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Lets see your vintage watches
- Thread starter murklemark
- Start date
Buddhabar
I'm Pretty Popular
May I present to you this beautiful and simple HMT Pilot 17J hand wound watch. At 36mm diameter including the crown and 11mm in height, this is a small watch compared to today's men's watch standards. This particular piece here is a franken watch (the case, hands and movt are gen) and actually dates back to 1981. The original dial was ruined(dont really know how) so a replacement dial (aftermarket as neither do these watches or the factory exist anymore) was put on by the owner.
Once I got hold of the watch, I was quite tempted to play around with the vintagizing project so off came this dial. And the experi(ence)ment began. I just tried emulating the aged markers by using a bunch of household things and finally ended up with a dial that I think looks old/aged and beautiful.
I now have this idea of having the hands coated gold. Not sure how that would look (suggestions/opinions are most welcome and needed!!).
Over to you all to let me know on what you think.
Regards,
Russel
Sent from the RWI mobile app
Going minimalist today. [emoji38]
Cartel case on jubilee. I have successfully drilled out the lug holes and am now going to attempt to shave the crown guards. Is the tube pressed in or is it screwed into the case ? Advice is appreciated before I attempt removal
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Tube is screwed in
Going minimalist today. [emoji38]
Cartel case on jubilee. I have successfully drilled out the lug holes and am now going to attempt to shave the crown guards. Is the tube pressed in or is it screwed into the case ? Advice is appreciated before I attempt removal
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
So I was over at watchsmith, a chronograph master, just hanging out and learning about the V72 when he told me to look in a box for spare parts. As I was digging through I saw a lot of broken chronograph movements. A few V23 and even an extremely rare V237. But what caught my eye was an almost complete (well not almost but it's not too far from complete) Valjoux 72. Now we know this is what the vintage Daytonas runs on.
I quickly picked it up when I realize it wasn't a V72 at all! It was a genuine Rolex 727 (Rolex sources their movements from Valjoux and the further modify them into the 727).
My watchsmith says he was shocked he still had some in there. He's been working on chronographs for almost 40 years and at one point had many vintage Daytonas and spare movements. Most of them have been sold or complete for his own personal collection. He thought he sold all his spares but I found one that was left tucked into a box under the spare parts cabinet.
Seeing my enthusiasm he agreed to sell the incomplete movement to me and after some cleaning this is what it looks like!
I'm trying to source the rest of the parts right now. It's gonna be a long process but this is exactly what I need for my Daytona Yatchmaster prototype build!
I quickly picked it up when I realize it wasn't a V72 at all! It was a genuine Rolex 727 (Rolex sources their movements from Valjoux and the further modify them into the 727).
My watchsmith says he was shocked he still had some in there. He's been working on chronographs for almost 40 years and at one point had many vintage Daytonas and spare movements. Most of them have been sold or complete for his own personal collection. He thought he sold all his spares but I found one that was left tucked into a box under the spare parts cabinet.
Seeing my enthusiasm he agreed to sell the incomplete movement to me and after some cleaning this is what it looks like!
I'm trying to source the rest of the parts right now. It's gonna be a long process but this is exactly what I need for my Daytona Yatchmaster prototype build!
