I bought a large lot of pre-production / prototype watches a few weeks ago and they have finally been delivered today (although I am still at work and haven’t seen them in person yet). They are almost all exactly the same model, and should date from around 1973-74. Now the interesting thing is that the case appears to be very similar to the one from the contemporary Omega Constellation ref. 168.0054. I mean it really could be the same case from the same supplier, even though my watches aren’t from Omega. To help try and figure that out it would be nice to have some precise dimensions from a 168.0054 case, namely: Max width excluding crown Max length Width of the narrow slots for the integrated bracelet Width of the narrow spacer between the two bracelet slots Can anyone with a digital vernier caliper (or suitable measuring kit) and a 168.0054 help ? And I suppose it would be interesting to know if the case for the 168.0054 was shared across other manufacturers. Does anyone here know who made the case, and if that case was used by anyone other watch companies ? Thanks… will add photos when I get home ! Omega 168.0054 for reference:
Looks pretty similar (albeit mine is for a double crown), as does the bracelet. No later than 1974 but could be from 1973.
Just had a quick googling myself - seems they are all with a slightly different design where case and lugs meet. Back to the drawing board.
Could be... I'll take a look. But to be clear, I know what my cases are from as I have movements, dials, and some built up ones. I know they're prototypes and I don't think they ever went into production. It's just very interesting to see if they used a case that was already being made for someone else.
Had a chance to go through everything in more detail. Amongst the 20-30 complete and partial watches there are four others which weren't from the original manufacturer. I guess they were acquired for benchmarking or something similar. There seems to be a Seiko (with sterile dial) plus three others, and the two gold c-cases have Omega crowns. Are these recognizable as production Omega models ? There are no casebacks so just the mid-cases and all the dials are sterile so no clues.
So I have broken cover on these over on the Smiths sub-forum of MWR. http://www.mwrforum.net/forums/showthread.php?81402-Smiths-last-days-in-the-sun-but-will-they-run Would be very interesting to see if there really is a connection between the case/bracelet of the standard Quasar prototype and the 168.0054 Connie.