Afternoon all

Everyone on the forum who knows me knows that my passion is Omega watches and more over I have a real thing about the Megaquartz 2400 series of watches. Whilst a lot of people shun quartz because of current trends for manual winds and automatic watches, but for me these are amongst the most special watches ever made! I won't go in to the detail but in short for those not in the know they are the most accurate Omega ever made and amongst the most accurate watches ever made, accurate to 1 second per month and made way back when in the early 1970's!

This watch is a calbire 1510, realised in circa 1973/4, the watch came in a very similar case to the famous Marine Chronometer but without the plaque and 14K bezel, available in Stainless Steel or 18 carat gold and with basically the same movement!

The Calibre 1510 was most famously produced with an aventurine crystal dial, nicknamed the ‘Stardust’. The watch came in a number of variations of dials: stardust (silver and gold), waffle dial in black, blue and brown and electric blue dial.

The total production run of calibre 1510 was also 1000 units, around 800 of which were produced in stainless steel with a variety of dials and 200 were produced in solid 18 carat gold (weighing over 200 grams) with either stardust or electric blue dials.

The original list price in 1974 for a calibre 1510 was £604 in stainless steel and £3275 in 18 carat gold, by contract the Moonwatch was £134!

Anyway, to cut to the chase, a few weeks ago a mate in Aus (who is more famous for writing books on Omega divers) gave me a heads up on a watch that had just come to market, I contacted the seller and took a leap of faith, which was well and truly repaid!


The watch is basically as close to new as is possible, completely crack free dial (I only know of about 1/2 dozen others with crack free dials) and the case has only the lightest of wear marks:







But what makes the watch really special is this:



The first and only other owner of the watches is "Kikki" Kivimaki who famous raced Lancia 037's in the 1980's with Markku Alen, this very watch is inscribed and was presented to him for winning the 1000 lakes Finish rally in 1976 in a Fiat 131 Abarth, the watch came with the original Alligator band signed by Kikki, the back is inscribed 'overall winner' and the finish rally details, just waiting for the extract to return!





So all in a pretty rare watch to start out with but with this amazing history it becomes something really quite unique! The movement has just been serviced by Swiss Tec (STS's sister company) and is keeping time to 0.03SPD or better than 1 second per month! Pretty cool and what a history!!

Cheers Tom

 

Fascinating watch and car brand.. two great histories.

 

Cheers all

Yep extract will be an interesting one, should have the details later this week and the extract in a week or two

Cheers Tom

 

Couple of additional shots including the one with all the bits it came with







A mate from Finland has translated the inscription for me:

On the white sticker reads "Paristo poistettu" that means "battery removed".

Engraving:
Yleisvoittaja = overall winner. "Jyväskylän suurajot" is the Finnish name for 1000th lakes rally. Jyväskylä is a city in Central Finland where the rally was held (and of course they still rally there). "Suurajot" is a little bit difficult to translate but it could mean something like Grand Rally.

 

Hello all, first time posting. My brother and I took in the 2 watches below (SS and 18kt gold) on a trade and have been looking for information on the MQ 2.4mhz online and found your forum extremely helpful. I wanted to share these photos with fellow enthusiasts, glad to report both are keeping time and seem to have been cared for. Reading about these survivors has been both eye opening and, well, conflicting...I say that in the sense that we don't usually hold on to hobby items but the significant importance of the movements in watchmaking history has us thinking twice. Do any of you know of a specialist watchmaker that knows these movements fairly well to perform minor upkeep in the event we decide to keep them?. I am also trying to find out more info on the gold watch, it has a date from the 70's professionally inscribed on the back - just mentioning that in the off chance someone may know the history behind these two...I am almost certain they came to us via an estate sale or something similar. Thanks.



watch below and

 

What did you trade??

A kidney or two??




Tom will be able to give you some expert advice, all I can offer is a big like for two spectacular watches.

 

That and threw in a first born for good measure, ha. My brother traded for some watches that had been hanging around for a while. The stainless could use a polishing but as my dad used to say, "that - whatever- will only look like it does now once in your life...why change it?.". Thanks for the like and I welcome any advice any of you may have.

 

Congratulations, that's a great catch, both watches look lovely and in lovely condition. In serviced condition the SS version is worth between £1850 and £2000 in the current market, the 18k probably double dependant on condition of the bracelet and case (which both look good on yours)

Instead of repeating what I have already written have a look on Wikipedia and search Omega Marine Chronometer, I wrote this whilst bored by the pool over the summer (distant memories now) but this should give you all the information you will ever need to know

The critical factor with these is time keeping and dial condition, if the dial is cracked it will impact value by approximately 10-20% and if the movement is not keeping second accurate time again it will impact value by 25 - 50% (SS model)

finally servicing: there is only really one specialist place who have the parts and service these, a company called swiss time services in the UK, their Swisstec division cater for these watches (www.swisstimeservices.com or www.swisstec.com) but don't expect much change from $1500 each to service, they are really expensive watches to maintain (I have 10 in various guises now, ouch) if they are running on time (1 second per month) then they shouldn't need maintanance but having them serviced if you do sell them on will help the value.

please PM me if I can help further

Best wishes tom

 

Here is a link to the wikipedia article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omega_Marine_Chronometer

SS watch:

For information looking at the first pic the SS stardust is on an incorrect 1210/202 bracelet, it should be 1209/202, the MC and stardust bracelets were 2mm wider than the standard medgquartz bracelet. As you can see from the images your bracelet doesn't come completely to the edge of the case (which is should on both sides). Correct bracelets are between £150 and £250 if you can find one or later service bracelets are about £350 from Omega, there is also a leather option still available from Omega for around £150

There appears to be a couple of small cracks, most noticeable above the 10-11 markers, but this is not uncommon on these models and so long as it isn't badly cracked won't affect value tremendously (probably 10% depending on the severity), dials can be restored but it is a factory only job and the current price is £600 + VAT (20%) plus shipping



The dial has also 'fogged', this can be easily resolved cleaning it with blue tack but is not a job for the faint hearted and you can ruin the dial if too much pressure is applied, STS could handle this for you, it will give it a much brighter lustre.

18K watch:

Appears to be in excellent condition, there is a little stretch in the bracelet but nothing too serious, it has been previously polished and re-brushed but would come back nicely if correctly finished by STS or another.

The guarantee booklet on the 18K example is a later addition (around 1980) and the box, although a correct Megaquartz is also incorrect for the specific watch as they were issued in either mahogany boxes with brass detailing or large leather boxes with wooden inserts (same as Speedmaster 125)

Again the dial has also 'fogged', but can be resolved as above

Hope this helps

 

Superb assessment TDH - I also read the Wiki article and it was a gold mine of information to say the least. I will double check the SS once I open the deposit box at the bank, I believe the cracks you described might be knicks on the glass itself if I remember correctly. Coming across these watches is kind of finding a puppy at your door step - more of a responsibility than a chore lol. Thanks again for your expertise.

 

I am in Norway at the moment showing the watch and received a question which I am at loss on how to answer - what function does the small button below the crown serve?. I don't have a manual for it and could not find any info online - there has been interest in the 18kt watch but I suspect its more for the gold than the actual watch and it's provenance. Also, any particular battery brand recommended for it?. Taking it to a local Omega / Rolex service center to have them changed out fresh. Thanks.

 

No, the button is for hacking - or in other words to set it accurately to the second following an acoustic signal (e.g. on radio, TV) as these watches were accurate to one second per year (at least the SS Marine version, I am not sure about the gold version) - I am sure Tom will chime in shortly as he is the expert on these Megahertz specials...

 

Hi there chaps

Sorry for the late reply, indeed the button is used for advancing/ trimming the second, don't be put off if it isn't working though as they have a small plastic shim on the end of them which wears and thus they stop working. the battery is 386, any good brand will do, I use energizer.

Best wishes and GLWTS

Tom

 

There's a Stardust ConniePurchases made through these links may earn this site a commission from the eBay Partner Network for sale on eBay. The listing says the watch isn't running though.
Edit: there also seems to be a nasty chip on the dial (bottom right).

 

Very useful thread

I'd love to get one of these someday and the info contained here has been very enlightening, not least for letting me know what I might be getting myself into!

But they really are stunning - I'm sure the expense and frustration would be well worth it...

(I saw that one too, Deafboy, but felt it better to let it go and see what else comes along...)

 

Very interesting thread...
What do you guys think of the photo's below? Calibre, release, condition, price... etc.
Big thanks