Hi,
Just wanted to share a restoration I have finally been able to complete.
It started of a few years ago when I bought a very sad looking, but extremely rare, Lemania cal 3300 / 27D watch.
The watch is basically the only commercially sold version of what was designated Omega 380.
Omega decided to only use the version of the caliber also containing a moon-phase complication, the Omega 381 (Cosmic).
Here is how it looked:


The dial was a horrid redial, and we attempted to rectify it but with only limited success.
Finding a good redialer was and is hard!


As you can see the whole thing looked a bit sad and overdone. Numbers are not well aligned, and everything is printed too fat. All very typical for redials.

Eventually, and after patience on a scale I normally have difficulties to muster, a used dial came up for sale.
A couple of marks on it, but I manage to bag it for reasonable money.

The newly acquired and original dial installed on my watch:


In order to illustrate the differences of a "not too bad - I have seen worse" redial, and my "new" and original dial I created this little animation:


Now it is home to Norway, and into the permanent collection.

 

Nice result! Getting dials reprinted is a frustrating exercise. In several watchmaker groups I belong to, it seems to be almost a never ending discussion regarding "who is best" and what I see often is that yesterday's hero, is tomorrow's zero. They all seem to be highly variable in the quality, so one dial might be great, and the next dial sent to the same place is crap.

Cheers, Al

 

Great work there and the patience of a saint waiting for that dial to show up!

 

Fully agreed. This project made me learn this the hard way.
Actually the dial was refinished twice before the end result, which again was only "half ok". The first attempt failed on a couple of details that just annoyed the crap out of me. The second (pictured above) was on a level I could live with, and it did actually look ok on the wrist.
Being a collector by heart I still ended up not wearing the watch due to its shortcomings.
Finding an old and unrestored dial was something I only had a very slim hope of achieving, but it proves that fishing in the bay is like fishing in general!

 

Since your used dial is (or at least was) luminous, will you replace the hands?

Tom

 

If I only knew how it should look!?
I have a catalog page that shows thin needle like hands with no lume.
And I have pictures of a couple of others.
Neither in a happy state.
The only one I can think of is this one:



I definitely don't trust it's pedigree, but the hands might be right.

Anyone with more info?

The hands above, with original lume, I have access to.

Cheers!

 

Those exact hands are what I was thinking of! I've seen them a couple of times and remembered because I was thinking how nice it would look relumed.

Tom

 

Then there is also other ones with about the same dial and hand combo as mine has:


My main trouble is to figure out the measurements of the hands. I know of some Lemania hands in the design of the Tiffany dialed one above, however I have a feeling they are too short. There is also the question about the hole/sleeve diameter as the ones I have located is for a preceding caliber (non date).
Omega 381 hands will work. But very few of the Cosmic had lumed hands (or dials). The ones that possibly had this seems to have had dauphine / alpha hand with a strip of lume on.
I guess it will remain "as is" for now.

 

Way to go in preserving the vintage qualities while restoring it to usable condition. A fine balance was successfully struck.

 

Always solid and straightforward advice from the archer ...

 

Looks terrific !!!!!

You sure love Lemania (for good reason!).

It's possible you have one of the biggest private collections the world. I've not seen any more varied or so much depth. And, many in perfect collector condition.

Keep going!!!!!!