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Archer
··Omega Qualified WatchmakerWhy not? What makes it go shouldn't be considered holy. Most of the vintage pieces will not be able to find watchmakers keeping them alive, parts will be become more and more impossible to find, partly due to major brand politics . This is analog to refit a vintage car with a battery pack and electric drive.
This was not an uncommon practice in the past as quartz movements came down in price and became more available. If you take away the whole collector angle, it make sense technically and economically to install a movement that is far superior in terms of accuracy, and less maintenance intensive. There was a time when mechanical watches had no alternative, and accuracy was more directly related to the amount of money you spent on a watch, but quartz has obviously broken that paradigm. With cheaper quartz movements you could turn your average priced, not so accurate mechanical, into something that the best and most expensive mechanical watches of the time could not match in terms of accuracy, and for not a lot of money.
Not saying that I would advocate doing this, but I do understand why people had it done.
Unfortunately a lot of the time the way this sort of "upgrade" is done leaves little opportunity to return it to the former state...
This one had the dial glued so completely to the movement that getting it off without damage would have been pretty difficult, if not impossible...
Cheers, Al
