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Daydate and explorer


Jblakes

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Morning all, 

 

Stumbled across this site by accident. I have a gen datejust, date, and speedking. I was looking to get either a datedate or explorer, both a 5k upwards. 

 

Can anybody or does anybody know if you can get one with a swiss movement, not rolex. With original dial etc. Basically a cheaper version of the real thing, but still with a swiss movement. They called custom build? 

 

Cheers in advance

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Welcome!

this place is the grail of watch forums!  You will meet wonderful people here from all walks of life that are both friendly  and  highly knowledgable and intelligent!

 

To answer your question, for the money you intend to spend you might even find the real McCoy.  To find an empty genuine  day date case or an explorer case is the hardest part of it all.  Movements are east to find even though they are also  scarce!

 

if you want to build a custom 18k gold day date,, you might want to try getting a star supply case and try to fit an eta Swiss mechanism, but the dial feet will not match up on a genuine dial,. Also I am not sure if a genuine dial will even fit in a star supply case!  This is where our technical expert member  Automatico can chime in!  He is a true asset to this forum along with some of the others that can make you feel like a child in a candy shop

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1 hour ago, Jblakes said:

 Im leaning towards to the explorer. I just didnt know much it would cost compared to an gen.

 

Regards

James

 

The explorer is harder still as you have close to NO chance of finding a genuine empty case  unless it is from a donor water damaged one.  You could try getting a case which is close to the real deal from yuki and have Justin  reshape it for you, but it won't be cheap!  Good luck!

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Swiss movements are still around, they just cost a couple of hundred dollars instead of $100.

This watch has a swiss 2834-2 in it. The dial is from Rafflesdials

SidOl9.jpg

This 1016 Explorer has a swiss 2824-2 in it- I call it the updated version of the 1016 since it has the 28,800 bph movement.

Z1kp0t.jpg

I typically just gather up the parts and have a watchmaker put them together. Mymanmatt built the DD, and my watchmaker put the Explorer together.

 

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I'd figure $600 to $750 each. I was looking at a couple of DDs over a Silix Prime the other day- maybe pick up one of those and put a swiss eta and a gen dial in there. A gen dial is whatever you have to pay on ebay or wherever.

As for the 1016, I'm not sure what you do these days. JMB is on an extended vacation so you can't get his case setup these days. You could check out rafflesdials.com and maybe get a case there and a modern dial. Check out Yukiwatch.com also for vintage dials. If you find a used Rolex 1500 or 5500 case, you can use it to build an Explorer. I think those cases will take a 2824-2 movement with a movement spacer- raffles #2 spacer.

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I stuck a JMB '1016' together and here is the story:

https://rwg.cc/topic/192105-jmb-1016-project-update/

 

The ST 18k gold cases will accept oem parts...dial, mvt, crown, bezel etc.  Looks like the only 18k case they have for 3155 DD is white gold...might as well use a steel case. 

The 18kyg ST DJ case for a 3035 was around $900 when I bought one in early 2001...because of $275 troz gold.  No way I can see paying $3600 for the same case now.

A ST 18kyg submariner case was around $1200 back then.

 

Ongoing gold DJ project:

I have an 18kyg  DD/DJ (for Eta movement) case but the dial opening is too big.  It came with an Eta 2834 and oversize DD dial but the dial was not very good so I never used the case.  Years later I bought a 'refinished' DJ 41 dial on eBay and a DW overlay for a DJ 41 dial/Eta 2836 but never got around to finishing it.  The case does not have any way to secure the movement...no case clamp groove or anything.  It originally had a plastic spacer and I am not a fan of plastic spacers in expensive projects. 

I worked on a 'Marathon' of some sort a while back and it had a metal spacer that fits against the movement main plate and the case back.  There was a thick rubber O ring where the spacer contacts the case back and when the back is screwed down it compresses the O ring to hold the movement in place.  It has to be a precision fit in order for it to work and if I ever finish this project I may go with this method.  The O ring has to be lubricated with silicone grease to prevent the friction from turning the movement inside the case and breaking the stem when screwing the back down.

 

Note on the 'Marathon'...

A friend had a Marathon dive watch and the crown threads went bad in a hurry (common problem).  He could not find a replacement crown anywhere (No Parts For You!) but he finally found a 'nos' replacement case somewhere and it had the spacer in it (his case did not have the spacer).  The case looked like it might have been a replica but I could not say for sure.  The case  back O ring was very small in diameter compared to his other case and the fit and finish was not too hot.

 

 

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fGwy1V.jpg

Here's another one of my budget replicas- I call it a 16238 with a $50 raffles dials case and a $25 riyi002 jubilee bracelet.That's a gen DJ dial and it has a 2836-2 swiss inside.

Come to think of it, it might be a 2836-1 inside- which was serviced maybe 5 years ago. If the gold wears off, I can replace the case and bracelet for $75 and swap out the innards in 5 or 10 minutes!

Here's the same watch with the $25 oyster bracelet

AN7Tka.jpg

The DJ gold case isn't exactly correct, but I try not to get bogged down with the details when I'm wearing reps. The Riyi002 bracelets don't have the Rolex emblem on the clasp, I've heard of people asking for them but I've never been able to get a bracelet with the Rolex crown on the clasp .

 

 

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On 5/29/2019 at 3:53 PM, jmb said:

I will be heading for the hills in about a week but when I get back (maybe in July) I'll crank out some case sets.

 

Would those Explorer cases accept a Rolex 1570 movement and gen Rolex dial?  Just curious, as I try to figure out if it is possible to do some of the "mostly" all gen parts builds on my wish list.

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1 hour ago, Jblakes said:

How much would i be looking to pay for gen case and bracelet? For vintage explorer?

Assuming you are talking about a 1016 ..... if you were lucky enough to find a gen case, you'd be looking in the $6,000-$10,000 range for the case. The last one I saw for sale several years ago was $6,000 for just the midcase and caseback (no crown, tube, bezel or crystal) and it was pretty beat up.

 

The 7836 bracelet is more readily available, and you would be in the $1,000 range.

 

At that point you might just as well go gen.

Edited by tomhorn
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