Hi, I recently got my grandfather's Omega watch and I am trying to find out if it's worth giving to Omega for service (~$700 + tax + new strap = ?) and how much it may be worth. I'm not really looking to sell it, but it would be nice to know I am not spending triple the value of the watch on fixing it. The watch is an Seamaster from (I think) the 60's. The face says Omega Automatic Chronometer Officially Certified. It has the Seamaster logo and - T SWISS MADE T - All the photos I've managed to find online of this model (with the square hour marks) have a date window that shows both name and number of the day. I haven't been able to find a single photo of a face that only has the number of the day. The watch is still running and keeps accurate time. I don't think it's ever been serviced by Omega (but it has been serviced a couple of years ago). Attached are some photos. Please let me know if there are other angles or features that would be helpful in identifying this. The strap attached is not the original one. Thanks! Tom
This is a very nice watch! Seamaster Chronometers had the same movements as the higher-line Constellations. In your case, this would be a cal. 564. At the time this watch was made, Omega offered this model with the day-date cal. 751 or this one with just the date. They are pretty much the same movement, except for the day. Both movements have a push-pull feature for advancing the date. All that being said, $700 is a lot for a service, even for Omega. You should be able to find a good independent watchmaker to do this job for between $100 and $250, if no other parts are needed. If you can give us an idea of your location, perhaps a member can give you a referral. Hope this helps, gatorcpa
Thanks gatorcpa I got the $700 ($675) from Omega's customer service section on their website for their pretty impressive complete maintenance service. I would love to hear some thoughts on whether it's worth the investment. I live in New York City and referrals would be welcome. Thanks again for the quick response.
bumping this up to get some more opinions on Omega's complete maintenance service or alternatives in NYC. Thanks for helping!
The main objection people have to Omega servicing is that they'll replace everything they consider necessary to make the watch look like new--including often the dial, which many collectors do NOT want replaced. In this instance I think the dial is good enough that Omega would leave it alone. They would likely replace the crystal, and, best of all for you, polish this case to bring it back to near-new condition. Expensive, but well worth it for a case like this which is tricky to polish correctly. The movement of course would come back running impeccably.
Thanks wsfarrell. I saw in some other posts that you can ask omega to leave the original parts in place (dial, hands) and just clean them a bit. Any thoughts on how well they actually comply with these requests? A polished case and a new crystal do sound pretty attractive.
No, they won't. Dial, unless it's shot, they'll leave alone, if you request, but hands will be replaced.
Should I be OK with the hands being replaced? I don't have any plans to sell this watch in the foreseeable future, but if I do at one point, would that make a difference? The hands don't look very remarkable to me, but I'm also the Jon Snow of vintage Omegas (I know nothing). Another question about the dial if I may, on the right side of it there's some black "something". Any idea what that is? I am referring to the white circle above the dial, which may not be part of the dial..