Interesting photo I received today...

Showing what appears to be 2 Rolex 3135 movements...



It is getting scary how accurately the fakers are getting with these...there are certainly tells, not difficult for some I would imagine, but to the untrained eye they would be hard to spot. One is fake and one real...

Be careful out there!

Cheers, Al

I also feel Right is fake but I could be wrong. This is why i always go to Rolex to get them checked

Well I don't have the movement - only this photo. But the person who had the movement (received it as a genuine Rolex for servicing) said it's a faithful reproduction. What you see are fully functional parts, so this is not like the fake Omega 8500's we've seen where someone has simply stuck a plate on a completely different movement to disguise what's underneath...

I'll bite. My guess is that the one on the right is the bogus Rolex. Yikes! I have seen genuine Rolex Date-Just movements with bogus dials and hands in bogus karat gold cases. Obviously, a steel Rolex "converted" to karat gold. I have been told that genuine steel Rolex cases, dials, and hands are (or have been) available on the Internet. A guy I know put an ETA automatic behind one of these dials, converting the ETA date ring using the Rolex date ring and crazy glue, fitting it all into a Date-Just case! If anyone doubts it is possible, it IS! I've seen it done! The guy who did it came to me for a pair of case clamps. Shamefacedly, 🤦, I did it for him. Scary!

Gosh, I'd have to say the one on the Right, too, but only because the SN seen on the left one isn't present in that same location on the right... the screws look flatter (better) on the Left, also, but all is quite amazingly similar! 😲

Well I wasn't asking for guesses, but thanks anyway! 😉

In this situation it's clearly too easy. For one you already know one of the 2 is a fake since I have already told you that, so you are already looking for something in detail. Second you have a genuine one right beside to compare to, so this is not a good "test" of how passable these would be in a real life situation.

There are certainly some pretty easy tells here, but if for example some genuine flat polished Rolex screws could be installed where the rounded screws on the fake are visible, it would make things more difficult, in particular in a situation where you are looking at a crappy eBay photo with no direct comparison available.

There are certainly other tells, but the screws are what I saw to instantly tell me the one on the right is the fake. Looking at the regulator (big one!) would confirm to any watchmaker this is not a real Rolex movement, because as they would all be aware the 3135 has a free spring balance. But if they are this close, I don't think it would take too much extra work to correct the things that are pretty glaring in this example. The watchmaker who received this watch for service said that it ran accurately with good amplitude. In his words it would fool the average jeweler who thinks the fakes are really obvious.

My main point here is that gone are the days when the fakes have a movement inside that has "China" on the movement and is so far off a real Rolex movement that it's completely obvious.

Again, if nothing else you may want to look just a little closer at a Rolex you are thinking of pulling the trigger on...

Cheers, Al

I'm not sure if posting sites to sellers of fakes is permitted here...

Again, the rounded top fake screws are one give-away, as is the regulator, like @Archer said...

Which is why I bought one with the much older 1030 movement:



Hard to fake these.

I've been told that the movement is worth more de-cased than running inside the watch.

gatorcpa

Why would that be?

Love to see the dial...😀

No more difficult to fake those than a 3135. However far more money to be made with selling fakes of modern watches to people looking for a Rolex who have no knowledge of watches, than it is to scam a vintage collector who likely knows a lot more...