A Tale of Two Bracelets or Which GMTIIC is better and why?

panerai153 · August 31, 2015

This is a part of my continuing GMTIIC saga. Way back in 2009, I bought a GMT IIC off a fellow member. II thought it was pretty good until I posted some photos, and several member told me just how bad it was!! At any rate fast forward a couple of years, and I had and opportunity to buy a gen crystal, followed shortly by a gen bezel/inset and a dial. Our fellow member sneed12 undertook the modding job which was to replace the crystal, bezel and dial. I sent the watch to him, and shortly he informed me that my case would not work as it was not gen like construction, but he had a case that would fit, which he used. This was I believe a BP case.He put everything together and shipped the watch back, it has been a fairly regular wearer for several years. The only problem was I had a really nice watch that had several key gen parts, but the movement was the infamous ICHS (Incorrect hand stack). This really didn't bother me too much, but during the time of day or night when the hour hand crawled over the top of the GMT hand, it was and instant tell. I was not happy with this, but there were no real alternatives as sneed told me that he didn't think the rep CHS movement would work easily with the gen dial which he said was thicker. Then a couple of months ago, I found the solution, offered by our own master watchmaker misiekped. Yuki movement converted to GMT with gen Rolex parts Only problem, he didn't want to use the BP case, so I dove in and bought a noob V2. Both watches were sent up to him, and both bracelets stayed with me.

And by the way, I can't wait to get my finished watch back. with the addition of the yuki modified movement and gen hands, it should be a real "show stopper"

Now to the real reason for the post. I have read a lot over the past few months about the noob bracelet and how bad it is. There are posts on other forums that really throw this one under the bus. So while I had both a noob and BP bracelet in hand, I decided to take a few photos of them side by side and hopefully some of the experts can weigh in and explain exactly what's wrong with the noob bracelet. with my feeble old eyes, I can see some differences, but really nothing just jumps out and hits me in the head!!

Here are the bracelets. In the photos, the noob is on the left in the side by side photos and on top in the others. Hopefully folks can explain just what the differences are and which is more gen like. Feel free to use the photos, draw arrows, circle the offending part, etc.