I am having my 1943-1945 UG Tr-Compax watch restored. The dial was just refinished. What would you value the watch at when the restoration is completed? Here are some before and during restoration pictures.
Might be my imagination, but it looks like the dial had a large dent between 2 and 3. If so, (a) how did that happen? (b) the person who refinished it is a magician.
It really looks like the person who refinish the dial managed to minimise the dent, you can see there are some unevenness left but it looks much better.
The dial refinisher is the one and only Kirk Rich Dial. The dial is being sent back to them for only one reason. The words "Tri-Compax" (if you see in the picture) are a little uneven in their spacing respective to the 6 o'clock dial. They think the die may have shifted and are going to realign the die and repaint it. They bough most of the dies when they were being sold in Switzerland. They did a great job. They way I found out the original dial was a reprint was the 9 and 3 numbers. They were not originally printed on the dial. Not sure how the dents or bend got on the dial. Probably someone who was inexperience tried to fix it or do something to the watch. I do have to also give kudos to www.chronometro.com. They are the goto guys on Tri-Compax restorations. I have yet to receive the watch back, but they have all the correct equipment to do a restoration of these UGs. I'll post the final pictures once I receive the watch. Probably looking at 3-5 weeks minimum. It will be a good watch to wear to my wedding in November.
Has anyone ever sent their UG to this guys as well? I'm in need of a good watchmaker for my UGs here in Sydney!
Very nice! The gold looks great on the dials and sub-dials. I haven't seen this color before. Is it original, or a repaint?
I did a lot of research for about a month. Talked to a lot of local guys and they wouldn't touch it since it is such a small brand. So that took me to the internet. There are few people outside of UG itself, that would touch it. There are a couple of places in Michigan. Other than that, I did not find any significant people who would touch a UG.
The dial on my UG is genuine, but whether it came originally with the watch or not is something I do not know. Most likely explanation is the old owner switch the old original dial with this one given steel case doesn't come with gold dial from UG (this dial Color usually comes with gold case) and the moon phase having faded so much vs. the dial which still looks new. Much less probable explanation is Freccero made this switch originally to the first buyer's request, to me it doesn't matter though, as I am happy with how it looks.