Then by all means buy that watch if that's what you are looking to do. Me, I'll pass thanks...

 

Unfortunately this can not be proven non-fake, especially in this case (Omega saying movement is from Seamaster and not Speedmaster etc)...

 

By the way, Charles is not part of the Heritage Team anymore. He's now working in a totally different department and has nothing to do with all of this anymore. Just to make it clear, in case somebody is looking to talk to Charles

 

I assume this means you didn't ask for an EOA but just informally inquired?

If you actually requested an EOA i would be interested to know whether they rejected your request and kept payment as they stated after last summer's change in the policy, since this looks like one of those cases where one could actually raise a complaint if indeed the mismatch in the archive is at Omega's fault

thanks
Duccio

 

If you think about it, if true, it could make sense.
The Speedmaster got all the glory (and most likely most of the sales) during that period.
Soccer Timer Seamaster, maybe no so much...

What does a profit driven company do?
Take the most complicated and time consuming component to produce from product line B, and uses it for their hottest seller; product line A to keep the production line going and push out more hot sellers than duds...

The serial on the watch I bought last year was earlier than SW range, it was more in the 145.022-68 range.
But again, if this was indeed done at the factory, it’s not like Omega cared about matching serial number ranges or cared to put in a movement with a “correct” serial range...
All they cared about was to get product out.
It was a $230 watch at the time...
That movement probably cost $30 to produce. (if that...).

All that said, this theory might all be nice & true, but at the end of the day an impossible sell to a client looking to buy a 100% original vintage Speedmaster.

 

Agree completely - I don't think anyone is saying that it isn't possible, or even likely, that this has happened in the past.

And there it is. Theories are not proof of anything when it comes to a single specific watch. Kinda sucks for what I would presume to be the small number of people who actually have one owner, never serviced, with original papers, and have the wrong movements in them. I suspect these are more rare in fact than the number that will be claimed.

 

Hmm this is a different issue I think.

 

As mentioned above, another elephant in the room here is that Omega apparently now charge for a nil return on an EOA search. Seemingly not not if you are Darren or an auction house but the man in the street could it seems ask for an extract on his one family owned Speedy, only to be told no dice and by the way we aren't refunding your £120. Now bearing in mind it seems that as many of us have suspected for a while Omega's record keeping is flawed, and they have acknowledged this fact in this thread, how do they justify maintaining the charge for an EOA refusal?

 

You pay for them them to look at their own archives, period. The refund when finding nothing was a classy move, that's all.

 

I have it in an email response from Charles when I inquired why my extract request was canceled.
(This was last year when the old extract system was in place).
He wrote to me that the serial came back as Soccer Timer, but did not elaborate about the story/theory behind it.
Therefore I assumed it was a Franken and just parted it out...

 

It’s just from a process standpoint as to why a racing dial would not have the same issue. You’d think the special dials would be recorded as they are pulled from normal production then recorded. While I can see normal production being batches and some batches being repurposed.

 

That's all well and good when you can trust them that the information they are checking is accurate, and when it isn't? Not so classy, borderline crappy.

 

Well, some people pay, and some don't from what I'm gathering.

Maybe the refusal to refund the "regular folk" is to help pay for the checks being done at no charge for the chosen few...

 

I think the most important piece of information that we can learn from this thread is that Rolex 1675 Blueberry inserts are fake... Or real... Or...

 

So in sum, in the post-war, circa 1945-70 period, Omega produced a large number of moderately-priced, reasonably stylish, decent build quality (but often not the last word in durability), accurate time-keeping watches as an affordable luxury for the middle class. Even my modest-living parents had them. They were never intended as prized collectors items. But Omega has now noticed that the slightest difference between models can mean a difference in value of thousands of dollars. So they have gone back to their records from this era (and it's impressive they kept these records at all, incomplete and inaccurate in places as they understandably are), given them the lofty title "Extracts of the Archives" and charge you silly money for them. Price gouging aside, I think you should be grateful you have any of this information from Omega. I've found that for any vintage collectible from before the digital era, production records are rare, even when the manufacturer is still in business. . Those records usually disappear after one corporate reorganization of any kind.