Seamaster 300 165.024 build help

Hi,
I have been collecting 165.024 parts for quite some time and have finally managed to put a relatively period correct watch together with a mish mash of parts. These consist of a heavily damaged case with snapped tube, service bezel, service dial and hands and lastly a 552 from a geneve from Japan that had horrendous dial and hand damage. You’ll notice that the bezel has non standard teeth milled. This was due to the case being twisted and my watch maker trying anything they could to get the service bezel onto the vintage damaged case. They had to do some real old fashioned watch making magic. The bezel has had Rolex bearings and springs fitted with the genuine omega bezel spring. I understand many of you may be frustrated with what has been done but it was only possible to restraighten the case so far. I hate to think what happened to this watch for it to be so badly damaged in the first place but I see it as a minor modification to being a watch back from the dead. As the other parts are all service parts no vintage dials, hands or bezels have been impacted.

My big question is. Does the threaded crown on the 165.024 / 166.024 have a gasket inside of it or is this inside the tube itself? I had to remove the crown from the stem as the end piece was damaged and not locking into the movement. I noticed the crown has no gasket inside and don’t want to risk damaging all of the work completed. I also do not intend to hide this watch from the community so it’s good that other members have visibility of its origins incase I come across hard times which requires me to sell it. My ceramic Seamaster would be long gone before this…..

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Oh dear, I took a bit of heat to it to seperate the crown and stem. Any idea on a replacement size from cousins Archer?

Any watch that didn’t leave the factory is a mishmash product and many people own them. The problem is when you try and sell it as original

I’d never do that hence my transparency on here

This type of seal is also seen in flightmaster crowns, they're virtually impossible to buy after market. Even if you could, not really possible to fit to a viable crown.

I will likely need to order a new crown given the heat it took. Can anyone comment on why the old stem on the far right locks into the movement no problems but the 2 on the left won’t? The stem on the far right is the original 552 stem that was fitted to the 552 movement from the geneve donar watch. The 2 stems on the left are apparently 552 but will not lock in. I have had the movement out again to check I’ve not damaged the keyless but the old stem locks in first time everytime but the 2 on the left will not. I’ve rebuilt keyless on etas not problem before and have been so careful not to press hard and just enough.

@Archer any idea what’s going on with the stems? The original has a slightly different profile. Was just going to order one from cousins but worried another like the 2 on the left turn up? Wondering if thec2 on the left are 565?

I’ve ordered one from cousins, hopefully that’ll be everything resolved once it arrives. Thanks everyone for the continued support. What a great community! 😀

Probably the 563 version which won't work correctly in the 552

Asking one last question on this build and hoping someone can shed some light for me. Since assembling the watch and fitting the correct stem I have noticed that the rotor is catching the case clamp movement screws. It was so bad that it was banging off them so I had to use the shallower headed geneve screws instead of the bigger Seamaster screws visible below. I have also noticed some light grazing to the movement which I have marked in red and the crown has no click type resistance when being wound backwards. My 165.014 feels tighter when wound in reverse whereas this just spins loosely. @Archer what have I done wrong and is it now a case of sending off for a service 😭?

It is also 100% audiably more rattly when on wrist

@Archer where are you based? Would you take something like a service on?