I've been looking for a display back Speedmaster and ran across this one.




I'm no expert in Speedmasters, so I'd like to get some feedback on this one.

Overall it looks nice to my untrained eye. It's obviously been polished, but tI'm not certain to what extent. Has the polishing gone too far?

Second, the dial looks to have aged into a nice patina, but the hands are going the route of many tritium hands and are turning black around the edges. Are replacement tritium hands available in case I wanted to get a cleaner patina? If not, can a more modern set of hands be sourced and relumed to a more uniform patina? In either case, I'd leave the original hands alone in case I ever need to go back.

 

Actually it looks like the lume is cracking, so you'll need to have them stabilized if not relumed. They can be matched to the dial though.

Not available new, but if you have the time and money you can hunt down sets of old tritium hands.

Yes, easily and without much trouble or financial outlay. If you were determined to leave the original handset as-is (unusable IMO, as cracking lume can be a threat to movement parts) this would be your best option. However, if it were me, I'd have the original handset redone with material matched to what remains on the hands.

 

Depending on price, might be better to find one with better handset. Or you can buy a regular Speedy and fit it with a third party sapphire case back.

I have the 3572 in tritium and bought because I wanted the sapphire case back. But I also bought a third party case back for my Ed White. I have found that in both cases I don't look at movement very much as it's difficult to do so with the braclet in place.

 

thanks for the feedback. I am also looking at 3590's and the cost for the 3590 plus display back would probably save a bit over the 3592/early 3572's. I'd rather not have to send a watch straight to a watchmaker, so I'll probably just keep the search going.