I am aware a lot of people make posts on identification, but that is for the reason vast pool of knowledge here. I got this from a market(picka delliy). I have not opened it up yet got it cheap and was wondering a bit more it.

 

Looks like 1975 with an "N5" on the back. Probably a 17 jewel Japanese 11DP manual wind inside. They also came in 7 jewel versions.
What does the writing say on the very bottom of the dial?

 

6? What do you mean?

 

Below the six. Very small writing.

 

I can make out ".APAN" so most likely "JAPAN"


http://www.mybulova.com/bulova-date-codes

 

Ok. Japanese 11DP inside.

 

put the loop to it it says Japan

 

Best answer ever

 

The question is was it worth 13$?

 

I think that movement is a Japanese copy of the very popular ETA 1080 movement.

http://www.ranfft.de/cgi-bin/bidfun-db.cgi?10&ranfft&&2uswk&ETA_1080

Image from Dr. Roland Ranfft's movement archive.

 

did not expect Bulova to source from Japan

 

If the movement is the one I suspect it is, Bulova used a lot of them in their popular priced lines. They were cheaper than the Swiss equivalent. I have one with ARDAY on the dial. Also from Bulova, late 1950s or early 1960s.

 

There's no surprise to me that Bulova marketed Japanese copies of Swiss movements in their lower end lines. The one Caravelle movement actually shown thus far in this thread, is actually a copy of the Swiss ETA 1080 movement. And I linked to the Swiss made ETA 1080 earlier in this thread. But Bulova was doing this sort of thing 50 to 60 years ago, before the Caravelle name was introduced. In the mid 1950s, Bulova introduced a line of watches with the ARDAY name on the dial. The line was named after the son of Joseph Bulova, Arde, who probably had more to do with the success of the Bulova Watch company, than Joseph did. I have shown a picture of an ARDAY watch. It too has a Japanese copy of a Swiss movement. But this one has a Japanese copy of a Swiss made Font (FHF) 72 movement. The Bulova caliber of this one is 11NX. These watches sold for $12.95, with a composition faux leather strap.


.

 

My very first EVER vintage watch (well, it wasn't vintage when my parents gave it to me 48 years ago, in 1968!) was a Caravelle.

I still have it, found it recently, deep in a drawer:

 

grandpa got a Seiko while in Vietnam