A couple of months ago, I pulled the trigger on what I believe is a relatively fair priced 18k gold Seamaster:

That wasn't the only reason, though...


But there was more, and that was what got my vintage mystery juices bubbling


Cal.351... chronometer?... RG luxury finish?
Ofcourse, an Omega Archives extract would settle the mystery... in the mean time, my watch maker had a thing or two to say about it upon inspection:

• "The barrel bridge seems to be pretty much the same color as the other components. Of course, some bridges are not totally visible without disassembly. Now, here's another mystery. See the fancier ratchet wheel above the mainspring barrel? Well, normally it would be accompanied by a fancier crown wheel, the smaller wheel/gear that meshes with the ratchet wheel. What's in place is clearly a plain crown wheel. If it were the fancier one, it would be more polished like the ratchet wheel."
• "The RG regulator assembly appears to be totally correct. Notice the round regulator piece that has the tab for the regulator/curb pins. It is beveled and highly polished on its inner edge where it surrounds the jewel setting. That's the way it should look. A plain one is polished, but the upper surface is flat instead of being beveled/chamfered."
• "Case condition is pretty good. The bezel is not removable, as it is machined to the case middle itself. The lugs have hidden spring bar holes, and this is very similar to a 2577 style with the beefy lugs. The beefy lug version of this style usually has little chamfers/bevels where the lug tops meet the sides. If there were originally chamfers in place, they have been polished away. The case 'has' received some polishing, but that doesn't necessarily mean that chamfers were ever in place on the lugs. I say that because the 2577/2576 cases that had beefy and chamfered lugs generally have a removable bezel. With this style of 'made onto' bezel, the normal lug style for 2577/2576 would have no chamfers, slightly narrower lugs, and the spring bar holes would go through to the outside. This is even more mystery."
• "So, I'm still at a loss to tell you exactly what you have here. A 352 would have had both the fancy ratchet and crown wheels. We have only one in place here. But....one would assume that if this were originally a 352, and someone changed out the barrel bridge, they would have likely swapped out the fancier crown wheel, along with the ratchet wheel. Doesn't make sense. Hopefully the abstract will shed some light, but I'm starting to make the assumption that you've run across something quite special that may take a while to totally document."
• "I've been thinking about the 18K chronometer quite a bit. I think I'm ready to conclude that this is supposed to be a 352. That's the explanation that makes the most sense to me. Why did this happen.....with the changing of the barrel bridge? Quite often these bridges become worn where the barrel arbor protrudes through to connect to the ratchet wheel. The absolute quickest fix for a lazy watchmaker would be to take another Cal. 34x or 35x bridge and substitute. This may, or may not, have been done with the owner's knowledge."
• "So, what I think I want to recommend to you, is to contact the seller to ask about the 'old' bridge/part. Granted, this repair/substitution may not have taken place while your seller owned the watch, but just in case there's a remote chance, I'd say it's worth asking about any or all old parts that can still be tracked down for this watch."

On checking with the owner, as recommended, I was told that the watch had never been to a watchmaker since he bought it from a hardcore collector 15 years ago. This original owner had many Omegas, and had unfortunately got quite sick and went out of touch.
Sad dead end there... the extract was the only hope for some enlightenment!
Unfortunately, and after an unusual delay from the Omega Archives, I received the following message from them over the email:

• "Due to the nature of vintage archives in certain cases information has not survived, is unreadable or even missing. We regret to inform you that unfortunately the provided serial number (12.722.967) falls onto that category, so we are unable to issue an Extract of the Archives. Therefore we will issue a full refund of your payment. We are sorry for the inconvenience."

Another dead end
Back to my watchmaker for a more technical review of what could have possibly happened here:

• "Note the distinction(s) in the 352 and 354 balance cocks, and you can see that your theory of simply swapping regulators isn't possible. The mounts are totally different. However....your theory 'can' be correct if one simply acquires the proper balance cock to receive whichever regulator you want to have. Dimensionally, functionally, all these balance cocks are identical, with the exception of the needed mounting holes for a particular style regulator. In other words, I can take a 352 balance cock, (the only caliber of the 350 series offered with RG regulator), and I can install it on any caliber that is a derivative of the 28.10, (330 new caliber designation). I can also take a 330 caliber, plain balance cock, locate, drill, tap, and mill all the needed mounting holes and clearance reliefs. Then, if could get them, I'd just order all needed components of the RG system, and mount them all on the 330 balance cock. I'd basically have the same thing, as if I'd just ordered a 352 cock and all the extra RG components. Of course, you're talking about a considerable amount of labor, but it is certainly doable."
• "Now, the big riff here is that the 352 is the only one of the 350 series listed to have a RG. The 330 Base Model doesn't even show any type of micro-regulator. It's just a plain, tanged arm regulator. So, what's going on here? Well, the only thing I can surmise is that something special was done. BTW, and I agree with your assertion, that the 351 was supposedly offered in 'chronometer'. Wouldn't that mean we should have either an RG or Swan Neck to complete the chronometer grade movement? These components aren't even listed in the 351 or 330 schematics. So, what's up? I don't quite know, except to say that Omega was very efficient at interchangeability between calibers. They could have used a 351 caliber and installed a 352 balance cock/RG on it. That would work, but they'd also have had to change the ratchet and crown wheels to the dressy style ones. All these pieces will sort of liberally interchange, Mazen, but parts have to be obtained under different caliber numbers."

Soooooooo, what do you guys think I have here?

1. A clever franken French Seamaster wannabe
2. A collector's concoction of the ultimate vintage Seamaster chronometer
3. A lazy repair job of a French cased cal.352 RG
4. A French assembled Seamaster chronometer hybrid
5. An authentic Omega rarity
6. Other (and you will definitely need to elaborate!)

 

I agree with your watchmaker ("I think I'm ready to conclude that this is supposed to be a 352.") that somebody repaired a 352 with whatever 35x parts were readily available. Had a chronometer 35x that was assembled from 352 and 354 parts - most noticeably a 354 swan's neck regulator.

 

What do you make of Omega Archives response?

 

Could we not factor in the inconsistencies of non-Swiss assembly to account for a hybrid-type chronometer, like a 351 with an RG luxury finish? May this also account for the lack of archive data for this sample?

 

Thanks gator
Yes, that is very helpful, especially the main "tell" regarding 351 chronometers and the "Officially Certified" text. That was new to me!

 

Initially, Dennis, that is what I thought.... that it was a 351 chronometer movement with an RG replacing the swan neck regulator as in the 354.

 

Would seem to me that you have what some in the automotive world call a "bitsa", put together from bits of this and bits of that to form a complete but bastardized whole. Its possible but, I highly doubt this came from the factory like it is.

Since the parts are so freely interchangeable, the most plausible explanation would be the careless/lazy watchmaker scenario. No one really cared back in the day and few watch owners would have cared or checked a movement after a service/repair, so the damage would go unnoticed for decades.

Interesting that the dial is marked both FAB SUISSE and SWISS MADE, I always though it was either or but not both.

 

I ran into this discussion of this same question, when I was researching that same point earlier:

http://home.watchprosite.com/show-nblog.post/fi-/ti-718203/t-/

Accordingly, as gator mentioned, the consensus is that it was a corrective action to suit legal requirements

 

I wish mine was as pristine, though!

 

I have a very similar watch with a 352, it's the non-Seamaster chronometre. While researching these French cased Chronometres/Seamasters I came across only a couple of examples for comparison but they were all fitted with the cal 352, so my bet would would be on no.3 with the parts being changed during a service.

I wouldn't say that it was a lazy watchmaker though, maybe he had the parts around and offered it as a more economical fix back in the day?

 

Bingo. I remember a Constellation with a 562 on PuristsPro that the guy could not get an extract on, and despite most of us knowing it was a franken he insisted it was a rarity that Omega lost the records on (or something like that so he could deny the franken-ness).

 

Yes, that lovely rose gold chronometer
Any luck with the crown for this one? I believe I will need a replacement in my case as well, and I guess they would be the same size...

 

Oh, no, don't mention the crown

I sourced one in the US and when it arrived the seller had sent yellow instead of rose, when I mailed him to let him know of his mistake he told me, "If you ordered rose then I sent rose" . Nice. He did come around though and after another couple of weeks I eventually got a rose one.

The watch is now with my watchmaker for service/crown swap/second hand swap and I received a mail from him only a few days ago to say the crown I provided doesn't fit, it is for a 2mm tube and we need one for 2.5mm.

Another long search followed and I found one from a very nice and helpful guy in Argentina, estelauparts on Ebay, it is hopefully correct and hopefully somewhere over the Atlantic as we speak!