Hi, All-- I've been hunting recently for SMP 300 and running into an issue I would love to hear other's thoughts on. Everyone seems to agree that the serial number on the movement is only a "rough" guide of likely production year. It seems common to say they should be within a year or two. But how far out of range is red flag territory? (In the Speedy world, serial number ranges have gotten VERY tight.) This is, of course, assuming for the sake of argument that all other parts of the watch appear "correct."

The movements in SMP 300s were used in so many watches that, short of an Omega extract, a movement that is too far out of range feels iffy without a strong provenance or some such. Of course, someone wanting to make one look authentic might not have much trouble finding a movement in the "right" serial number range, either...

So: help! Curious how others approach this problem...

 

Not sure what exactly you are asking, can you give a specific example. You wont get an extract for many SMPs since many are after the cut off date of I think 2000. I have handled many and can give an educated guess at age based on a serial but no one can be exact.

 

Yes, sure: talking pre-1972, say. Ref 165.024 etc. if everything ELSE looks correct (bezel, dial, hands, lume, caseback, etc but the serial number is, say, in the 25xxx range when the other characteristics would point to a 22xxx range... does that smell fishy?

 

That model is normally referred to as the SM300, the SMP is another more modern model altogether. Your thread title will hopefully attract those with more knowledge of these than me, I thought you were asking about the Bond and its derivatives so I will bow out.

 

Perhaps you could post some pictures or at least more details. Are you sure about the dating of the individual parts? What does the caseback say? What type of hands and bezels did you observe? Is it a rather high number in the 22 range?

 

Yeah, it’s not a specific watch. More a general question when hunting for these. For instance, here is 165.024 with a 25xxx serial (PLEASE NOTE: I am not trying to make a point about this watch in particular--I am using it merely as an example for discussion):




When you compare tables such as the below, the serial and bezel insert type do not match up. I know a lot of this is still not precisely known and much is approximate, but I am curious how others deal with some of these gray areas and how far "off" from known sources do people feel comfortable venturing. Certain watches are getting so expensive that "mistakes" are more costly....

 

That S/N vs. production date table shows one year early... e.g. 24xxxxx is from 1967and 27xxxxx from 1969.

 

But the bezel chart indicates a later bezel, no? Type F insert?

 

I would not say that this is true in every case:

 

What about the bezel "correctness" according to the bezel table above? Shows 27xxx, 28xxx as "correct" for bezel type F but movement has serial of 25xxx....