I just picked up a 74 in pretty much near mint unused unpolished condition on original 1171/633 with everything appearing correct on it eg flat dial with greenish lume, hands, pushers etc. However the 861 movement serial number is 31009xxx which is earlier than anything I have seen for this reference and before anything indicated in Moonwatch Only or elsewhere. Indeed it would make it one of the very first 861s for the 69 straight writing. Extract is ordered but not sure exactly what that will reveal other than sale date to solve a possible mystery. Thoughts? Anyone else seen one this early on a 74? I dont think it can be the wrong caseback as the flat dial is on it. Unless it was serviced by Omega and had new case, dial AND caseback - which is pretty unlikely given the condition, OR original watch had a heart transplant with an earlier movement!
Nice find! These 74s do constitute an interesting little glitch in the relationship between production date and serial number. While yours is very early, 31x is generally recognised as the beginning of the range for -74s. Indeed I also have one that appears entirely correct and is in the same range. When I was collecting data for the development of the prediction methods a couple of years ago, I found 13 extracts in the 31x range. All but one gave production dates of 1971. The exception was one in 1972. Even though 31x is recognised as the beginning of the range for the -74 I have personally never seen an extract showing 31x and a 1974/75 production date. In fact, I have a pet hypothesis that no such extracts exist. Not because there's anything wrong with these watches, but because of the relatively chaotic nature of the mechanical watch market in the early 70s and/or because of idiosyncratic record keeping methods. I've spoken to others on the board about this and while there's agreement that these watches can be correct, there are different ideas about how they came about. You will almost certainly also get some comments saying this is too early and the movement must be a transplant. In my reckoning, there are too many of these out there for us to write them off in that way. More and more will appear in the fullness of time as interest in the 70s speedies grows. Interesting stuff! Do report back when you get your extract. By the way, there's a typo in the thread title: it should be 145022 rather than 145002
thanks - title edited. Will update when Extract arrives. I personally think all is legit as it just seems to hang together properly. No bad vibes!