The 2915 dial body colour is natural.
there is an established history of bidders from China that agree a very high price for an auction lot and then take a very long time to pay, or renegotiate. First heard of in 2013 when a Chinese buyer renegotiated his auction win from £43m to about 20m. Now auctioneers try to put pre sale conditions on buyers.
Cooking dials is not simply 20 minutes at gas mark 5. It’s putting them in one of
these - and you cannot test with a less valuable modern dial because they are different. And you can try a cheaper machine, but it has eluded me so far.
Like others I have dabbled in dial treatments - it’s a hangover from when I used to try to replicate the gemstone treatments in the lab for research. But honestly, to make a brown dial in an oven, or even a UV test chamber, is going to require the testing of many many dials to destruction. The surface of a vintage dial is unique. Each one would react differently.
So it is my opinion there are less dials with a changed body surface colour than I initially feared there might be - the whole purpose of my research. The same goes to all other Speedmaster guys who have tried the same - we are looking to reassure ourselves it’s not a matter of a simple process to alter a dial, such that we think it looks naturally patinated vintage.
This price will bring brown dials out of the woodwork from everywhere. I have been shown five privately since the sale asking, what do I think, is it worth $3.5m?
these are rare, but there are pleanty about and a nominal price of 3.5m is going to persuade everyone to part with them.
even I am tempted. Well no I’m not, but my wife is telling me to sell them.
