Built your own dial and make youself a UNIQUE model

[Spboudart]

It's been quite while since I wanted to built myself a very personal watch!
I'm a big fan of Francisco's tutos and that pushed me further in my idea.

I wanted it to be Ti Pam based! (that's what I like)
A while back I ordered a Seagull ST-36 from a guy in Germany (to replace an asian 6497 in on of my Pam), anyway the guy screw up in is order and sent me a nice PVD 6498.
I kept the movement and he sent me the one I wanted for less than 25$.

The idea then came to build a Pam dial with second at 6!

I copied Pam blueprint and using Paint (that's the only thing I know how to use) obtained this:

I then make a basic drawing of my vessel (I'm a master in the merchant marine), still using Paint and put the 2 drawings together using Word.

I tried 2 different ship as I hadn't made my choice about having color or not!
At that point you can pick up whatever image you want to personalize your watch and have a very unique model.
Now I followed one of Francisco's tuto about placing decals on watches:

Bought myself some LIQUID DECAL FILM and some DECAL PAPER.
I printed my 2 drawing an the decal paper and applied a coating of liquid decal film and let the whole thing dry.

If you've ever been on a cruise ship or just a ferry, you must have seen Safety signs eveerywhere to show you direction to lifeboat, etc... Anyway those sign are called IMO sign and are made of self-adhesive photoluminescent vinyl so that if you have a total power failure you can find what you're looking for in the dark!

I had quite a few spare sign on board my vessel and took a piece of one to serve as support for my dial! I also bought some MICROSET and cut my decal to its dial shape:

Now I'm ready to go:

About 30 seconds in distilled water!
Time to put some Microset on the support and to slide the deal onto it.

I also had so MICROSOL so I applied a coating:

This step is not mandatory as our support is flat. But, be careful if you decide to do it, the ink almost washed away (I use an Inkjet printer on Inkjet decal paper, don't know if the same thing would happen using the Laser stuff).

Now I had in my spare part and old sandwich dial, I removed the upper part and sanded the lower one.
I cut my newly done dial and placed it on my dial base:

I then used my dremmel to make the dial holes:

The following steps don't need any comment as I just put the watch together.
Here's the final result:

I didn't take a lume shot but will post one later one, but no need to say that it's very luminous.

 

[Pix]

That is a very clever way to avoid reluming
That movement looks great and the dial too.

If you ever want to have a more resistant pinted image, you may use a polyester label and print it with thermal transfer : that kind of print will resist water and solvents.

It's fantastic to see where the knowledge aquired on the boards bring us

 

[747]

Good on ya mate! I am very envious of your skill and talent. That is a fantastic effort. Very very good tutorial.
A nice unique watch.
cheers
747

 

[Migge]

Very interesting and good work you done here!!

Maybe this will start an idea among all the skilled members to create some super dials

Thanks for sharing,

regards
Mike

 

[Spboudart]

Thanks all of you guys for the wonderful comments!!!
Encouraging!
Here are a few wrist shot:

And my attempt to a lume shot:

(Taken with a small Sony DSC T-33 camera)

 

[phillycheez]

very innovative! good work... i think your on to something.

i really wanna see that lume in person! an entire dial that lumes... how fun.

 

[Dr.Verylong]

Excellent idea. I have some luminescent tape left ("Trassierband") from the Bundeswehr that I could use but the sign is surely much stiffer and even.

Looks great, thank you for the tip.

Dr.verylong

 

[Cloudhopper]

Nice idea and you make it look very easy

I think it was a good call to go with the blakc and white picture, the colored one wouldn't have worked as well as this.

 

[Spboudart]

I think it was a good call to go with the black and white picture, the colored one wouldn't have worked as well as this.

I was afraid of the color with the yellowish support.

 

[BlueRod37]

whoooooaaaaaaaaa this is nice!

i"m really impressed you must be very proud of the result and for sure nobody has the same one !!
good job it's fantastic

 

[MEYER8888]

BONNE initiative, good job, on attend l ouverture de ta fabrique a aix en provence ahaha

 

[Exploder]

Coool! Now I have to get myself som decalpaper!

Xplodr

 

[russtang]

Pretty cool. Probably looks like a Timex Indiglo...all the time.

 

[5566]

remind me of doing this when modding my car speedometer.

 

[Spboudart]

A little update on this thread:

After a while 2 of my colleagues ordered similar watch from me, here they are:

I ended up also modifying mine into a blue color:

And last week, I finished for a another colleague a different model using the same movement as the one used in the Pam 027/028 rep or homage.
Odered the watch from Jackson and did a new dial:

The final result:

 

[levelmanroger]

Impressive work, Boudart!

Any chance you will start a sideline business creating custom watched to order? I'm sure many of us would be very interested - for our businesses, families, etc.

 

[Spboudart]

Impressive work, Boudart!

Any chance you will start a sideline business creating custom watched to order? I'm sure many of us would be very interested - for our businesses, families, etc.

It's not like I don't have the time.....
I just think I lost money on that last one!!!

 

[Epimetheus]

LOL!
This reminds me of my younger years when i pulled the glass and hands of a wake-up clock and glued a nice pic from a porno mag as a dial and then put the clock back together.
The clock was very popular among my friends, and I eventually gave it away.

Absolutely stunning work on this, Boudart!
Really impressive.

 

[Spboudart]

So after my last post on this thread someone pmed me and ask me for a custom watch. We got an agreement, and I just mailed him the watch this morning!
Here it is:

Lume shot:

And a wrist shot:

 

[CoolRob]

Very good tutorial. I follow the steps here and got one special for me. Check these out:

I need to practice more on the lume job