Help please guys!

[predfan2001]

I have a friend who works on gen. Rolex watches. I have purchased all of my gens from him. I haven't seen him in a couple of years and I ran into him the other day. I told him that I was getting into mod'ing reps. He gave me a fairly nice vintage genuine 1680 dial and a tropic crystal that I would like to install into a rep. I need advise on which rep. best accepts a genuine dial. I've heard that some reps will not accept a gen. dial, they are too small in diameter for some rep cases.

I was wondering if anybody had any advise on this. I don't really want to invest in a MBW to mod. at this point, I am just getting started. I'm not a novice but I don't trust myself mod'ing a $450 watch at this point. I was wanting an ETA vintage Sub rep. to try this out on. I plan to get the rep., fix the cgs, install the tropic, put in the gen. dial and install a gen. tube and crown.

I trust your opinions. I have made a few bad purchases that made me realize that I should have asked questions here.

Thanks in advance!

[Guest avitt]

My suggestion:

Set that dial and crystal aside, until you feel ready to install them into an MBW (the only rep case which is worthy of these parts). In the meantime, pick up some cheap sub reps, and practice your modding techniques. There is plenty of material here to help tutor you along.

[eunomians]

There is only one way: you should buck up and get an MBW. This is after you get some practice on some cheapo reps like Avitt suggested.

If you don't want to spend $$$, pace yourself. Either way, MBW will allow you to use genuine parts. Like I said, you can slowly, over the course of a few months, purchae all the parts needed for your mods.

The dial feet will have to be cut off to fit onto ETA 2836 - OEM dial feet placement are different than ETA feet. You can use 3M double sided tape to stick the dial onto the ETA movement. Or you can use 'dial dots' which are sold at various watch supply houses.

Cheers

[Pugwash]

Don't even consider wasting those parts in anything less than an MBW.

[predfan2001]

Don't even consider wasting those parts in anything less than an MBW.

Yes friends, you are right. I am not at the level to start mod'ing a MBW yet. I've franken'd many cheap old manual and automatic "flea market" watches over the years. Replica mods are new to me but the techniques really aren't. I have many hobbies, one of which is antique toy restoration. I have restored some like new and some that looked unrestored using "vintaging" techniques.

Since starting this hobby I have purchased many watchmaker tools, new and old. Since I really like "old" stuff, my idea is to mod vintage reps. to really look like old watches. I really like Submariners so before I do a 1680 or a 5512 I am going to do one based off of a "vintage" rep. rather than a MBW. I have purchased a geniune dial off of eBay that I am 99% sure is an old refinish. They claimed it to be non-refinished but the ft/meters is over the Submariner. I have never seen an original layed out like that with a date. I plan to install this in a vintage rep. I know that it doesn't exactly fit, but I am working on that. Here's the dial, see what you think. I'll save my original for a MBW later on down the line.

And here's "kind of" the look I want, just not a red. Something that really looks old but runs good enough to be worn regularly:

Edited May 10, 2007 by predfan2001