Jump to content
When you buy through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.
  • Current Donation Goals

My Franken 16610 Submariner


HauteHippie

Recommended Posts

Here are a few overdue pics of my franken sub. It started as an old school TW Best with lug holes. This long since discontinued old case is a great modding platform with its deep cylindrical rehaut, centered lugholes, and gorgeous thick crystal with polished bevel. Ubi's lead was followed for most of it, except that I wanted to emulate an earlier 16610 model with the lug holes. So my watch is very accurate compared to an A serial sub from 1998-1999 whereas Ubi's would be a F-or-later serial. The mods are: Genuine A-serial bezel insert, genuine crown, genuine tube, drilled lug holes for genuine spring bars, Noobmariner dial with super luminova, Noobmariner date overlay, Noobmariner hollow midlink bracelet, Noobmariner case back, shaped CGs.

A couple issues I have with the watch are: (1) I am not sure if this is the "right" crown. Can anyone tell? Maybe it's too old, but it doesn't seem to fit into the tube quite right. With the inner O-ring in place, the stem will just not go all the way in. So I've removed that O-ring until I figure out what else to do. (2) The hands are the original TW Best hands, and they leave a little to be desired. I'd purchase some surplus MBW hands or the hands than come on Paul's $149 ETA sub in a heartbeat. I wonder if Paul sells parts. (3) Although the lug holes are drilled and do accept gen springbars, I've currently got a set of non-gen bars in there that came from TJGladeRaider. The Noobmariner bracelet can be drilled for the gen bars, but the holes break through a little on the underside of the bracelet. So, I've got two bracelets - one for gen bars that is drilled and one for TJGR bars that is not drilled. The nice thing about the TJGR bars is that they fit into the drilled lug holes and in the undrilled bracelet.

A few pics below. Macro photography continues to challenge me. :rolleyes: Thanks for looking. Comments welcome.

226668-13062.jpg

226668-13063.jpg

226668-13064.jpg

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Great watch and work, chief!

I have the same but have only installed OEM bars and insert. As you say, the case and crystal are excellent on this 16610 & it's probably the best Sub case ever produced. I have a spare hollow mid-link bracelet that I need to drill and install.....thanks for the reminder. :)

Your crown is fine & looks to be the correct 7mm gen. I think the issue you may have is that there is a bit too much metal at the base of the crown. If you could remove a tiny bit of metal from the case so the crown sits deeper in the CG, I think you'll be quite happy with it.

Thanks for sharing!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Great watch and work, chief!

I have the same but have only installed OEM bars and insert. As you say, the case and crystal are excellent on this 16610 & it's probably the best Sub case ever produced. I have a spare hollow mid-link bracelet that I need to drill and install.....thanks for the reminder. :)

Your crown is fine & looks to be the correct 7mm gen. I think the issue you may have is that there is a bit too much metal at the base of the crown. If you could remove a tiny bit of metal from the case so the crown sits deeper in the CG, I think you'll be quite happy with it.

Thanks for sharing!

Thanks for the comments. The Zigmeister gets credit for most of the work. About removing metal from the case, I'm not sure... The case is already counterbored for the gen tube, and has already come dangerously close to breaking through on the underside. Essentially, there's no more metal to remove from the case... The problem is that with the inner O-ring installed, the crown just doesn't fit into the tube. The Zigmeister sent me 3 rings to try and I had no luck with any of them.

Agreed. Quite amazing!!! (watch and pics) :1a:

A true compliment coming from you, sir. Outdoor / natural light pics, just for you! But I still need to attend the TTK school of macro lighting and composition (especially).

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Nice job Chief. Great looking watch.

You could try Paul for a set of hands. He sent me an extra dial once, but I was ordering a watch at the same time. It's always worth a try.

Just thinking out loud on the case tube and crown situation. Would it be possible to remove the stem and crown and file down the top of the case tube w/o messing up the threads? Or maybe put an aftermarket case tube in there, kinda defeats the purpose of using gen parts, but if it works, so be it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Great work Chief,

this one looks fantastic.... :thumbsupsmileyanim:

I think you can change the datewheel with a gen one...

The Noobmarinerwhheel is good but the datefont is too big...

Than its a perfect masterpiece...

You're right that the Noob date wheel isn't perfect. You were buying gen date wheels off EBay at one point, right? I remember OFrei had some generic 3135 wheels but don't don't if the print is any better than the Noob. And, by the way, how do you make a 3135 wheel fit on a 2836?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

You're right that the Noob date wheel isn't perfect. You were buying gen date wheels off EBay at one point, right? I remember OFrei had some generic 3135 wheels but don't don't if the print is any better than the Noob. And, by the way, how do you make a 3135 wheel fit on a 2836?

yepp, you can get them on ebay...

Just glue them on the existing datewheel...

Fits good...

Hope this helps...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest RiverwindMDS
Thanks. If you happen to remember the seller ID who had them, send me a PM. A quick EBay search yielded nothing.

For me too...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Actually, I used "rolex date" and then just wade thru all of the Date watches, etc! This guy is down in Sugar Land which is a suburb of H-town. He's not the greatest, but I also noticed he has ETA Rolex hands. I've bought other rolex type aftermarket stuff from Clark Watch Supply- nostalgia2000, with good results- but as I recall, ubi didn't like his sub hands. I don't know if this guy's hands are any good, but you can see he has a lot of aftermarket stuff. BTW, I'm not planning on making a purchase from Paul at this time, because I bought his Perfect Sub last month, I just haven't gotten around to dealing with my TW Best case, which entails drilling the lugs holes more on center than they already are, in other words, I have one of the cases w/ the off-center holes!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...
Please Sign In or Sign Up