Hello from the UK

[Cross7]

Hello to all,

I'm finding the forum a fantastic place for information, advice, recommendation and opinion, so thank you.

I'm on an extremely steep learning curve at the moment but am enjoying the experience. I've found myself in this position by accident really. I've always loved watches and had various Swiss automatics over the years but only ever one at a time. I've always loved the 'tool' watches, particularly divers, so naturally have gazed at the various Rolex and Tudor incarnations over the years. However, I've never been in the position to afford one. 

Currently, I have an Omega Seamaster America's Cup Chronograph, which I've had for what must have been nearly 20 years. I have never had it serviced at all during that time. Feelings of guilt about the neglect I've shown it recently made me determined to get it done. For that reason, I started to look at reasonably affordable automatic watches that I could buy to wear while my Omega was away having the service. This was a real 'eye-opening' experience.

I naturally started looking at Swiss and Japanese watches due to me being familiar with those as a starting point, bearing in mind that I hadn't looked at anything for around 20 years. From there, I started to further investigate 'tool' divers on the web. This completely changed my thoughts about current automatic watches and showed the huge range of exciting products that now exist. From this point, I had well and truly been 'bitten by the bug' again. I started to gain an understanding of the 'indie diver' market and the companies that produce quality automatic 'homage' watches. Over the subsequent few months, I got a couple of Steinharts and a Helson, which all perform as well as any Swiss watch I've owned.

As part of my investigations, I came across information about the rep market. This again was a truly eye-opening experience. In my mind, reps were cheap, tacky knock-offs that family members picked up on holiday, which usually resembled something out of a Christmas cracker and lasted for a few weeks at best.

Wow...things have changed! Looking at what is being produced now, in terms of range and quality, is truly breathtaking. However, for me this created another dilemma. The idea of having reps of this kind of quality made me feel a little uneasy and made me look at what was being offered for sale as supposedly gen in an entirely new light. 

This is where this forum has been a fantastic reassurance. Reading about the philosophy of forum and the rules and guidelines made me realise that people here are genuine enthusiasts who have no intention of engaging in any unscrupulous activity but just appreciate the engineering, beauty and excellence of quality watches. Seeing how members will 'call out' people who are attempting to pass things off as gen on popular auction sites, thus saving unsuspecting buyers what could be literally thousands, shows how serious you are about protecting the enthusiast community and the public at large. Seeing the lengths people will go to to modify and perfect pieces, particularly the vintage watches, is amazing and the results are stunning.

I am looking forward to continuing my journey and further developing my knowledge and understanding and by turning to this forum I can feel confident that I will be in the presence of genuine experts who clearly have the members' best interests at heart, so again, thank you!

[Sogeha]

Welcome to the forum and thank you for such a long and interesting first post. 

[astonjenks]

Welcome and congrats on a great 1st post/intro. There's so much to learn and see. enjoy.

Regards


AJ

[Nanuq]

Cross7, welcome aboard! We embrace true enthusiasts here... and don't care if it's Timex or Rolex. Every brand has something to offer, as does every member. And we're all on a learning curve of some point so a little grace for each other is well understood (and appreciated!)

You mentioned the amazing builds our members have put together. This evening I saw a watch on eBay priced at $175,000 that's *supposedly* genuine, although there are things about it that belie that claim. And a member here has put together a build of almost exactly that piece, and his build is better in every way than that eBay piece. I'll leave it to you to do the sleuthing and see what I mean.

Welcome! You're among fellow WIS here.

[vlydog]

Fellow members, please join me in giving our new member the best of cordial welcomes to RWG!