Dear all. I hope it´s ok to post my pictures, and remarks on them, from my Excelsior Park. The watch is, I think, from around late 1940 to mid 1950. Movement EP4 has incablock which I don't think was present in the very early movements. Movement needs some work but today I have tried to examine the dial and hand to verify if it is original. I have owned a few vintage pieces over the years and I have also read a lot of post about vintage watches in general and a lot about dials/redials. One thing I can say for sure is that the threads often is full of people making statements that they are absolute certain is correct but they are not. I think that with vintage pieces a lot of things are more or less intelligent guesses. So further comments are my believes and guesses. Please feel fre to ad comments and thoughts. So this is the watch. Case with a few dents and scratches. Most of the dirt is removed by me. One of the pushers slightly askew. My initial impression is that hands and dials have the same color and structure (when viewed with a loupe) as 1-12 numbers. Circle no.1 shows some paint that has came lose. Exposed under the paint is a "gold" color very slightly lighter than the outer seconds marking. Seconds marking no.2 is very crisp and clear (also see no.5 below). Color is very slightly darken that position no.1. I believe that the dial is done with a gilt technique and that the markings are original. At no. 3 you can see the crisp logo printed on the dial. Especialy look at the circled "or" that contain very fine details. At position no.4 you can see that the luminous material is a bit "shaky". The paint are still within the underlying markings (gilt?) and since this is an old watch it was most certainly applied by hand. Remember the "radium girls". Even if it still could be a later touch up i doubt it. Radium mostly disappeared late 1950/early 1960 as far as I know. Also compare the luminous look of the E.P. with the Rolex picture below. It´s from Phillipes excellent post about rolex Gilt dials in Rolex passion report. http://rolexpassionreport.com/15606/the-evolution-of-rolex-luminous/ No.6 applied luminous. No.7 and around the marking you can clearly see some defects of the dial paint. When original pictured is zoomed in you can clearly see some cracking of the surface. Without magnification it´s impossible to see. Above no.9 you can see luminous mass light up under UV-light. The hands do at a first glance not light up as powerful. But when looking closer its possible to see (no.8) that its indeed light up a bit. Considering that the applied radium (see the two last pictures) is much thinner on the hands than on the indexes it could be a normal finding? Radium 226 It measures between 1,5-1,6 uSv/h = radium. So, that is my thoughts. I hope that for some of you it was of some value. Any comments appreciated. BR Peter
informative/interesting forensic post. I think it's all original and looks beautiful. One thing I've never quite grasped of the use of the word "gilt" is - is it for numerals/printing that have aged to a golden color - or originally were printed in that shade of color..
As I understand it it´s sort of an "inverted" printing technique. From the beginning the dial is "gold" in color. Then they print all the black over the dial except some areas which they leave without color. The gold "gilt" is hence visible as markings and numbers. The logo of my watch is then printed on top of the black. In case of Excelsior Park you can find several brands with the same case, movements and similar dials as this one. For example Certina, Zenith, Gallet. It was probably very convenient to just print "Zenith" instead of "Excelsior Park". BR Peter
I have little knowledge of Excelsior Park but that dial seems utterly unmolested and wears its age well. (Fantastic, detailed, photographs by the way).
Thanks for your replies and your appreciation! I did forget som questions about the movement though. Hopefully some of you knowable members can help. The watch was bought in Sweden and did certainly not look as a "collector" piece. I have not been able to find any markings on the movement yet beside the "JXR". When "googling" it I have found some responses that not have been conclusive. Some claim it to be a manufacturer code (zenith, gallet etc) and some claim it to be a code of the US importer company. So - what is the truth? This watch was found in Sweden. Of course it could have been brought here. But on the other hand I think that maybe they where not that picky when assembling watches back in the days? Looking at Omega Speedmasters it´s quite clear that at least Omega did mix old cases with newer movements or use parts creating "transitional" pieces. I think that the watch being a franked seams a bit far-fetched. Opinions?
el. Yes, will do! My watchmaker just called me to let me know he found the pillar wheel spare part. Right know it’s a “peg” short....
Interesting. Where Omega’s and other brands manufactured under license in US? Or where they re-exported?
@jumpingsecond Here's a little thing I wrote about what gilt dials are from my 1675 site: https://gmtmaster1675.com/gilt-dials/ "First off, what are gilt dials? The term “gilt” or “gilt/gloss” refers to dials of the GMT 1675 that were created by a galvanic coating process and appears on the 1675 until 1967. Galvanization generally refers to a method of coating metals with another substance through a chemical reaction that binds them together. In this case, the dials were dipped in an electrified black ‘paint,’ causing deposition of the liquid onto the dial plate. "In a multi-step process, the dials were first stamped with a coating that outlined the text and markers. This coating would stop the the black paint, which was applied next, from adhering to those parts of the dial. Subsequently, a clear lacquer was placed over the printing. After lacquering, further text (such as underlines, depth ratings, etc.) could be added. Finally, the hour markers in radium or tritium were applied."
@ahantel thanks for pointing me to this and for organizing/ writing up this info. So is the Rolex GMT the only true "gilt" dial out there- or if other brands have used this galvanic process are they also considered Gilt dials?
Not just the GMT, any model/brand that uses that or a similar process of galvanizing with inverse printing. I'm directly quoting from the site (which is only about the GMT) so that's why it just says the GMT.
Ok thx for clarity. I see the term gilt bandied about constantly in descriptions but good to know the true characteristics for the word.
Hi, nice EP; I just posted a similar dial in the Longines dept. https://omegaforums.net/threads/post-your-longineseses.472/page-38 rgds - h.u.
I think suppliers like Singer made dials for several brands like Omega and Rolex. Probably some other companies as well. I will look at my dials reversed side during upcoming service. BR Peter