Dear OF'ers,

Because of the radium thread I remembered a project that is lying in a box. A very special project and I need your advice.

Thnx to @ConElPueblo I bought this 37mm 1st gen 1958 kontiki a couple of months ago (thnx again Troels). As you can see the crown and hands are wrong and the radium on the dial... Well, it's not good. Especially around the 9 o'clock marker.

I found some examples how the watch should look like. I've contacted a watch restorer in Paris, France, and I've asked him what his thoughts are regarding restoration and if he can do the job.

I'm thinking of replacing the hands and crown (I'm not sure how, I did'nt find replacements during the last couple of months) and I'm thinking of reluming the dial with tritium (dont know how this will look and if it's possible). I've send a email to eterna to ask if they could help with the restoration but they did'nt react (as expected).

What do you think? I need some guidance.

The pictures:

 

How it should look like

 

And of course, thnx OF!

 

You also need an Eterna Logo...

Concerning your question: The lume is lost, a good relume would be fine.
Good luck finding hands!

 

That's part of the relume right?

 

And do you think tritium would be a good alternative for the radium? Not that I know of other reluming possibilities... Are there any?

 

Nope. As far as I know, there should be five metal points:
https://omegaforums.net/threads/exciting-eterna-kontiki-arrival.82567/

Why tritium? Relume is relume, it won't be original anymore, so why not modern lume in a nice vintage colour? A skilled watchmaker coould do the job.

 

Ok. So I need to restore the logo as well with metal points. Thnx for pointing this out!

Regarding lume, I thougt tritium was the only possibility. I dont have experience with reluming watches.

Do we know somebody who can do the restoration? I've send a email to this one because I saw some work from him that was impressive.

http://www.atelier-horloger.fr/contact.php

 

Nowadays, Tritium is only used when you intend to bring a valuable watch back to specs. And you need someone, who has access to Tritium, or better: the old recipe of lume.
Do you know a skilled watchmaker in your area? As I said, a skilled watchmaker can do that.

 

I do but I did'nt ask him if he can do a restoration like this. And I saw the work of that french atelier and I was quite impressed. Maybe I should ask my own watchmaker first.

 

Yes. Hope this is one of those constructive dumb questions - how do we think the originals were lost?
Good luck with this beauty.

 

How in the hell were those metal balls attached? And where could I find these? Hmmm. I'm in contact right now with the shop from france and asked him the same questions.

 

It would probably be a very painstaking job, but I have a couple of Eterna dials
with the same applied logo if you need a donor.

 

Thnx! That's good to know! I will contact you if necessary!

 

Honestly, I am not over the moon concerning the dial. So many scratches as it seems.
I guess someone messed around with the watch in a suboptimal manner.

 

Hmmm. I'm a bit in the dark. Should I also go for a refinishing of the dial? And if I would do so, would I still like it? The objective is to let it look like this one:

https://omegaforums.net/threads/sol...ration-spectacular-now-reduced-to-6800.99389/

But is that achievable?

 

I think in the hands of someone like Hyman, you can get the relume you desire. He may even have a solution to the missing bearings. As for the scratched dial, my first Seawolf looked like this one and after the dial was cleaned and hands relumed, you can’t notice anything under the crystal unless you really look hard.

Side note- glossy dials like this in the hands of someone who knows what they are doing can really be helped- not to give away too many secrets, but car wax was involved in the restoration of mine and it did an amazing job at minimizing many of the fine scratches- just like on the clear-coat of a car.

 

The restoration costs are app. EUR 1000. That means servicing the movement, new hands and crown, reluming hands and dial, restoring eterna logo and refinishing dial.

 

So you would say only a relume and leave the dial alone?

 

I’m not an expert, but have had a few dials like this really brought back to life without going full Monty- just a clean, wax and relume. Every tradesman has their tricks, and you have to be of the mindset that you have nothing to lose. I think a re-lumer can get this looking great.
Will it be perfect, no. But it can look 10x better without destroying the original dial.