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Hi guys,
This thread is dedicated to my recent build, the hulk.
First of all, i'd like to say that i'm no watchsmith nor 'certified' watch modder. I'm just a passionate Rolex fan that has an obsession for detail like many of us here. This build is, let's say, the fruit, of all the study and learning made here on RWI , since first signing up. Without you guys, this build wouldn't have come into existence, so i guess i owe it to you and RWI!
Last weekend while i was working on my hulk build, there was was a documentary about Hitler and his book 'Mein Kampf' palying on TV in the background, that was constantly stealing my attention. As much as i like history documentaries I switched off the TV and i said to myself, "i have no time for your fight, i have a fight of my own, with this damn watch!
) ".
Being my 1st serious project, you can imagine the stress i went through. It was also the first time ever i've used a crystal press and I was very nervous not to mess everything up and break the ceramic or the glass. Not only this, but my wife was putting pressure on me to go outside and enjoy the nice weather together)
So yeah, this build was a pretty intense and i can say it kinda earned it's name: 'Mein Hulk')
About the watch and the order :
I have to give a big thanks to Jay from Chazingtime. I changed like 4 watches and one bracelet till i got everyting almost the way i wanted it. Tbh I didn't think the guy would be so kind to change the watch so many times for me. I'm sure he hates me anyway) .
When the watch arrived / first impression:
The insert.
I have ordered 2 subs, one LN, one LV both v7 new batches. The fisrt thing that got my attention was the ceramic insert on both watches. Noob made a huge imprevement here over the previous versions. Both had very bright numbers and the color was silver metalic. It lacked the gen platinum shine of course, but still a very good copy.
Here are some pictures of the new insert compared to the v6s insert (green is v7 new batch, black is v6s):
The pearl looks to be smaller in diameter which is good and also seems to be just a bit less tall, which is also a good improvement.
The bezel.
The bezel is still wrong. I've said it before and i'll say it again, noob probably makes the scallops in a diffrent way than rolex does, at least in my opion. Rolex must be drilling the scallops with a rotating drill bit, approching the bezel from the side while noob must be using a disk that spins perpendiculary in relation to the bezel. Thus the shine of the scallops is diffrent on the noob bezel.
Here are 2 pics explaining this better :
Gen method:
Noob method :
Here you can cleary see the difference between the two:
noob:
Gen:
As i didn't manage to find a better picture online of the gen 6 digit scallops, here is a macro of the 5 digit TC which has a correct replicated bezel :
I've heared many say (including me) in the past that the scallops on the gen are polsihed. Lately however, i've come to a rather different conclusion. Zooming on the gen 6 digit bezel you can see the scallops are not shiny although the light is reflected by them. This is also true for the noob bezel, the light is reflected but the surface itself is not mirror like.
I'm not pretending to be an expert. This is just the concluiosn i came to after studying a lot of gen submariner pics and (when had the chance) the gen in person. If somebody else has a diffrent opion please share it with us here.
Judging by the new dial this noob has, i'd say the watch is a replica of a 2017 gen hulk. To me, on the 2017 gen, the scallops seem a bit wider than on the eralier iterations. Noob, got this almost right. The scallops are indeed wide, but look slightly taller. I usually made compariosons between the gen and the noob late at night, mostly tired after work ,so i invite others to share their opinion about this because i may very well be wrong.
The dial.
Big improvemnt from previous version here again. This time, the dial replicates an existing LV dial (2017).
The only difference i found between the rep an the gen is that the round hour marker surroundings on the rep dial are thinner than they should be. On the 2017 gen dial the round hour marker surroundings have the same thickness as the triangle or the rectangular markers.
Here is a picture of the gen 2017 dial :
And here is the noob dial (please ignore the black insert):
There is however a gen hulk dial that has thin round hour markers surroundings but uses a diffrent font and text layout:
This may be considered not to be a big deal but in fact i think it is. While the triangle and the rectangular markers reflect the light, the round markers have almost no reflection.
This makes for a pretty big tell imo because the bold "SUBMARINER" text is found only on the new 2017 dial that has fat marker surroundings.
The crystal.
The sencond thing that impressed me was the crystal. Again noob made a very very big improvement over the previous versions. The crystal on the v6s is shit, no 'black hole' effect of course and you could barely read the date through the cyclops due to heavy light reflections.
The new version has to have AR coating on both cyclops and the back of the crystal because the 'black hole' is certainly there. And trust me, i know what i'm talking about. Not as obvious as the gen's 'black hole' but very close. IMO the only thing setting these 2 apart is that the gen crystal has more glare and thus in relation with the no glare cyclops, the 'black hole' is more obvious.
noob is top:
I've heared about this improvement being reported here on RWI only once before, in a sales thread. The guy selling his noob explorer 2 chs, was mentioning that the watch had a new improved crystal. It also looked good in the pictures but back then i thought it was just a lucky angle.
The hands.
The hands look pretty good but still have sharp edges. The JF hands look nicer from this pov. Some say they lack the 3d look. I think the only difference between rep and gen is that the gen hands are buffed and have smooth chamfred edges.
stock noob:
After buffing :
The Date wheel.
On one of the wathces i rejected, the date wheel numbers were right justified and the '25' for ex. was crooked. On the model i chose, the date sits perfectly in the middle of the date window and has a nice shiny raised text. I think the v6s had the same, so i guess no big improvement here. The font print however is still lower quality than the gen's.
I know it may look like the date is still right justified but i assure you it's just the angle.
Here is another picture of the date:
The SEL.
On my v6s the sel was flush with the lugs because the bracelet was v7... On this newer version the sel was recessed but just a tiny bit, still not how i like it and not how it should be.
Seeing so many v7 s here on RWI, i knew that having a good sel on the v7 is a matter of luck. But why some have good sel fitment and some don't ? After carefully studying both bracelet and the lug holes, I think I found out what the problem is. The sel does not sit fixed in postion when mounted on the watch, it has a bit of a wobble. So if i applied some presseure on it, the sel fitment improved. I took the sel out, removed the springbar and putted it back in (holding it with my hand in postion). The fit was perfect.
So in conclusion, either the lug holes or the sel holes are not drilled in the right position and the sel holes have a bigger diameter than they should, this being the reason the springbar has room to play inside.
As for the gaps between the sel and the lugs, they are still present. As much as I tried to find a watch with no gaps, i wasn't able to. At least they are narrower than on my v6s.
The case.
The case is a huge improvement over the v6s IMO. Many say that the v6s has the best shape ever, but mine was certainly not the case. I've made several comments on the forum in exile about this issue . One lug was thicker than the other and had an overall bad shape. This new version has much better lugs. The light reflection comming from them is almost perfect like the gen's and not wavy like on my v6s for ex.
The bracelet.
The bracelet rattled like crazy. This is a step backwards from the earlier version. The previous version had almost no rattling and oiling it made it silky smooth, genlike. Oiling the new bracelet made little to no difference. I tried using the old bracelet on the new sub but the sel fitment was very bad having no recess at all.
The clasp.
The clasp on the LN version was better than on th LV. The cut (where you put your finger to open the clasp) was wider and correct on the LN while on the LV it was narrower, not reaching the edges of the center risen part.
The engravings on the inside are pretty decent.
Period correctness.
Mine has the double lined rehaut engraving which corresponds to the pre 2015 models while the shiny claps can be found on 2016 and newer gen models. The dial is, i think 2017 and still not entirely correct due to the thin round marker surroundings.
In a thread started recently by @smoke i found out, that a newer noob version is already out there that has the single line matrix rehaut, which is period correct with the shiny clasp and the new dial. This improvement will make an almost period correct hulk with a few flaws that can be addressed by swapping parts and some modding.
The conclusion.
This new version of noob lv submariner ( let's call it v7s ) certainly has many improvements over the previous versions but it's still not period correct and still not gen, lol. Overall it is a pretty good rep out of the box but in order to take it to the next level it certainly needs some modding.
To the modding then...
The first thing to have in mind when modding a watch besides better looks is making it period correct. Now this was a pretty big hurdle for me, because making my hulk period correct had it's drawbacks.
I don't know how the quality of the new matrix rehaut engraving on the noob case is, but it doesn't matter anyway cause at time i bought my sub this new case didn't existed and upgrading to a new case now doesn't make sense.
So, from my point of view i had only one option:
The only way to make a period correct hulk in my case was to use the double lined rehaut engraving v7 case.
The engravings on this case are very good and as i said before, the shape of the lugs has been much improved over the previous verisons. While you would think this case may be a perfect candidate, this would imply finding a v6s GENE VA sanded clasp and using a BP dial.
While sourcing a BP dial is rather easy, finding a v6s clasp is highly unlikely. Although i haven't tried it, i guess buying new from another factory is also not possible because BP and JF have also been making only shiny clasps lately. Thus, as much as i hate to say it , i've let go of the ideea of being period correct.
What bezel should i go for ?
The first thing that came to mind was to use a JF bezel. Judging by the pictures of the JF nodate sub for ex. i'd say it's bezel is better made than noob's( correct scallop shine).
But not knowing if the bezel would fit the noob case and JF having narrower scallops than the noob (and the gen noob is replicating), i've chosen to mod the existing noob bezel.
Here is a post i've made when RWI was in exile (bezel mod):
A gen rolex has bezel teeh shine that goes all the way around the bezel indifferent of the position you hold the watch in. Of course you will have to be sitting in a well lit room but still, i'm sure that many of you know that a gen sub will have that unique scallop shine all way round the bezel.
To me this is one of the most esential characteristics of a rolex sub. This scallop shine is like a signature and should not be neglected.
So no matter if you polish the v7's scallops the shine will not go all the way around the bezel .
Here are some pics that show better what i'm talking about.
TC:
Another picture of the TC with the exposure all the way down to better show the effect:
Noob:
This is because of the way the scallops are cut on the noob vs the gen or TC.
So in order to make the bezel look more gen like one would have to make some horizontal scratches to mimic the way the gen scallops are drilled. Here goes my 1st attempt :
Although the result was satisfiying at a first glance, looking with a loupe you one can clearly see that the tool i used was not suited for the job and thus the result was pretty bad and unconsistent throughout the circumference of the bezel.
I went and bought a larger bit and i went to work again. Here are the first pics:
You have to take in consideration that this is made at home and not using proffesional tools. So due to hand shaking i managed to put some scrathes between the scallops. No big deal for now, the bezel is a guinea pig anyway)
Towards the end i have developed a tehnique that alows me to get far better resuslts than before.
After carefully doing all the scallops, you can clearly see that the horizontal scrathcing is covering almost all the scallop area, not like before.
The socond step was to slightly polish the scallops because the tool used at the fist step was very rough so the scratched area was rougher that it should be. I fist tried polishing with a buffer but this seemed to be too much. So I rebrushed the polished scallops and moved on.
Instead of polishing the scallops i used a stainless steel wire bursh to slightly smooth the scratched surface of the scallops. This yelded a near perfect look.
So even if the surface of the scallop is not shiny when looking with a loupe, from a distance you will see that the shine is there.
The 3rd step is to repolish the upper surface of the bezel because it will get scratched during the porcess.
The 4th step will be to re-sand the outside edge of the bezel.
So here is the final result.
Okay, so that was my initial take on moddig the bezel. As i said the only major thing setting the 2 appart (noob and gen ) is the scallop shine.
The gen's scallops shine all the way round the bezel regardless of the position you hold the watch in. The GEN 6 digit has a similar shine but it's not so obvious due to the steeper angle the scallops are drilled at.
After looking at some macro pictures the conclusion is obvious. GEN scallops are not polished, are just drilled horrizontally in regard to the bezel, thus the shine is diffrent.
So as shown above, all i had to do is mimic the way the gen scallops are mare by making some horizontal scratches on the noob scallop surface. Easier said than done for sure) My first attempt destroyed the bezel. My 2nd attempt, even if satisfying at first( as seen above ), was also pretty horrible ) .
Using a dremmel and finding a a tool that is just the right size to leave scratches on the whole area of the scallop is pretty hard to do. Not only this but managing to not hit anything else in between is almost impossible. So after a lot of trial and error, i've came to the painstakingly conclusion that i have to do this by hand.
Imagine going 20 or more times clockwise and 20 or more time counterclockwise by hand with a round sanding tool for each scallop. This took me like 2 days to fully complete.
After finally finishing the bezel the shine was perfect but the surface of the scallops was pretty rough when looking through a loupe. So i decided to go at it once again using this time a tiny rolled piece of 500 grit sandpaper.
The result was much better.
Keep in mind that the bezel scallops shine like crazy now and the surface was finished with 500 grit!
The last touch i would've wanted to make on the bezel was to give the top surface a buffing just to smoothen out any sharp edges left by the sanding, but being affraind this might ruin the look, i left it as it is for now.
The crystal swap.
I've bought a gen crystal here on m2m sales at the same time i've ordered the watch. TBH i wasn't expecting the noob crystal to be soo good. As i said, the gen made a huge difference in the past but not anymore. If i'd had the watch before, i think i wouldn't have ordered the gen crystal.
One plus that the gen crystal has over the noob none the less is the gasket. The fit is much more tighter and the crystal is much more harder to press. So this must make the watch more better with water resistance.
Because i've already had a brand new gen crystal, i've said why not.
Here is some information i think most of you would find interesting. The noob uses a thinner gasket that is made out of a diffrent material which is softer. This is the case that when the bezel is removed, most likely the crystal will come out too. This was the case for both v6s and v7 and i guess this is one of the reasons water resistance is not so good on the rep.
The cystal mounted on the gasket will slide into position but pressing the reteiner metal ring over the gasket proved almost impossible using a plastic dye. After many tires and a lot of sweat, i've went back and used the noob gasket.
Pressing the retainer ring over the noob gasket was eeeasy. Filled with joy i went and put back the bezel back in and glued on the insert when .... surpize!!! the crystal was sitting lower than the insert! At this point i was pulling my hair filled with anger.
I had to carefully remove the bezel once again, but this time matters got worse. The whole assembly poped out and along it the crystal, retainer ring and gasket all in one piece . And because this time the insert was glued in properly you can imagine the trouble i went to in removing all the pieces apart.
This was the most freighting moment of the whole project.
The likelihood of breaking the glass or the ceramic was major and there were a few times i almost shit my pants))
After succesfully removing all the parts from eachother i want back to using the gen gasket as the noobs was already loose and unusefull. The only way i managed to pull this off was by sanding down the retainer ring and making a chamfred edge on the side facing the gasket. This allowed the rign to slip over the gasket and go into place. I had to use a lot of force to make the ring go all the way down and the plastic dye was pretty much ruined after the job was done. I guess using aluminium dyes is the way to go here.
I've also had to use a very thin double sided sticky tape for the insert in order to make the crystal sit flush with the insert.
The insert.
First of all i'd like to give a big shoutout for @d09624008 for hooking us up with this mod !
Going gen was a nobrainer to me. The cost is just too high to make any sense and to be honest the noob insert was so good that if spongebob ( user : @d09624008 ) didn't existed i would have happily left it as it was.
But since Spongebob does exist, ( hurray!!! ), i've sent him the insert right after receiving the watch. Let me tell you, the result is amazing! This mod certainly brings the watch to whole new level. It just ads that premium look to it, it makes the whole wathc more refined, premium looking. I was really blown away.
Amazing work buddy !
Not only the color is pure platinum just like it should be but the numbers have chamfred smoother edges (polished), making the font look fatter just like in the gen insert. This mod is defenetly a must!
Spongebob has a thread of his own and i advice you to check it out for details .
https://forum.replica-watch.info/threads/noob-ceramic-insert-with-platinum-plating.369081/unread
The SEL mod.
The good news: I've fixed the sel in the right position. The recess starts from the bezel and becomes bigger towards the end of the lug just like it should be.
The bad news: I had to glue the sel in place. That's right, i've used 2 part epoxy glue and glued the SEL in place. I know this sounds horrible but i was the only way i was able to pull this thing off.
What i did was, i put the springbars into the dremmel and used a file to sharpen the tips just enaugh to allow the sell to fully touch the case. This was the correct position that was unreachable with the springbars as they were. Anoter way was to make the lug holes bigger, but who would want to mess with the case anyway.
Anoter plus if you want when glueing the sel is that you can glue it exactly in the center of the lugs, making the gaps between the sel and the lugs equal and less visible on both sides.
The clasp mod:
The last thing i did to this watch was to mod the clasp and give the bracelet an oil bath.
Oiling the bracelet didn't make much diffrence this time but i still recommend doing it anyway.
I won't get into much detail on the clasp modding . There is a dedicated thread i've made just for this mod and you can go check it out by following the link below:
https://forum.replica-watch.info/threads/clasp-mod.372845/
All i have to say it's that all goes down to being patient, taking small steps at a time not to ruin the look (cause you can't go back once you've cut too deep) and using the right tools.
Althoug a very subtle difference, it makes the clasp more refined and really takes the bracelet to a new level.
Well... this was it. I hope you've enjoy reading it and i hope you'll like the watch.
And at last here are the pictures of the finished build :
Interior incandescent lighting :
Exterior natural lighting:
Bright sun light:
I really hope you've enjoyed this thread.
Please excuse my spelling and grammar. I wrote this in a hurry with my wife behind my shoulder again)
Cheers guys !
This thread is dedicated to my recent build, the hulk.
First of all, i'd like to say that i'm no watchsmith nor 'certified' watch modder. I'm just a passionate Rolex fan that has an obsession for detail like many of us here. This build is, let's say, the fruit, of all the study and learning made here on RWI , since first signing up. Without you guys, this build wouldn't have come into existence, so i guess i owe it to you and RWI!
Last weekend while i was working on my hulk build, there was was a documentary about Hitler and his book 'Mein Kampf' palying on TV in the background, that was constantly stealing my attention. As much as i like history documentaries I switched off the TV and i said to myself, "i have no time for your fight, i have a fight of my own, with this damn watch!
) ".Being my 1st serious project, you can imagine the stress i went through. It was also the first time ever i've used a crystal press and I was very nervous not to mess everything up and break the ceramic or the glass. Not only this, but my wife was putting pressure on me to go outside and enjoy the nice weather together
)So yeah, this build was a pretty intense and i can say it kinda earned it's name: 'Mein Hulk'
)About the watch and the order :
I have to give a big thanks to Jay from Chazingtime. I changed like 4 watches and one bracelet till i got everyting almost the way i wanted it. Tbh I didn't think the guy would be so kind to change the watch so many times for me. I'm sure he hates me anyway
) .When the watch arrived / first impression:
The insert.
I have ordered 2 subs, one LN, one LV both v7 new batches. The fisrt thing that got my attention was the ceramic insert on both watches. Noob made a huge imprevement here over the previous versions. Both had very bright numbers and the color was silver metalic. It lacked the gen platinum shine of course, but still a very good copy.
Here are some pictures of the new insert compared to the v6s insert (green is v7 new batch, black is v6s):
The pearl looks to be smaller in diameter which is good and also seems to be just a bit less tall, which is also a good improvement.
The bezel.
The bezel is still wrong. I've said it before and i'll say it again, noob probably makes the scallops in a diffrent way than rolex does, at least in my opion. Rolex must be drilling the scallops with a rotating drill bit, approching the bezel from the side while noob must be using a disk that spins perpendiculary in relation to the bezel. Thus the shine of the scallops is diffrent on the noob bezel.
Here are 2 pics explaining this better :
Gen method:
Noob method :
Here you can cleary see the difference between the two:
noob:
Gen:
As i didn't manage to find a better picture online of the gen 6 digit scallops, here is a macro of the 5 digit TC which has a correct replicated bezel :
I've heared many say (including me) in the past that the scallops on the gen are polsihed. Lately however, i've come to a rather different conclusion. Zooming on the gen 6 digit bezel you can see the scallops are not shiny although the light is reflected by them. This is also true for the noob bezel, the light is reflected but the surface itself is not mirror like.
I'm not pretending to be an expert. This is just the concluiosn i came to after studying a lot of gen submariner pics and (when had the chance) the gen in person. If somebody else has a diffrent opion please share it with us here.
Judging by the new dial this noob has, i'd say the watch is a replica of a 2017 gen hulk. To me, on the 2017 gen, the scallops seem a bit wider than on the eralier iterations. Noob, got this almost right. The scallops are indeed wide, but look slightly taller. I usually made compariosons between the gen and the noob late at night, mostly tired after work ,so i invite others to share their opinion about this because i may very well be wrong.
The dial.
Big improvemnt from previous version here again. This time, the dial replicates an existing LV dial (2017).
The only difference i found between the rep an the gen is that the round hour marker surroundings on the rep dial are thinner than they should be. On the 2017 gen dial the round hour marker surroundings have the same thickness as the triangle or the rectangular markers.
Here is a picture of the gen 2017 dial :
And here is the noob dial (please ignore the black insert):
There is however a gen hulk dial that has thin round hour markers surroundings but uses a diffrent font and text layout:
This may be considered not to be a big deal but in fact i think it is. While the triangle and the rectangular markers reflect the light, the round markers have almost no reflection.
This makes for a pretty big tell imo because the bold "SUBMARINER" text is found only on the new 2017 dial that has fat marker surroundings.
The crystal.
The sencond thing that impressed me was the crystal. Again noob made a very very big improvement over the previous versions. The crystal on the v6s is shit, no 'black hole' effect of course and you could barely read the date through the cyclops due to heavy light reflections.
The new version has to have AR coating on both cyclops and the back of the crystal because the 'black hole' is certainly there. And trust me, i know what i'm talking about. Not as obvious as the gen's 'black hole' but very close. IMO the only thing setting these 2 apart is that the gen crystal has more glare and thus in relation with the no glare cyclops, the 'black hole' is more obvious.
noob is top:
I've heared about this improvement being reported here on RWI only once before, in a sales thread. The guy selling his noob explorer 2 chs, was mentioning that the watch had a new improved crystal. It also looked good in the pictures but back then i thought it was just a lucky angle.
The hands.
The hands look pretty good but still have sharp edges. The JF hands look nicer from this pov. Some say they lack the 3d look. I think the only difference between rep and gen is that the gen hands are buffed and have smooth chamfred edges.
stock noob:
After buffing :
The Date wheel.
On one of the wathces i rejected, the date wheel numbers were right justified and the '25' for ex. was crooked. On the model i chose, the date sits perfectly in the middle of the date window and has a nice shiny raised text. I think the v6s had the same, so i guess no big improvement here. The font print however is still lower quality than the gen's.
I know it may look like the date is still right justified but i assure you it's just the angle.
Here is another picture of the date:
The SEL.
On my v6s the sel was flush with the lugs because the bracelet was v7... On this newer version the sel was recessed but just a tiny bit, still not how i like it and not how it should be.
Seeing so many v7 s here on RWI, i knew that having a good sel on the v7 is a matter of luck. But why some have good sel fitment and some don't ? After carefully studying both bracelet and the lug holes, I think I found out what the problem is. The sel does not sit fixed in postion when mounted on the watch, it has a bit of a wobble. So if i applied some presseure on it, the sel fitment improved. I took the sel out, removed the springbar and putted it back in (holding it with my hand in postion). The fit was perfect.
So in conclusion, either the lug holes or the sel holes are not drilled in the right position and the sel holes have a bigger diameter than they should, this being the reason the springbar has room to play inside.
As for the gaps between the sel and the lugs, they are still present. As much as I tried to find a watch with no gaps, i wasn't able to. At least they are narrower than on my v6s.
The case.
The case is a huge improvement over the v6s IMO. Many say that the v6s has the best shape ever, but mine was certainly not the case. I've made several comments on the forum in exile about this issue . One lug was thicker than the other and had an overall bad shape. This new version has much better lugs. The light reflection comming from them is almost perfect like the gen's and not wavy like on my v6s for ex.
The bracelet.
The bracelet rattled like crazy. This is a step backwards from the earlier version. The previous version had almost no rattling and oiling it made it silky smooth, genlike. Oiling the new bracelet made little to no difference. I tried using the old bracelet on the new sub but the sel fitment was very bad having no recess at all.
The clasp.
The clasp on the LN version was better than on th LV. The cut (where you put your finger to open the clasp) was wider and correct on the LN while on the LV it was narrower, not reaching the edges of the center risen part.
The engravings on the inside are pretty decent.
Period correctness.
Mine has the double lined rehaut engraving which corresponds to the pre 2015 models while the shiny claps can be found on 2016 and newer gen models. The dial is, i think 2017 and still not entirely correct due to the thin round marker surroundings.
In a thread started recently by @smoke i found out, that a newer noob version is already out there that has the single line matrix rehaut, which is period correct with the shiny clasp and the new dial. This improvement will make an almost period correct hulk with a few flaws that can be addressed by swapping parts and some modding.
The conclusion.
This new version of noob lv submariner ( let's call it v7s ) certainly has many improvements over the previous versions but it's still not period correct and still not gen, lol. Overall it is a pretty good rep out of the box but in order to take it to the next level it certainly needs some modding.
To the modding then...
The first thing to have in mind when modding a watch besides better looks is making it period correct. Now this was a pretty big hurdle for me, because making my hulk period correct had it's drawbacks.
I don't know how the quality of the new matrix rehaut engraving on the noob case is, but it doesn't matter anyway cause at time i bought my sub this new case didn't existed and upgrading to a new case now doesn't make sense.
So, from my point of view i had only one option:
The only way to make a period correct hulk in my case was to use the double lined rehaut engraving v7 case.
The engravings on this case are very good and as i said before, the shape of the lugs has been much improved over the previous verisons. While you would think this case may be a perfect candidate, this would imply finding a v6s GENE VA sanded clasp and using a BP dial.
While sourcing a BP dial is rather easy, finding a v6s clasp is highly unlikely. Although i haven't tried it, i guess buying new from another factory is also not possible because BP and JF have also been making only shiny clasps lately. Thus, as much as i hate to say it , i've let go of the ideea of being period correct.
What bezel should i go for ?
The first thing that came to mind was to use a JF bezel. Judging by the pictures of the JF nodate sub for ex. i'd say it's bezel is better made than noob's( correct scallop shine).
But not knowing if the bezel would fit the noob case and JF having narrower scallops than the noob (and the gen noob is replicating), i've chosen to mod the existing noob bezel.
Here is a post i've made when RWI was in exile (bezel mod):
A gen rolex has bezel teeh shine that goes all the way around the bezel indifferent of the position you hold the watch in. Of course you will have to be sitting in a well lit room but still, i'm sure that many of you know that a gen sub will have that unique scallop shine all way round the bezel.
To me this is one of the most esential characteristics of a rolex sub. This scallop shine is like a signature and should not be neglected.
So no matter if you polish the v7's scallops the shine will not go all the way around the bezel .
Here are some pics that show better what i'm talking about.
TC:
Another picture of the TC with the exposure all the way down to better show the effect:
Noob:
This is because of the way the scallops are cut on the noob vs the gen or TC.
So in order to make the bezel look more gen like one would have to make some horizontal scratches to mimic the way the gen scallops are drilled. Here goes my 1st attempt :
Although the result was satisfiying at a first glance, looking with a loupe you one can clearly see that the tool i used was not suited for the job and thus the result was pretty bad and unconsistent throughout the circumference of the bezel.
I went and bought a larger bit and i went to work again. Here are the first pics:
You have to take in consideration that this is made at home and not using proffesional tools. So due to hand shaking i managed to put some scrathes between the scallops. No big deal for now, the bezel is a guinea pig anyway
)Towards the end i have developed a tehnique that alows me to get far better resuslts than before.
After carefully doing all the scallops, you can clearly see that the horizontal scrathcing is covering almost all the scallop area, not like before.
The socond step was to slightly polish the scallops because the tool used at the fist step was very rough so the scratched area was rougher that it should be. I fist tried polishing with a buffer but this seemed to be too much. So I rebrushed the polished scallops and moved on.
Instead of polishing the scallops i used a stainless steel wire bursh to slightly smooth the scratched surface of the scallops. This yelded a near perfect look.
So even if the surface of the scallop is not shiny when looking with a loupe, from a distance you will see that the shine is there.
The 3rd step is to repolish the upper surface of the bezel because it will get scratched during the porcess.
The 4th step will be to re-sand the outside edge of the bezel.
So here is the final result.
Okay, so that was my initial take on moddig the bezel. As i said the only major thing setting the 2 appart (noob and gen ) is the scallop shine.
The gen's scallops shine all the way round the bezel regardless of the position you hold the watch in. The GEN 6 digit has a similar shine but it's not so obvious due to the steeper angle the scallops are drilled at.
After looking at some macro pictures the conclusion is obvious. GEN scallops are not polished, are just drilled horrizontally in regard to the bezel, thus the shine is diffrent.
So as shown above, all i had to do is mimic the way the gen scallops are mare by making some horizontal scratches on the noob scallop surface. Easier said than done for sure
) My first attempt destroyed the bezel. My 2nd attempt, even if satisfying at first( as seen above ), was also pretty horrible ) .Using a dremmel and finding a a tool that is just the right size to leave scratches on the whole area of the scallop is pretty hard to do. Not only this but managing to not hit anything else in between is almost impossible. So after a lot of trial and error, i've came to the painstakingly conclusion that i have to do this by hand.
Imagine going 20 or more times clockwise and 20 or more time counterclockwise by hand with a round sanding tool for each scallop. This took me like 2 days to fully complete.
After finally finishing the bezel the shine was perfect but the surface of the scallops was pretty rough when looking through a loupe. So i decided to go at it once again using this time a tiny rolled piece of 500 grit sandpaper.
The result was much better.
Keep in mind that the bezel scallops shine like crazy now and the surface was finished with 500 grit!
The last touch i would've wanted to make on the bezel was to give the top surface a buffing just to smoothen out any sharp edges left by the sanding, but being affraind this might ruin the look, i left it as it is for now.
The crystal swap.
I've bought a gen crystal here on m2m sales at the same time i've ordered the watch. TBH i wasn't expecting the noob crystal to be soo good. As i said, the gen made a huge difference in the past but not anymore. If i'd had the watch before, i think i wouldn't have ordered the gen crystal.
One plus that the gen crystal has over the noob none the less is the gasket. The fit is much more tighter and the crystal is much more harder to press. So this must make the watch more better with water resistance.
Because i've already had a brand new gen crystal, i've said why not.
Here is some information i think most of you would find interesting. The noob uses a thinner gasket that is made out of a diffrent material which is softer. This is the case that when the bezel is removed, most likely the crystal will come out too. This was the case for both v6s and v7 and i guess this is one of the reasons water resistance is not so good on the rep.
The cystal mounted on the gasket will slide into position but pressing the reteiner metal ring over the gasket proved almost impossible using a plastic dye. After many tires and a lot of sweat, i've went back and used the noob gasket.
Pressing the retainer ring over the noob gasket was eeeasy. Filled with joy i went and put back the bezel back in and glued on the insert when .... surpize!!! the crystal was sitting lower than the insert! At this point i was pulling my hair filled with anger.
I had to carefully remove the bezel once again, but this time matters got worse. The whole assembly poped out and along it the crystal, retainer ring and gasket all in one piece . And because this time the insert was glued in properly you can imagine the trouble i went to in removing all the pieces apart.
This was the most freighting moment of the whole project.
The likelihood of breaking the glass or the ceramic was major and there were a few times i almost shit my pants
))After succesfully removing all the parts from eachother i want back to using the gen gasket as the noobs was already loose and unusefull. The only way i managed to pull this off was by sanding down the retainer ring and making a chamfred edge on the side facing the gasket. This allowed the rign to slip over the gasket and go into place. I had to use a lot of force to make the ring go all the way down and the plastic dye was pretty much ruined after the job was done. I guess using aluminium dyes is the way to go here.
I've also had to use a very thin double sided sticky tape for the insert in order to make the crystal sit flush with the insert.
The insert.
First of all i'd like to give a big shoutout for @d09624008 for hooking us up with this mod !
Going gen was a nobrainer to me. The cost is just too high to make any sense and to be honest the noob insert was so good that if spongebob ( user : @d09624008 ) didn't existed i would have happily left it as it was.
But since Spongebob does exist, ( hurray!!! ), i've sent him the insert right after receiving the watch. Let me tell you, the result is amazing! This mod certainly brings the watch to whole new level. It just ads that premium look to it, it makes the whole wathc more refined, premium looking. I was really blown away.
Amazing work buddy !
Not only the color is pure platinum just like it should be but the numbers have chamfred smoother edges (polished), making the font look fatter just like in the gen insert. This mod is defenetly a must!
Spongebob has a thread of his own and i advice you to check it out for details .
https://forum.replica-watch.info/threads/noob-ceramic-insert-with-platinum-plating.369081/unread
The SEL mod.
The good news: I've fixed the sel in the right position. The recess starts from the bezel and becomes bigger towards the end of the lug just like it should be.
The bad news: I had to glue the sel in place. That's right, i've used 2 part epoxy glue and glued the SEL in place. I know this sounds horrible but i was the only way i was able to pull this thing off.
What i did was, i put the springbars into the dremmel and used a file to sharpen the tips just enaugh to allow the sell to fully touch the case. This was the correct position that was unreachable with the springbars as they were. Anoter way was to make the lug holes bigger, but who would want to mess with the case anyway.
Anoter plus if you want when glueing the sel is that you can glue it exactly in the center of the lugs, making the gaps between the sel and the lugs equal and less visible on both sides.
The clasp mod:
The last thing i did to this watch was to mod the clasp and give the bracelet an oil bath.
Oiling the bracelet didn't make much diffrence this time but i still recommend doing it anyway.
I won't get into much detail on the clasp modding . There is a dedicated thread i've made just for this mod and you can go check it out by following the link below:
https://forum.replica-watch.info/threads/clasp-mod.372845/
All i have to say it's that all goes down to being patient, taking small steps at a time not to ruin the look (cause you can't go back once you've cut too deep) and using the right tools.
Althoug a very subtle difference, it makes the clasp more refined and really takes the bracelet to a new level.
Well... this was it. I hope you've enjoy reading it and i hope you'll like the watch.
And at last here are the pictures of the finished build :
Interior incandescent lighting :
Exterior natural lighting:
Bright sun light:
I really hope you've enjoyed this thread.
Please excuse my spelling and grammar. I wrote this in a hurry with my wife behind my shoulder again
)Cheers guys !
