The Devil IS in the Details

[freddy333]

A funny thing just happened when I caught a glimpse of my watch out the corner of my eye -- I thought I had installed 1 of the lumeless gen Daytona handsets, because I saw only black lines on the hour & minute hands. No lume! Fortunately, after shifting my wrist in the light, the lume sections came back into view & all was right with the world again. But that initial scare got me thinking, which got me experimenting --

 

Viewed through a loupe, if you position a gen Rolex watch so that a straight (ie, non-Mercedes) hand containing lume catches the light in exactly the right angle (so the light obscures the separation between the lume & paint), the combination of black paint & lume forms a perfectly straight line down the entire length of the hand. Although they do not do justice to what is seen with the naked eye, these modified pics should give you a good idea of the general effect.

On the other hand, with (almost) ANY aftermarket Rolex hand (the hands included with The Big Kahuna are almost gen-like), because the painted black lines on the hand are both narrower & slightly offset relative to the lume section, the effect is that of a broken line with the lume appearing wider & slightly askew of the thinner black line.

This straight line effect affects all of the gen Daytona & Datejust hands I have checked. It is kind of interesting to discover these tiny details as you look closer rather than seeing more imperfections, which is the case with reps. I thought others might appreciate this --