Speedmaster 105.012-63, the hunt, the buy, the "problems"

I have long been looking for a Speedmaster Professional105.012 - 63.
The very first Speedmaster Professional!
The watch itself is very rare and, as I have noticed over time, difficult to find having been produced
apparently less than 2000.

After a few years (!) I managed to locate an apparently very nice one from a well known
and very expensive merchant from Geneva.
Note:
I thought it could become one of my zero-mile watches, until I discovered that,
from extract, it was produced in 1964, but sold in Mexico ...

As mentioned, the watch was in good condition and from the photos everything looked oem.
- The dial was of the second type with the asymmetrical "T"
- The caseback was marked 105.012 - 63 with the "sandblasted finish."
- The movement was a rare "intermediate" type 321 with the right reference

- The "wide & short" chrono buttons as it should be
- The very beautiful DON bezel
- The bracelet was a 1506 from 1/64 with 16 terminals
All accompanied by the extract from the Omega archive

At first glance, the thing that didn't quite fit me was the crown which appeared to be of a more recent type
and this allowed me to "extort" a minimum discount from the seller well avareof the rarity of the watch.
Note:
Thanks to my friend Gino Balbi for the specific help!

The watch took a while to arrive because the seller went on vacation right away
after I paid for the watch.

Once it arrived I inspected it carefully and some "problems" came to light, even though of lesser extent

The crown had nothing to do with a 63 watch and therefore I immediately replaced it with an A1 crown,
which among other things is a job that is anything but difficult to carry out:


Obviously, to do this, the caseback must be removed and here I found the biggest negative surprise:
The so-called "dust-cover", which is actually the part that holds the movement in place, was of much more recent
type!

it will have to be changed with an old one that fortunately is not very difficult to find.

Another negative surprise, given the name of the seller, was that the glass was not original as it lacked the typical
central stamp with the Omega with "flat feet".
These glasses are now difficult to find and are expensive as well, but the hunt is on and I am still confident
that I will find one.
Furthermore I noticed a grease stain on the sub-dial of the hours, but my watchmaker
told me that this is a minor problem and that it can easily be solved.
He also advised to do a nice cleaning of the dial leaving the hour marker and the hands as they are and, if anything, restoring the sub dial hands

Note the particular dial with the asymmetrical "T".

The bracelet was all in all in good condition, but being picky, he should be revised too:

View attachment 1381468

SUMMA SUMMARUM:

A Speedmaster difficult, if not very difficult, to find with some characteristics that make it very special!

Note
The "problems" encountered after the purchase are all in all easy, even if not very easy to solve.
But, as was to be expected, no responsibility was assumed by the seller.

Have a nice day!

P.s.:
I personally like these old Speedmaster on a vintage JB Champion mesh band with straight lugs:

Sorry, but I forgot to post the picture that shows the wrong crown:

May I ask what/how is the asymmetrical T dial? As a novice I can't really see .... Thank you.

Believe me, my watch maker is absolutely top notch.
He already restored a few of my Speedmaster delivering super results.

In between 1963 and 1964 the Swiss Government obliged the watchmaker to mark the watch that contained radioactive material.
In this specific case Omega had to mark that the luminous marker and the hands contained "Tritium".
The first generation 105.012-63 in fact had a dial marked "SWISS MADE" only, on the second batch the "T" for tritium were added later on
and therefore the are a little bit out of center: asymmetrical precisely.
Note the different gap in between the "T" and the "S" and the "T" and the "E"

Aaaah! OK! I knew about the T for titrium, but what puzzled me was the "asymmetrical " T . Thank you very much! It is not that easy to notice this particularity, though !

Effectively it is not so easy to spot.
The 1963 Speedmaster Pro is a rare bird by itself (apparently less than 2000 made)
and has, to make matters worse, two dial variants.

Regardless of the minor issues, that's a gorgeous piece.

I have an extremely original 105.012 with a crystal that has no flat foot stamp in the center. The crystal looks in similar condition to the watch (has a small chip missing beneath the bezel), so it could be original. I wouldn’t change it if I were you.



Congrats on getting a lovely -63. I call that a RAF watch … and no, that’s not ‘Royal Air Force’ 😉

Everything could be, but the watch had for sure the crown changed and the seller told me that the crystal
was changed the same time...

Does the crystal have a silver or a black retention ring?

Thank you

Black.

Mine says hello



Dial has a very rare shiny grey tone that matches the ghost bezel nicely. The discoloration doesn’t look as bad in person.



No T dial, silver tension ring.

I have a good friend that bought a 105.012-63 in the 60s. He is the one and only owner of the watch since then...
Lucky guy!
The crystal has a black ring and he will check if the central logo is there or not.

Have a nice day

Nice

Nice watch!
Does your crystal have the central logo?

Thank you

I quote what Gino Balbi, the major Speedmaster expert in Italy, wrote me yesterday regarding the
crystal question:

"Everything could be ... they had two production lines at the same time, one for the ref. 105.003 and another for the 105.012.
At first they may have used the same glass with silver ring on 105.012, even if they might have had to install the one with black ring and then again with the one with silver ring on 105.012 due to production / supply problems.
For me what they had on hand they mounted.
As a guideline perhaps we should take into account that for the straight lugs, silver was the preference, for the twisted lugs the preference was a crystal with black tension ring.
This certainly happened at the beginning of the production, in '63, after that, things stabilized."

Gino also told me that all the crystals had the "flat feet" central logo

Cheers

Thanks. Yes, old style flat feet logo