I've been wanting to acquire a black dialed vintage Seamaster for a while, preferably a Cosmic, but have heard black dials are nefariously tricky. Any tips on what specifically i should look for as I begin my search this weekend? Figured I'd ask before looking and ending up disappointed in a silly mistake.

 

I don't have any specific tips or hints, but I wasn't sure if you saw that there is a black-dialed Cosmic for sale in the private watch forum at the moment: https://omegaforums.net/threads/omega-seamaster-cosmic-166-036-serviced-400.109266/#post-1452869

 

Thanks for pointing that out. After a PM exchange w/the seller, he actually doesn't mind if I use a couple of dial shots from his ad as an example.

For the pictures of the example below, am I incorrect to think that dial and hands are generally correct for the model and era? A Cosmic 166.036

 

Another black dialled version, I much prefer this to the date or day/date, which clutters the dial IMO

 

I do like the cross-hatched lines aesthetically. Looking at the photo, yours to me appears to be correct, with slightly better aged indices on the hands than the day/date model, which also appears to my eyes to be evenly marked and uniformly aged. @cristos71 do you know if your dial is all original?

 

Yes, it's a poor picture, but an original dial.