My 42406 Tri Compax is fully operational. This thing was a bear, took three rounds with the watchmaker, but just delivered and appears to be all good ! Purchased over email from Vienna, I'm into it for $5K at this point, which is probably starting to approach market value for a gold plated, OS Tri. Not the bargain I had hoped, but a good, honest example I think. Now it just needs a new strap.

 

What was wrong that you had to spend $2500?
Dial looks very nice by the way

 

Yeah, I'm curious as well. As an avid vintage collector, I'm kind of worried about these potential money pits.

Of course, I suppose maybe I shouldn't be in the vintage game if that was the case . . . .

 

I bought the watch for $2500 and interestingly the seller offered a full service for additional $2500. I thought this was very high and passed on their offer, but I suspect they were aware of all the issues and knew it was going to be expensive.

Bill is below. (There was one more bill for another $200, which was the final part on round three that seemed to resolve things.)

It would have been around $1100 for a regular service with no major issues, but.....
*two of the internal pushers were really worn and not consistently working, had to be refabricated from scratch
*chrono sweep was super glued to the tube, not very stable
*problems with both moon and date indicator advancing inconsistently with normal (time) operation
*and on and on and on....

So that all added up to about $1400 in additional bill, not to mention the year long completion time. Some of the issues were very finicky.

It made me wonder, how much do people test all their functions on a tri compax after service? Do you test ALL the functions, both with normal time operation and also with pushers? Because these things can work great with the pushers, but then not advance with time operation, and they can work from say the 1st to the 13th, and then not from the 14th to the 20th, and then work again from the 21st to the 29th, etc. Due to inconsistent wear in these circular parts the teeth/gear mesh can be variable and cause inconsistent advance. The day/month/moon can be working together, but not the date, or really any infinite variable of combinations. I just say this as a word of warning.

Hopefully this was a unique case and not at all the norm!

 

Not many times overall but whenever I've seemed to have enjoyed a 'barn-find' type deal- in comes a repair/overhaul bill to lay waste to my triumph.

 

Honestly, your watchmaker is very expensive ! And to turn new setting pushers for your model is very easy for someone with the tools.
Anyway, your Tri-Compax looks great.

 

+1
Very, very expensive
But watch looks great

 

I love that dial. But I must agree, very expensive for just the base service. Im in the high cost NE USA and a tri service pre and substantial parts $600-700 which assumes calibration, timing it out, etc.

 

I agree, very expensive, I would not use them again.

However, the next Tri I did after that, with someone else, was $1450, for the following work:

UG 481 cleaned, timed, adjusted, replaced sub sec hand, replaced center sec hand tube,fixed 6 marker, new stem, new crown, fixed pilot hole tube, moon jumper finger, tightened center wheel bushings.

This included a sub hand, and some parts, so a bit more reasonable, but still pretty expensive.

I will happily receive any and all your suggestions via PM for a cheaper option in the future.

 

Wow ,

$120 for a mainspring ...
$225 for "stabilizing a chrono hand" ? sounds like it was so perilous that he needed to erect scaffolding
$965 for calibration? is that not part of the service?

sorry, but it all sounds like a bit like a joke to me ...

 

Price for a mainspring ...

 

Yes, some watchmakers abuse customers with complicated watches but in fact tri-compaxes movements are quite easy to service and parts are findable. IMHO the whole job, for a private client, shoud cost around 900 $ max...

 

If the bill is payed, now rest and enjoy the watch. It looks beautiful.
Maybe what you've learned here will lead you to a better solution for next services. Live and learn

 

Do you mean base service before parts, or the specific job I posted above?

Seems hard to generalize as every watch is different and needs different parts, which makes up a lot of the cost.

This thread follows a common pattern where someone posts an expensive bill, people say that is crazy, and you should only pay X. But what does that mean. From a moral/ethical point of view of what you SHOULD pay? From an industry average of what people ARE paying? Compared to what YOU are paying?

I would say people in that states often propose costs that are one third to one half ($700-$900) of my two examples. And people in Europe propose costs that are half that ($400-$500).

My experience does not match what some others are saying. I have found it hard to find people even willing to work on tri compax, and those that do, very expensive, very slow, very complicated.

I contacted Archer, he didn't want to go near it, said that he had just finished another tri that took over a year, getting parts was a nightmare, and he didn't want the headache. RGM base service was $900 before anything extra and they were cranky and not great customer service. A few others like art dial watch wouldn't give ballpark costs without watch in hand.

So I have posted two specific examples above. The first included 5 parts, repair on chrono sweep, plus two internal pushers. It took three rounds of getting the watch, it not being right, sending it back for more work.

The second example looks like three parts, one hand, one hand repair, and rose gold crown. Completely different person. It also took THREE rounds of getting the watch, it not being right, sending it back.

I'm not defending this work, it was annoying and expensive. In particular I was really frustrated getting the watch multiple times still not right. I'm just saying, this is my experience getting tri compax service. I understand a few others have watchmakers that can fix tri very easy, no problem with parts, really fast, and a fraction of the cost. That is awesome, I'm jealous! My inbox is noticeably absent of their contact info. Lol.

I guess I'm more interested in average costs. I think it's helpful to try and establish some guidelines for people of what is cheap, what is average, what is expensive, so that when they get an estimate, they have some references to compare.

It would be great if people would post their actual invoices, so we can see a breakdown of the service and costs. This would be much more useful than anecdotal examples. It doesn't have to include the watchmaker obviously, just the service info.

To begin with, I would love to see some examples that are in the range of work that I posted above, and under $1K in cost.

If we can get a decent sample size, say of work done in the last two years or so, I think that's a good forum resource.

 

Here's what was required to get my Tri-Compax right @bgrisso:



Unfortunately the invoice isn't very helpful with the breakdown of work done. The seller covered the cost of the service before it was shipped to me, so I can't help you with a watchmaker contact.

Here's the actual breakdown I got from the seller:
Clean - $500.00
Minute recording jumper replaced - $200.00
Chrono runner replaced - $110.00 (minus $35.00 credit toward the original runner)
Bushed movement and dial for minute recorder hand - $200.00
Minute recording wheel - $110.00
Adjusted hammer to zero back hand properly after replacing minute recording runner - $60.00


The basic service cost seems reasonable enough. What happened with my watch was someone had previously replaced the 30 minute recording wheel with a 45 minute one. That created wear in the pivot holes of the movement plate and dial. As a result the minute recording hand would not align with markers 6 through 24 with the chronograph running. You can see that in the photos below:



Bushings had to be machined around the pinion to compensate for the gaps, and many adjustments were needed before the hand was bang on the markers. These old chronographs can sometimes take a lot to get right. I had to wait 7 months before seeing my watch in person and that was hard enough a wait.

Hope this helps!

 

yes, great, thanks for posting a specific example with details. Let see some more....

 

very nice tri compax by the way, I love it when the moon phase dials still have blue, I really want to find one like that !

 

Fortunately, I didn't have so many problems with my watches like you had.
A normal service of a chrono like UG 481, 287, Omega 321, Angelus 215 etc. costs me about 400$.
Any additional work is more. For example:
I had to buy a rotten movement for 200 Euros just for one part to get the chrono of my 287 work again.
If there is corrosion to be removed, that can be additional 200.
New blueing of screws or hands 100.
Making a spring for a pocket watch: 200.

One has to be lucky to find a good and realiable watchmaker who doesn't charge too much. I had already the experience of a bad and expensive watchmaker...

 

good info, sounds like great prices. You are in Europe? Seems like people get better UG service pricing over there...

 

Hi,
I am sorry if I upsetted you, it was not my goal. I assume that a forum purpose is for gathering various opinions and experiences.
Now, I live in europe and what I ment is that for the whole service that you paid about 2300$, here it would cost about 900$, assuming that you are dealing with an honest (small) experienced watchmaker, not a trendy vintage watchmaker located in a very expensive area...
Of course, when the watch is serviced, there is a 1 year guarantee, that is a common rule here.
It's a shame that the watchmakers that you met didn't want to work on your watch, for me it says it all: They are not REAL watchmakers.
I mean, they don't have the true love and horology spirit, they just want to make quick and easy money: Like 900$ for a simple lubrification and cleaning that takes maximum 2 hrs to do.
I hope that i made my self clear and again, I'm sorry if I was too blunt or unclear.
Cheers.