]

Cheers for the comments guys much appreciated, and thanks again James for the dial and jkay thanks for the help when I originally had my dilemma with the keyless works.

[cougar1]

That's brilliant work and a fantastic write-up and pics Ryan, great read, this sort of detail stuff is superb, love it

[spooky driver]

Great write up....you made it look so easy!

Sent from my MB860 using Tapatalk

[sunnydale]

Great job! You have the skills!

[sgtguk]

Awesome write up and a fantastic quality build enjoy it !

[gran]

:o :o

Home MADE

[FxrAndy]

Great post, great watch, great work!

A little tip if you put your rodico on the end of a toothpic when you are fitting hands you have less chance of putting a finger on the dial.

[the_rymeister]

Great post, great watch, great work!

A little tip if you put your rodico on the end of a toothpic when you are fitting hands you have less chance of putting a finger on the dial.

cheers for the advise buddy I'll try it out next time

[danza1812]

You should go for that gen bezel insert

[the_rymeister]

You should go for that gen bezel insert

I really want to get a black bezel if I go gen, I just can't justify £200+ just to correct pearl I need to get a rep bezel for my other upo 45mm build if any one has one for sale

[mikellem]

Ryan, Not only did you figure out your own watch problems,

You went to the web and read, you received some help from

RWG member.

I am shocked not only to see your fix your own watch

being a noob to repairs, you documented incredibly

your work along with great photos.

I am very proud to see situations like this..they are far

and few between.

Congrats my friend!

Now where do I pick up this Omega?

Great job, well done..

MM

[the_rymeister]

Ryan, Not only did you figure out your own watch problems,

You went to the web and read, you received some help from

RWG member.

I am shocked not only to see your fix your own watch

being a noob to repairs, you documented incredibly

your work along with great photos.

I am very proud to see situations like this..they are far

and few between.

Congrats my friend!

Now where do I pick up this Omega?

Great job, well done..

MM

Thanks mm for your comments.

Pop over whenever your ready buddy and pick up the watch

[bamcky2k]

try it on the rubber PO strap you have too, will look like a totally different watch yet again-always good to have options!

as for the gen bezel like i've said before-its cool to have but not really worth it...plus alot of people dont know that the gen bezels insert is built into the bezel-not like the rep version where its glued on. people have removed it carefully but then you have to file down the gen insert on the back side to sit flat, or you can bond the whole bezel assembly in place (as the gen bezel doesnt fit straight on-too wide at the retention spring compared to the rep case...). defo not worth the 200+ quid new price, which is in effect the price of another rep...

gotta say again though thats a superb franken UPO now and an excellant write up on the whole process-if anything this should be pinned as the info is invaluable to anybody wishing to attempt the same.

[cougar1]

It looks great Ryan, agree with you the gen bezels are ridiculously priced, not worth it unless you can pick one up 2nd hand.... They've gone up retail since last summer when they were about £170 back then in cousinsuk.

I can't even imagine what parts for the newest ceramic PO 8500 would be like if we got to the stage of a good base case for a franken.

It'd probably be 500 quid for a dial and 400 for the ceramic bezel. I think we are in the golden age of franken PO's ...the new one would probably be way too expensive to franken....it's all still speculation at this stage anyway.