As we all know lume can fall off and is sometimes extremely fragile, but I would never take the step of reluming it without asking first. It would seem they somehow took your asking about missing lume as a request to relume...

 

Leona was the person who was my first point of contact at STS as well @Don Bocadillo . I found her very helpful and she got back to me with the answers to any questions I had about the service fairly quickly as well.

As I said earlier, My experience of STS was a good one, but I think Simon Freese's left some very big shoes to fill. I really like the idea of giving my watch to the bloke who is going to be taking it to bits and I intend to use Simon Freese Watchmakers for any future work on my vintage Omega Speedmaster.

I hope you get some help with this issue Don. Please keep us updated with any progress. I think there are a few members here who would be interested to see how this situation turns out.

 

Will do...

 

Ok do it was relumed.

As @Archer suggests, it seems they took you're inquiring about the lume to be the green light to go ahead.

They should certainly have asked for confirmation prior to reluming but on the flip side, this is exactly why you need to be 100% clear in your communication with expensive watches.
"It appears some lume has been lost from the plots. Is this correct? If so please advise of the options but do not carry out any work until I give the go ahead".

We can argue that it should t come to that, but better to be safe than sorry.

 

Tough to blame this in any way on the OP.... if the service provider does not ask before proceeding with a fairly significant modification, that is 100% the fault of the serious provider, regardless of the need for clear communication...

 

Agree. I'm not saying any fault lies with the OP.

I'm saying we frequently hear stories about various watchmakers carrying out work that wasn't required (possibly due to the fact that collectors are a weird bunch and ask for work (not) to be carried out that most normal people wouldn't).

To avoid this, you need to be explicit in what you do/don't want doing at all stages.

It maybe should t come to this, but it frequently does.

 

Seems a bit odd that they did the re-lume without asking so, it seems to have slipped through.

From their website:
"Once the watch has been assessed in our Estimating Department an estimate is compiled and submitted to the customer for the work required via post or, if requested, by email. Upon receipt of instructions to proceed every watch will undergo the following process"

In the same way as Al, I wouldn't ever do this without discussion first and I find it hard to believe that the watchmaker at STS took it upon themselves to just do the re-lume. It's probably a different person anyway as it's a specialized job. I'd imagine they do a lot of watches there as they have a team of people so, it seems the estimating department and the watchmaking management didn't co-ordinate it correctly.

I do hope they can keep you happy in the end.

Regards, Chris

 

I have sent three Speedies to Simon since he branched off from STS, but he's become hesitant to accept watches from the US.

 

I've been contacted by STS so have a good feeling this will be resolved

 

Sorry to hear, what a nightmare...........As I'm in the UK I have sent multiple watches to both Simon and STS. The ones to STS were while Simon was still there and have moved with him when he left. Never had a problem. I do find him nicely conservative with any work and prefers to leave in as original condition as compared to cosmetic improvements. Always have a discussion on the phone to agree work which is then documented in a email before work is started.
Hope this gets resolved for you.....
M

 

Really... that suprises me. Any idea why?

 

Import Tax to be paid on the insured value of the watch, takes months to get a refund from the tax folks.

 

Ahhh I see. Thankyou Eugene.

 

Re USA to Simon Freese

I have had clear direction from Simon regarding watches from outside UK going to him for service.

The golden rule is talk to Simon first so the watch is sent under correct procedures. This will enable any watch to come in (and out) through UK borders without delays. While problems cannot be guaranteed to be avoided, if there is communication between client and Simon there should be no issues.

He is also able to arrange insurance.

 

Wow, sorry to read this

For a vintage watch, I would expect the watchmaker to contact me if anything else than servicing the movement is suggested to be done. Even regarding the movement work, if he intends to replace any parts, I expect to be informed upfront.

As others have already mentioned, it's once more all about clear communication.

 

Had a good chat with Kieran today and got some nice high res images of the dial and movement removed from the case...think things will be just fine.

 

Little trip up to the master...James Hyman

 

What did they do to it this time?
What materials did he use?
How will it age from this point forward?

 

James removed the touched up lume and the old remaining tritium and relumed with a beautiful light cream with a low level of luminescence which fades quickly ala vintage tritium. As far as aging going forward only time will tell...

 

Oh, and I see you added some more pics (it was only the first, so I couldn't tell what was done). Glad it worked out.