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Albino GMT - New Sighting!
- Thread starter KJ2020
- Start date
Have Rolex made any white gmts? (Explorer offcourse and ”pan-am in the 70s but is there any other newer variants? It looks so cool, verry good job my friendGreetings fellow watchaholics, this project has been on my plate for so long, I’m so happy to have it completed. I bought the donor dial rep about 18 months ago. It’s a VRF “Oreo” GMT. I have other plans for it as well!
So the first step is removing the black surround hour markers. Standard stuff but it quickly turned into much more work than I expected. The white dial had tiny marker holes so that means drilling bigger holes, and the markers I wanted to use ended up looking rather off-white on the shock white background. So that means re-luming.
I drilled one slightly larger hole for the 6 9 12 markers, this makes it easier to set them and gives some room to pivot them for straightness without going so far that the glue escapes out to the side. The round markers needed bigger holes for the new marker posts, so those were drilled in two stages just to be ultra careful. This is not a difficult task but you have to watch for metal stringers as they can scratch the dial if you let them drag across it.
Next up is re-luming the markers. I stripped out all the old lume with acetone. I tried several different ways of making the lume ultra white including mixing some paint into the lume mix. That didn’t work well, it ended up non-uniform and splotchy. What worked best was starting with a base coat of Testor’s gloss white enamel mixed with thinner. The thinner makes it run smoothly to all the edges then evaporates out. It’s such a nice result I actually toyed with the notion of adding a few more coats and the hell with the lume, hah!
Top pic is paint fill, bottom pic is lume added
After the lume dries you can very carefully wipe away the excess on the borders with a soft cloth and some ISO alcohol. None of the round markers had any overspill.
Then you just use tiny dabs of glue to mount the markers on. I use BSI 30 min slow cure epoxy. After it cures, I go back and drop a dab on the backside of the dial. Then when that cures, I grind off any hardened blobs and sand it all smooth so nothing comes in contact with the datewheel.
Next up, the dial gets a bath. Yes! I discovered this one day while tinkering with a junk Hulk dial. I figured if you can wash a painted car you should be able to wash a painted dial. I’ve done this on many dials since then, including a gen. Obviously do this on a junk dial first, not on a matte dial, and not with water based lume. I use a high quality very soft artist brush and Dawn dishwashing liquid.
Rinse under the faucet, a quick blow dry and it’s immaculate. This is my default dial cleaning method now. Occasionally if you aren’t fast enough with the air puffer, you’ll get a tiny spot or two. Just rinse again, maybe a little extra brushing and blow again.
Finally, we can get to the install
Hands on
And boom, we got an Albino GMT, woohoo!
This is in a ROF case, everything is stock. The insert is paint modded. Here are some pics in different lighting environments.
I’ve often wondered why Rolex won’t make another white dial GMT, it’s such a nice combo.
Thanks for looking!
- 12/3/18
- 34,540
- 66,375
- 113
It's a pin vise bro. All manual pushing and turning. But they do have a separately rotating end cap like a jeweler's screwdriver.
Yes I use Molotow Metallic Silver but for gold I use a Krylon gold leaf pen. I tried many different gold ones too. Molotow and Posca gold are ugly shades on inserts, along with some others. Ewww.
- 12/3/18
- 34,540
- 66,375
- 113
Not a one since the 6542 Albino Pan AM. And like the 1675 Blueberry insert, Rolex is tight lipped about the authenticity of those.
Sometimes dial makers created samples to show to Rokex in a small number. Or sometimes tests prints were run with black ink on white just to check the design or the pad printer. Then these might get sold or given away even if not used officially.
Interesting article below.
In-Depth: What’s The Deal With ‘Albino’ Rolex Dials?
A first-of-its-kind white Explorer 1016 is set to be auctioned this week – here's the fact and the fiction behind these ridiculously rare vintage Rolex dials.
www.hodinkee.com
Space Man
Getting To Know The Place
I posted this under “What Are You Wearing Today”, but I thought this may be a better place for it …
I am not a GMT super fan, but this is beautiful.
If Rolex made this watch, I would buy it.
Have you ever played with Daytonas ?
I’ve always dreamed about a White Gold (or Stainless Steel) full metal bracelet Daytona with the Green (“John Mayer”) Dial.
Of course you would have to change the hour marker surrounds from Yellow Gold to White Gold (Silver color), and anything else on that dial that was yellow … so it may not be that practical.
I am not a GMT super fan, but this is beautiful.
If Rolex made this watch, I would buy it.
Have you ever played with Daytonas ?
I’ve always dreamed about a White Gold (or Stainless Steel) full metal bracelet Daytona with the Green (“John Mayer”) Dial.
Of course you would have to change the hour marker surrounds from Yellow Gold to White Gold (Silver color), and anything else on that dial that was yellow … so it may not be that practical.
- 12/3/18
- 34,540
- 66,375
- 113
Yeah, I agree with you, the transition is horrid. Even if you take your time and do the cross-fade transitions, it's still not right.The Omega Tai Chi GMT has been on my wish list for a long time but I would have to change the insert to all black. I can't excuse the way they did the color transitions, masking out some of the numbers. I don't like the way Seiko does it either, moving the borders below the whole numbers. But with such a stark constrast as black and white, the Rolex traditional color split on the numbers doesn't work so well either. The 18 can be adjusted a tad but the 6, IDK. Bit of an eyesore maybe.
I would perhaps not color the bottom half digits and just leave them platinum filled to lessen the eye soreness, even if that means worse readability, but I do agree that a Coke works the best for various reasons.
Hopefully, someone will manufacture a decent one.
It's sad really that Coke gets ignored this much, it's my favorite combo.
Space Man
Getting To Know The Place
Your watches always look so good … do you use the crystal that came with the replica, or do you ever “upgrade” the crystals on your builds ?
- 12/3/18
- 34,540
- 66,375
- 113
I upgrade them if they are bad. Some rep crystals have distortion or wrong mag level, etc. I use a lot of Clark's with AR cyclops from Ebay or a gen crystal on a really special watch. Keeping a crystal spotless and using angles that eliminate reflections go a long way toward improving photo quality.
So, looking at your meteorite dial, I wonder how it would look with the black surround markers and Explorer II hands instead of white gold. I’ve thought about that since Patrik did that beautiful meteorite dial.
- 12/3/18
- 34,540
- 66,375
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I do have this in the queue - will be adding black surround markers and a WG date window frame
Stretch242
Active Member
Hi Sir, do you think this is ok? unfortunately the Molotow 127.505 is not found in my country, I was thinking if this was an alternative.
Molotow mo227505 ONE4ALL Acrylic Twin Marker, Metallic Silver, Pack of https://amzn.eu/d/0mdFzsL
johnchpark
Active Member
Beautiful work!
I don't know if this might help you or not, but saw this Clean GMT 3285 case listed on Alibaba
I don't know if this might help you or not, but saw this Clean GMT 3285 case listed on Alibaba
High Quality Rlx 126710 Watch Case Cnc Case Kit Full Brushed Substitute Case Is Suitable For 3186/3285 Watch Movement - Buy 126710 Watch Case,Gmt Watch Case Product on Alibaba.com
High Quality Rlx 126710 Watch Case Cnc Case Kit Full Brushed Substitute Case Is Suitable For 3186/3285 Watch Movement - Buy 126710 Watch Case,Gmt Watch Case Product on Alibaba.com
www.alibaba.com
- 12/3/18
- 34,540
- 66,375
- 113
Yes bro, that looks like the exact same paint, just in a different pen. Use the thick tip - it has to be plunged inward a few times to start the flow.
