There is no doubt however that 1) that watch has not been serviced with an amplitude that low and the Hyde range of plus/gain in different positions, 2) the dial you say is refinished.
Obviously it’s your choice but those two alone would be more than enough to prevent me keeping it.
Wishing it was a chronometer is not going to make it happen!
Omega specs require that 24 hours after fully winding this movement, that the amplitude in any position should not fall below 190 degrees.
Your initial numbers were below that, presumably fully wound. Even if they have come up to 200 or so, it's unlikely they would stay above 190 after 24 hours of running.
Also, if you are checking this on a timing machine, make sure the lift angle is set correctly - should be 49 degrees. If you left the lift angle set to the default, which is normally 52 degrees, then the amplitude readings will appear higher than they actually are.
Well out of spec, as is the positional variation. I'm sure there are people who service and sell who do a good job, but for me there is an inherent conflict of interest involved that can lead to very poor decisions being made with regards to whether a given part "needs" to be replaced or not. The person doing the service is the seller, so they know that every penny spent during the service comes straight off their bottom line...
Interesting read.
One thing that after reading throughout the entire thread seems apparent is that you (@Vizard ) seem to be looking against all your better sense for a reason to keep the watch. Or a reason to justify its flaws.
Simply put, you don’t need a reason. It’s your money, if you like it so much that you’re struggling to see if it performs better or if there could be a reason for the mis- qualification of chronometer rating for that movement etc then you like it enough to keep it.
The watch is not going to change, it is what it is and all ( extremely knowledgeable) advice has made clear what it is. So the only thing that can change here is your opinion of it . We can’t help with that .
Deep. 😉
In fact I am broadly indifferent about whether I keep or return the watch.
If I decide that it needs to go back, I have a chap to call on Monday about a manual wind Patek Calatrava that has just come back from service at the manufacturer. Unless Patek has now become a shower of charlatans, it will hopefully be in good shape.
PS: And if there is anyone on the planet more qualified than @mac_omega to advise on Omega Chronometers I'd like to know who it is.
Hi all,
Yesterday I have come back late from a short journey to Germany (visited a terrific exhibition of Vermeer paintings in Dresden) and so I was too tired to read through all the long thread.
This morning I took the time to do so and I was a bit amused that it took that long that somebody came across these older threads where we already discussed similar watches.
Well to make it short:
There have appeared 4-5 watches (if I recon correctly) after the release of my book which show the same "pattern" - cal. 283 and chronometre on the dial. All of them were found in England and those which were looked up in the microfiche of Omega archive share serials in a small range of numbers but cannot be found in the archives due to damage/loss of a part of the microfiche film. I wanted to research these watches more closely in the Omega Museum but due to the pandemic situation I have to postpone this for some time...
Meanwhile I tend to set up a new category of chronometres the "UK chronometres". All share "late" three line dials and of similar style (not much variation found) and all but one have Dennison cases of the same shape. The movements don´t show special finish like the Rg-chronometres but this is not necessary to make a watch a chronometre as we all know. IMO it is possible that a small batch of movements were chronometre rated and sold to UK to be cased and sold as chronometres. There have been special chronometres for France, Spain and Italy - so why not for the UK?
I hope to find proof for this theory in the Omega archives once I get the chance to go there once again.
OP´s watch could well be one of these UK chronometres but - what a pity - has a restored dial. So we don´t know if it started out with a chronometre labeled dial or if a "regular" 283 Dennison cased watch was pimped up to make it a chronometre.
I think that's the best option.
As you get deeper into the vintage watch world, you start to understand originality, appearance etc and if you kept this one I think you would soon get to wince every time you looked at it.
I talk from experience.
