Gotta love the woman in your life....

[Marcba221]

I have been discussing with my girlfriend lately that I wanted to look into purchasing a vintage watch of some sort and have it serviced, restored, etc. Unbenounced to me, she takes it upon herself to bid and win an Omega Seamaster Cosmic 2000 that she says she got a helluva deal on and it will be a great project. After you view the pictures, laugh, poke fun, do what you will! I just have one question. What the heck am I to do with this thing? I am, by no means, a watch expert of any kind, but this looks like either i'm going to have to hurt her feelings, or spend what looks like at least $1000 to have a watch worth a quarter of that. Honest thoughts please.

Marc

 

[dsio]

There's an option B, if one our regulars can pick the reference you can probably find one that isn't destroyed for cheap, pretend thats it and hide this one in the shed.

 

[ulackfocus]

Ummmm, yeah..... don't kill the messenger, but that's junk. If the movement were intact it would be good for parts towards another project, but things are missing including the winding rotor. Don't throw it out just in case.

 

[dsio]

I'd take it to the local Omega AD and say "It just stopped"

But that's just me 😉

 

[Steve]

Ashley's idea is a good one, buy another and pretend its the original. But that could open the flood gates and your g/f could keep buying you one every year for Xmas and birthdays !.
Or you could just tell her you accidently dropped it and broke it beyond repair.😗

 

[SynMike]

You know, I think it might be alright with just an oil change. But I would go with 10W40, not the standard 10W30 stuff.

Just tell her that when you posted it to a forum of experts they all told you unfortunately this one is missing too many pieces and restoring would be almost impossible. She will appreciate that you put in the effort to post it and gather advice on it.

 

[dsio]

Can still be impressed that she cared enough to try, most watch nerds' wives tolerate their man's hobby, knowing that at least its cheaper that yachting or philandering, but few encourage it.

 

[Trev]

dsio

Can still be impressed that she cared enough to try, most watch nerds' wives tolerate their man's hobby, knowing that at least its cheaper that yachting or philandering, but few encourage it.

Definitely. Sounds like a keeper.

Welcome to the forums, Marc 👍

 

[Marcba221]

I have thought about this for a few days. I going to try and restore it. I know I know, I sound crazy and I might not even be able to. But I will give you a few reasons why i'm going to try.

1.It may cost well more than it is worth to restore, but if I think long term, this watch may be worth a lot more 30 years down the road.
2.Why not save a quality piece of craftsmanship from the scrapheap? (Would you not save that 69' Camaro just because its going to take some work?)
3.I could pass it down to my son if I have one.
4.Last but not least. It would make my gf (hopefully future wife) extremely happy.

 

[Marcba221]

Also if I go through the whole process of getting this restored it will show my gf not to buy a watch in such crappy condition again. And it will show her that despite jumping the gun a little bit, I still appreciated the gesture and tried to turn this turd into something special. Heck, I might even document the restoration beginning to end. Post it to a few forums.

 

[ulackfocus]

M Marcba221

(Would you not save that 69' Camaro just because its going to take some work?)

No, not if that Camaro was only a dashboard, frame, and bare engine block missing the carb & heads - and I had to find the fenders, doors, trunk, hood, seats, steering wheel.... you get the idea. 😜 You do realize that you'll be replacing the whole watch because even that dial is ruined, right? Why not just buy a mint Seamaster Cosmic 2000 with a date (caliber 1012 like that one was) for $300-ish and call it a day?

 

[Marcba221]

U ulackfocus

No, not if that Camaro was only a dashboard, frame, and bare engine block missing the carb & heads - and I had to find the fenders, doors, trunk, hood, seats, steering wheel.... you get the idea. 😜 You do realize that you'll be replacing the whole watch because even that dial is ruined, right? Why not just buy a mint Seamaster Cosmic 2000 with a date (caliber 1012 like that one was) for $300-ish and call it a day?

I have a 71' Chevy Nova and I started with frame and body that was rusted out in several areas. I didn't even have the luxury of having an engine block or dashboard. It took 4 years to build, but now it is mint and my prize possession. I would probably never ever get the money out of it that was put it in. But when I look at her I just smile. Do you see where i'm getting at? It's not always about the money or the difficulty completing a project. It's about the journey and being proud of the finished product.

 

[dsio]

I'd still find an identical Ref, hide this one for 12 weeks, produce the good one and say thanks honey.

 

[ulackfocus]

M Marcba221

I have a 71' Chevy Nova and I started with frame and body that was rusted out in several areas. I didn't even have the luxury of having an engine block or dashboard. It took 4 years to build, but now it is mint and my prize possession. I would probably never ever get the money out of it that was put it in. But when I look at her I just smile. Do you see where i'm getting at? It's not always about the money or the difficulty completing a project. It's about the journey and being proud of the finished product.

Okay, I see your point. If that's your thing it's cool. 👍

 

[pz93c]

I would probably buy a good condition one with the same color dial and replace what parts I needed to into the partial watch. Think of the new one as a donor watch.

 

[ulackfocus]

Hi Brian, nice to see you here.

 

[gatorcpa]

The 1971 Nova sounds like a very worthy project. But you had one advantage there that you don't have with the Omega. That is the avaliability and cost of spare parts. There's always been a cottage industry here in the US for the reproduction of vintage car parts, particularly for GM muscle cars of that era.

I think you'll find that many of the parts for your Omega project are simply unavaliable as spares at any price. You'll need to acquire another watch. The issue here is that Omega movements are very good and sometimes it is difficult to find donor watches with the proper movements through normal channels like eBay or Amazon. Even then, you have no way of knowing if between the two non-runners, you have enough of the right parts to make one good one.

If you really want to pursue this, maybe the best bet would be to acquire a working watch with the same movement caliber (this would equivalent to an engine), and have a watchmaker swap out any usuable parts from her movement. At least this way, you've made use of the heart of your girlfriend's old watch to create one from two.

And what could be more romantic than that?
gatorcpa

P.S. The dial on her watch is just too far gone to even consider using. Trust me, you won't be happy with a repaint.

P.P.S. If you really want a project...go find a 1970's Olds Omega. Basically the same car as the Nova.

 

[Marcba221]

See it takes a fellow Gator fan to explain it to me in a way I understand it. What part of Florida are you from? I'm from the Tampa area, but currently reside in Savannah, GA.

I will take what you said into consideration. I get the estimate tomorrow so he is going to go over everything with me.

 

[pz93c]

Hey Dennis, fancy meeting you here!

I recently felt an overwhelming need to rescue a Convex 2852 off of Fleabay and it's off to Michael Presser for a service and redial. The old one was chipped, badly, so it needs one.

So I'm back in the Omega fold for now. If I follow true to form, I'll get bored with it in about a year and sell it off.

Enough hijacking of this thread..... back to your regularly scheduled program.

 

[Trev]

M Marcba221

See it takes a fellow Gator fan to explain it to me in a way I understand it. What part of Florida are you from? I'm from the Tampa area, but currently reside in Savannah, GA.

More thread hi-jacking... The Gold Coast here (Queensland) is essentially your un-official sister city/state. We even have suburbs called Miami, Palm Beach, etc. The early city planning and construction was all a copy of what was happening in Florida. There's tons of similarites between the two regions.

Gold Coast developers created canal estates by utilising land reclamation methods first implemented at Fort Lauderdale in Florida. The techniques consisted of pumping the sand from the water to form finger-like canal estates while raising the land above flood level