After reading Michael Stockton's article on Fratello a few years back - #TBT Seiko 7A38 Chronograph (fratellowatches.com) - I developed a bit of a taste for the Seiko quartz chronographs. For the unfamiliar, the 7A28 movement was the world's first analogue quartz chronograph, and the 7A38 was the first with day and date too. The movement can be fully stripped and serviced. The 7A28 family is well known with the RAF Gen 1, the Speedmaster (Not all Speedmasters come from Switzerland | Omega Forums) and various other specials as worn in Aliens and a View to a Kill, and even an obscure They Might Be Giants video for a song about the march of time... Anyway, a few years back I picked up a Seiko 7A38-7029 in an auction, that I really liked - it had a slightly larger than most, dodecagon case shape that has earned it the nickname "Royal Oak", after the AP original... I showed the watch to a friend who said he really wanted to buy it, so being a good mate, I sold it for pretty much what it cost me - and I set off looking for another. Fast forward 3+ years, and this popped up on eBay. It was listed as only being available to UK buyers, and it sat for most of its time at a low price - I swooped and bought it for £1 less than the max bid I had placed, so managed to outbid a few other people by a whisker. The cost was a lot of money (in some people's eyes... and nearly 3x what I sold the last one for) for an early 1980s quartz Seiko, but comfortably less than a service of a Speedmaster at an OB. It's cracking
Congrats on the pick up. Looks to be in great condition. It's worth mentioning these movements, despite been quartz, had 15 jewels in them. My 7A28-7039 from 1983 says hello.
Actually 17 jewels for the 7A38, as it gained 2 additional ones compared with its simpler 7A28 incarnation. Here's mine (ref. 7A38-7000), bought by my dad as a gift to me in 1984. I love this watch to bits!
Indeed. My mistake. For some reason I had always believed the 7A38 had two additional jewels, and after your post I even unscrewed the caseback on mine to find out that my belief was incorrect. Funny how one can becomes so firmly convinced of something despite the clues being so easy to come by... Thanks a lot for the clarification.