What time is it? Watches and horology

I'd have had one for retail, but not now.

Plenty of "better" watches in the £300 range.

Same

One for the Speedy nerds. When Omega were submitting watches for later space missions in the 1970’s (under the working title Alaska project) one of the astronaut lead revisions was a 60 second bezel. A Tachymeter is fairly useless on earth, let alone space and most of the chronograph timing operations were less than a minute. The bezel appeared on prototypes (below) but never made it into production… until one guy in the US made some inserts!

https://www.radialproject.com/

I’m not going to put it on this Speedmaster but will build a bitsa over time, I think it looks dope.

2 Attachments

.

It looks "wrong" with such a sterile bezel.

Probably because the tachy is so ubiquitous on the speedmaster

Actual cool story though (bro)

Interesting story. It really changes the look of the watch - I was surprised by that.

The other great detail about that prototype is the so called 'radial dial' which has the extra sub-dial numerals which are super rare. Omega used this as well on the reverse panda Speedy Tuesday limited edition but they're crazy money so I'm thinking of taking a radial dial from a 60’s Seamaster (sacrilege!) and shoving it all in a Speedmaster case.

1 Attachment

The talented photoshopper Risto on OMEGA Forums ran with my idea and mocked these up…
Sorry for the spam, went to T4AP last night and feel enabled.

3 Attachments

Ooooo how was T4AP? Sad I missed it and you guys.

Yeh you’re going to hell if you do that to a 60s Seamaster chrono

Agree it jumps out but in a functional way, I think my brain just ignores what is actually written on the tachy bezel because I got used to it.

@jv I won't be breaking up any watches in my franken creation, strictly a parts bin build!

@ChainBreaker Missed you too dude, was a really interesting one actually. Simon Freese did a talk on his approach to hand making watch cases, there was dirty dozen discussion and history lesson on Smith's ill-fated attempt at quartz called the 'Quasar'. Pics to follow.

I liked the anecdote that the Smiths execs went to Japan and were given a tour of Seiko’s facilities, and on returning to the UK immediately cancelled all quartz project development.

The box of prototypes was so cool.

1 Attachment

Autavia vibes a bit.

Wednesday took a bit of a turn: jacked my job and bought a Breitling (in that order).

Just going with the flow...

1 Attachment

Why not… Congrats on both 👍

Picked up a mission to mars last week in France. Happened to be walking past an Swatch shop, saw a small queue, 30 minutes later had my hands on one. Limited choice and Mars was the best of a bad bunch. First impressions were not good but I had been wearing a sub for the week before and it doesn’t hold a candle to that obviously. Had a bit of time on the wrist this morning in the sunshine and it’s a nice enough cheap watch. I’ll probably keep it and I’d also queue for one of the grey ones if the opportunity came along in the same way.

Might even post a pic on Friday!

.

1 Attachment

Why not...

The very words with which CE Heath invented the non-marine insurance market!

I'm in good company then.

I went a bit crazy (crazier than usual) and need to move some “keepers” 👀 anyone interested in any of these?
1970 Omega Seamaster Chronostop
1973 Omega Speedmaster Mark II
70s Seiko Lord Marvel gold plated
70s Seiko Lord Marvel steel
70s CWC W10 issued
PM me if keen I’m sure we can work things out. Most of these (apart from the gold plated LM) are recently serviced too, so ready to be enjoyed.

You could always post a pic before Friday 😀

Congratulations. Didn't you sell a Breitling recently? I quite like that colour. Not mad on the others but that's fun.

1973 Omega Speedmaster Mark II

No! No! No!

Still want it, just waiting for it to be available online.

Pretty sure they've backtracked on that.

Something about online purchases lacking soul...

I wish, but no.

I'd been dithering for a while: tried orange 36mm but too cluttered; tried blue 42mm but wasn't gripped.

But they got the white in this week and next to the blue it was no contest.

As it's getting darker, I notice that there's a distinct underlighting effect from the hands on the dial. 😍

The lack of a date (halle-fuckin-lujah) and the unbalanced second hand make telling the time a p.o.p.

Oh, and I never even noticed the angled bracelet links until I had it on.

And it's hand winding too, which takes some of the PITA out of an auto.

PS Obligatory "wears small" comment [it really does though].