I bought my Speedmaster Pro new in 1992. I had lusted after one since seeing one in a jewelry store in the mid seventies. Since then, it has been my trusted companion without fail. This April, it stopped running. I took it to my local OB where they quoted me a repair estimate of $750.00 which is the posted price on Omega's website. Pricey, but for a watch I last had serviced in 2002, I figured I was ahead of the game. I was also told a return time of six to eight weeks with most watches taking the lesser. It's now been a full eight weeks with no completion date on the horizon. The folks at the OB are always polite when I call to check the status but I'm getting anxious. Has anyone had a similar experience? Should I be troubled?
I guess the upside of this is that I discovered the 300M in blue on my visit to the store. Thanks!

 

6-8 weeks is normal, and chronographs can take longer. Do you know which service center the OB sent your watch to? 9-12 weeks isn't unheard of if they're backed up, btw.

I personally would rather have them take longer and do the job properly.

 

Thanks for your perspective. It was sent to Seattle, WA.

 

I had a watch sent to Seattle, a Seamaster Professional, for service under warranty and it came back within a month. I was impressed!

 

Depending on what your watch needed, under warranty, the movement my have been replaced, rather than serviced. For a non-warranty repair, perhaps they may be servicing the movement. That could conceivably the reason for the slower service. Just my guess.

 

Omega doesn't replace movements at service, ever. All cases and movements are serialized and the numbers must match.

The only time this changes is when a movement is too damaged to be serviced (usually from corrosion), in which case a blank movement must be serialized and then cased, which to the best of my knowledge only happens in Switzerland.

Warranty service is quicker because it goes to the head of the queue and is prioritized (as it should be).

 

Oh really? This one went to Omega Canada for a service, and the movement was replaced! No lie! Never, you say?

 

That's an old modular movement. I was speaking specifically for non-modular movements, which Omega hasn't used modular movements in 15+ years.

 

But you used the word never! I guess it depends on the watch whether they service or replace.

 

It's literally just for modular movements because the module isn't worth servicing.

And I said never because I don't view module movements as being good enough to even worry about. I've never owned one and I never will. It's lazy watchmaking.

 

Oh poo!

 

Would you please explain me the modular and non modular movement. I wish to know about them.

 

Sure!

A modular movement uses a base calibre, like the ETA 2892 (Omega 1120) and places a module on top of that movement with whatever complications are needed/wanted. It's powered by, but not really geared into, the gear train of the base calibre.

When I say it's lazy watchmaking, I'm mostly being a snob; there's nothing wrong with a modular movement inherently, the problem I have with it is that you're not taking the time to do the watchmaking.

As an example, the Speedmaster Reduced has a modular movement; it's an ETA calibre with a Dubois Depraz chronograph module stacked on top. The Speedmaster Professional would be an example of a non-modular, or integrated, chronograph.

 

Thanks a lot.

 

Some of us who aren't snobs quite like these "hybrid" movements.

 

That's fair, there are people out there that collect lunch boxes; who am I to judge?

 

Perhaps a separate thread for the discussion of modular movements is in order? It certainly is a concept many are unfamiliar with, or even those familiar with them may still have questions(myself included).

Such as:
Can you have multiple modules stacked on top of each other?
Do modular movement perform better or worse than their non modular counterparts?
If multiple complications are stacked, can the excess stress result in more strain on the base-movement?
Is there a record for how many modules have been stacked?
Can we possibly try to break this record as an OF team??

 

Both statements made here are false. As noted already Omega does replace movements as the "service" not just for modular chronographs, but also for most quartz calibers. And certainly not all movements are serialized - the modular chronograph movements are certainly not, and neither are many of the 7750 based chronograph movements, such as the 1151, 1152, and 1155. Most quartz movements are also sans serial numbers.

Also note that serializing the movement makes no difference to having the ability to swap an entire movement out. If, as you already suggest, Omega is willing to swap out an entire serialized movement that is badly damaged and has a procedure for that (they do alter the serial number records accordingly when this happens) then there's no reason they could not do the same for any service swap. This is also what Tudor does with their new in-house movements - all are serialized and all get swapped at service. Many other brands do this as well and I expect to see more of this in the future.

Cheers, Al