Very Great of TC to address these concerns and put talk to the elephant in the room. BUT, in my humble opinion, that all seems redundant once starting to put other members, by name, into public humiliation. This is just plain wrong.
No matter who was right in this situation - and my best guess is that no one did anything wrong, and certainly not intentionally - there is just no excuse for starting a public flaming debate unless someone has deliberately scammed other members.
I, for one, will say that Ssteel has been a true sport always and in every aspect on this forum, and for anyone to assume that he would be stupid enough to risk all that good-will and reputation for this small issue is just sad. And for TC to post his personal conversations and Ssteels offering to do WR-testing, and make it out so it seems SSteel is a greedy and deceiving man is imo uncalled for.
TC has always been very friendly and helpful when I have mailed him, and has done SO much great for this hobby that we all owe him respect and gratefulness, but to be honest, this kind of public exhibition at the cost of others, just to promote ones own case really is not a gentleman move.
On the dial alignment issue - I think that the left-justification of the dial is a really acceptable compromise, and the date is much more important, and yes many gens have this very same issue. One thing, though, that I have seen on many reps - and unfortunately also on TC's is the the dial is crooked - meaning that the whole thing - movement + dial leans to the left, so that 12 o clock is not pointing straight up, but rather to 11:55 or thereabouts. This is just pure sloppiness during assembly, and for a 600 watch, rep or not, this is just not acceptable - but thankfully this can be fixed really easily.
As for the case being the same - yes and maybe. The case might be the same, but I know some people have speculated in different molds being used, when old ones wear out. This is perfectly natural, and just a fact of the process of manufacturing, but I have owned just as many TCs with skinny rehauts (actually more) as I have owned TC's with a nice deep and gen-like rehaut. This difference IS there, and it for me it does dictate whether or not the watch will be a keeper or not, as unlike all the other minor flaws we have discussed here, this cannot be easily fixed/corrected. The cases might have been made by the same factory and on the same machines, but these variances are a fact, and I, for one, could wish for this to be a fixed constant so that every TC will be the winner that TC's work deserves and has made possible.
My thoughts go out to Ssteel, and also to 911flyer who got kind of dragged into this mess unknowingly.
