How to Replace an Asian 21j

[Francisco]

It is know that many times has no sense to repair a replica with an Asian 21j movement. The repair may be very expensive in comparison with the cost of the watch. The objective of this tutorial is to show how to substitute / replace an A21j movement. For that reason I bought a broken submariner from a colleague of a Spanish forum. Here follows a picture of this submariner.

The equivalent of the A21j to be bought is the DG2813. This movement can be obtain, for example, from Ofrei (USA) and Cousins (UK). Follow the links:

http://www.ofrei.com/page1119.html#16874

http://www.cousinsuk.com/catalog/4/40/1921.aspx

The DG2813 beats at 21600. The equivalent version beating at 28800 is the DG4813 (Ofrei) and DG8413 (Cousins, wrong name in this webpage). The DG2813 is very cheap: $15.40 at Ofrei,

[Slartibartfast]

Fabulous Francisco! Thanks for sharing your tutorial with us. You have proved that with the cheap cost of replacement Asian 21J movements that it is well worth fixing up 'Asian' reps. Well done!

[hyster]

Well done and thanks for sharing that, nothing in watch repair is ever straight forward is it, little wonder The Zigmeister is so busy.

[andreww]

Good tutorial, but I would suggest transplanting the sub datewheel into the 2813 as it would eliminate the whole gluing and alignment process. I recently swapped the 4813 in my UPO Lite, and as 4813 is only available with white datewheels, I had my watchmaker swap them for a couple of dollars.

[Francisco]

Good tutorial, but I would suggest transplanting the sub datewheel into the 2813 as it would eliminate the whole gluing and alignment process. I recently swapped the 4813 in my UPO Lite, and as 4813 is only available with white datewheels, I had my watchmaker swap them for a couple of dollars.

I tried it. No chance. First you have to unglue the date wheel in order to be able to unscrew the date plate. The glued date whell in the submariner is covering one screw..and there are more problems....

[Fireman_Fred]

Excellent tutorial Francisco

[vric]

nice info here. thanks

[scoobs1971]

Great tutorial! I've done this a couple of times myself and it's fun to see that I had to make the same decisions as you had.

[DemonSlayer]

Thank you so much Francisco, I have been looking for a tutorial like this for ages, I now have somewhere to start when I will update the movements on my asian 21J reps.

BTW, does anyone know if the DG4813 @28,800 BPH will fit a Datejust?

[ajoesmith]

I tried to see if there was interest in the DG4813 movements for $20 shipped but no one was interested!

Maybe now they will be?

[yt74]

Great job! Thanks for sharing.

[ajoesmith]

I tried it. No chance. First you have to unglue the date wheel in order to be able to unscrew the date plate. The glued date whell in the submariner is covering one screw..and there are more problems....

Yes thats correct but you still do not have to glue the datewheel back on, just swap date wheels, ill show a pic later if i have time of how to do this.

[Guest porsche356a]

These are the kind of posts that make coming to htis forum exciting. Thanks for sharing this with us.

[Toadtorrent]

Yes thats correct but you still do not have to glue the datewheel back on, just swap date wheels, ill show a pic later if i have time of how to do this.

That would be great if you could.

@Francisco...very interesting.

A question for the Rolex experts...is the glued on datewheel with the "thinner" numbers more accurate than the original thicker or "bolder" datewheel with teh gule all over it?

[AMK000]

I welcome the Spanish (and European) The Zigmeister.

Bienvenido Fran.

[ajoesmith]

OK very quickly

i dont want to take anything away from Francisco, he has done a great job in this tutorial.

I would just like to add that you dont have to take the date wheel overlay off and have the hassle of re gluing.

Please also note that this movement is complete, its missing a few parts, so please dont worry about the overall condition of the movement or any finger prints on it, i took these pics just there now and didnt really care about the movement so...

Quick pictorial

Base movement, Dial and hands off

Arrow showing the 3 screws, 1 is easy to get to as its in the middle of the movement, the other 2 not so easy as the datewheel covers half of the screw head

Arrows show the datewheel overlay is on top of a white piece of plastic, i have also highlighted the white plastic in red. Why is there white plastic?

Using a small screwdriver, the whole white plastic disc has been removed, datewheel overlay is still in tact, no re gluing required!

Here you can see how the white plastic datewheel sits on the actual movement date wheel disc, the movement date wheel has holes in it for the white date wheel disc to fit onto, its just a pressure fit, no gluing

Now the 3 screws are easily accessible!, simply remove the top plate, take off the date wheel and switch date wheels with what ever movement you want to use, then do the revers to reassemble.

This method requires you to take off the top plate of the movement revealing the date mechanism and requires a steady hand. If you are more comfortable doing the glue method by all means do it.

Thats what i like about sharing info on how to do things, everyone has their own method, just like Maths, you can arrive at the same answer but use a different method!

[Francisco]

Yes thats correct but you still do not have to glue the datewheel back on, just swap date wheels, ill show a pic later if i have time of how to do this.

Hopefully you are right. But I cannot see teeth in the datewheel (left side of the picture). It is very hard to obtain the original datewheel (submariner). if you have a look to the original date wheel of the submariner (right side of the picture) I damaged some teeth in order to remove it.

[ajoesmith]

OK it looks like we have got different date wheels, my sub was a noob sub just bought last month.

How old was yours?

[Francisco]

OK it looks like we have got different date wheels, my sub was a noob sub just bought last month.

How old was yours?

No idea. I bough it from a person of a forum.

[scoobs1971]

@Francisco: did you loosen the sping tension before you took off the balance? If so, do you have a pic that shows the position of the release button/lever?

[Francisco]

@Francisco: did you loosen the sping tension before you took off the balance? If so, do you have a pic that shows the position of the release button/lever?

Yes, I took a picture, that follows. I did not post it because has no sense replace the balance wheel, as we found that they are not compatible.

There is a small spring where the screwdrives is placed. The arrrow shows the direction you have to push with the screwdriver. Same procedure in the DG2813.

Francisco.

[sssurfer]

Awesome tutorial on a very desired and very deserved topic, thanks!

An added, special thanks for finding the 4813 on cousinsuk! :thumbsupsmileyanim:

For those who love PAMs, I'll just add that the Asian 21J with small seconds @9 is the DG3809.

[capice]

This is why I love this place, another thing learned. Tnx Francesco, fantastic write up m8...

[warren18]

I tried to see if there was interest in the DG4813 movements for $20 shipped but no one was interested!

Maybe now they will be?

If I can swap my 21J's with a 4813, I'd be interested. I've got a beginner mariner LV from Andrew that I want to use as a guinea pig to start learning about movements and modding. I fully expect to have a non working 21J by the time I'm done messing with it. Perfect opportunity to get it running again

[Flashman]

Cheers Francisco, great tutorial. Now I can't wait to try it out on my Noobmariner.

Tom