A little background - since the first time I saw Ulackfocus’s Conguest I’ve been looking for one of those and a little while ago I finally found one (sorry for the dust on the crystal). I'll dare to call the dial mint. I'll let the pics speak for the rest. Two of the lugs is bend a little, but I hope the watchmaker can fix that. Here the pics: Crown is not original, though, and the original type is very hard to come by, so I decided to have a little fun trying manufactory one myself. First step was building a cad model and for that I needed good pics and a couple of measurements of an original. Dennis (Ulackfocus) was very helpful with both pics and measurements of his (thanks again Dennis): Result of cad work: [ATTACH]830926[/ATTACH] Next was the cnc milling the back: Then front. Tool diameter is 0.2 millimeter (0.008 inch) – the smallest I’ve ever used [FONT=Arial][COLOR=#002060][SIZE=3][COLOR=#002060][FONT=Arial][COLOR=#002060][SIZE=3][COLOR=#002060][FONT=Arial][COLOR=#002060][SIZE=3][COLOR=#002060][FONT=Arial][COLOR=#002060][SIZE=3][COLOR=#002060][ATTACH]66596[/ATTACH] [/COLOR][/SIZE][/COLOR][/FONT][/COLOR][/SIZE][/COLOR][/FONT][/COLOR][/SIZE][/COLOR][/FONT][/COLOR][/SIZE][/COLOR][/FONT] Finished and a little polish ahead: The idea is to try finding a standard crown, lath it down, and press fit my crown on it. The watch and crown is now on the way to Christian (Watch Guy) in the UK, for a service, where he also will check, if it’s the whole thing is possible or not. If he says good for it, next move is to decide: 1) Gold plating the crown. 2) Use my crown to do a rubber mould and cast a copy in 18 or 14 karat (will there be noticeable color difference in 18 vs. 14 karat?) . Anyone know if these came gold plated, or as a gold cap, from the factory? Any input welcome. And yes, I know it’ll not be exactly as an original, but for me it's close enough until finding something better…… If it's thumbs down from the watchmaker - well, I've had the fun then
WOW, what an amazing bit of machine work you've done there! I believe these were gold capped, however proper plating should work just fine. Making a mold and casting will probably loose too much crispness and detail. 14 and 18k gold do have a different color, although it depends on the exact alloy.
Most 'solid' gold crowns are actually gold capped because gold is too soft a material to stand up to the use a crown gets under normal circumstances. Gold's color depends on the formula used: http://www.watchtalkforums.info/forums/thread12005.html Nice work!
Superb Job Paul, full of such intricacies. I admire that you gave this a shot, let alone create such a good end product !!
Even better a completely solid, flush fitting version of the number 6 endlink sort of built like the 808 internally but no.6 looking externally as an aftermarket part for daily wear. Number 6's are such rubbish for what they are, would love to keep mine in the safe and have a solid alternative.
Amazin'! Is there a firm that did this for you from your CAD work, or do you have access to the hardware?
Thanks - I'll remember that if Christian say good for the project. I know he use this place http://replateit.com , though, but if you can do the same, it would be easier, if not being forced to ship it to Canada..... I'll leave the decision to Christian, though. Thanks.
Holy Feckin' Sheeyat - I want one of the finished products. Doesn't have to be plated, as I don't own a watch for it yet so I don't know what color the finish needs to be. Let me know when you have one so I can PayPal you the funds!
Christian does a lot of my watches so he knows me, let me know if you want my contact details for him - id do your crown but wouldn't want to redo your case - if you need that get Christian to send it away...