I've been on a really bad auction streak lately, loosing the last 4. It's not so much loosing, but beeing the under bider by less then 5chf and in the last seconds... Plus the winning bidder had been the same person for all 4 watches. If you see yourself in this list, congratulations! Two Universal Watch Co., a really nice Zenith Captain and an Angelus Chronodato, and they all sold for a reasonable price that I was willing to pay.

Enough wining, you loose some and win some! And as many have stated the hunt is half the fun.

I'm in contact with a seller who has this beautiful Tri-Compax (sellers pictures), unfortunately it doesn't have the proper hour hand. The price is reflected on this missing hour hand and I'm pretty sure the rest is good. What do you think, is the rest good?

How difficult would it be to source hands for cal. 481?

As always, thank you for your opinion. It's always welcomed and valued.

 

Great watch...but I don't think I'd be able to get over that franken hour hand

 

Shudder....I'd pass.

 

I want to bump this back up in case I can get some more info. I'm presently on hold waiting for the owner of the watch. He is convinced he can find the correct hour hand and said he would get back to me in a few days.

I believe that most people probably stopped looking after seeing the hour hand, but please have another look and let me know if something is off. Thanks!

 

The date wheels are in French?

They are not in spanish: LUNes/FEBrero and they are not in portuguese SEGunda/FEVereiro. So they only can be in french LUNdi/FÉVrier but i'm not sure abou the lack of accent on "É".

It's possible that, at least, one of the date wheels is from a different watch?

 

I guess that could explain the colour variation between both. I know they are in french and that's one the reason why I am interested.

In my opinion the Février abréviation FEV should not have an accent, but I don't know if this relates to date disks.

 

According to Wikipedia the correct abréviation to "Février" is "FÉV" but i don't know if this applies to date disks.

https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mois#Abr.C3.A9viations

 

I am not 100%, but I believe the hour and minute hands are the same for most UG calibers. (As in hole diameter, not style/shape of course).
This seller in France used to have a variation of hands for sale. I would have contacted him. He is a very helpful man, and seems to know his UG parts. http://www.ebay.fr/usr/saabreit

 

Yeah, to be debated! Then again we tend to change our rules in french every other day. Thanks

 

Contact seller SAABreit on ebay, he may be able to help you. He claims he has one.

 

Let us know if that works out !

 

I sent him a message, now it's the waiting game. Thank you both.

 

Let us know how it turns out !
Your watch collecting friend,
Roland

 

Let's hope he doesn't delete it. Communication via eBay in Switzerland is all in German. I wrote to him in French since he's based in Paris but the eBay header will be in German. If I saw that in my in-box I would delete it!

 

Contact has been made!

 

Great, let's hope he comes through for you !

 

I was wondering if the cal. 481 Tri-Compax had a some models with different hands or did they all come with the triangular/losange hands?

I have the possibility to obtain a triangular hour hand but it's 10mm long and the seller mentions that it might be a little short since usually for a 32mm dial the hour hand should be 11mm long. This cal. 481 is 34mm so will it look much too small in that dial. I have no experience in buying watch hands and would love some input from the more knowledgeable members on here.

Could someone with Salas book confirm or chime in.

@LouS @jordn @Severin @10H10 (sorry to bother you guys and sorry if I forgot someone that could get offended fo not beeing called upon)

 

I would try the 10mm if he gives yoi a good price, only one mm difference ? You may never find the exact right one, IMHO ! The one you have on the watch looks short to me as well, so at least it will match the other hand !

 

Sorry, didn't see this earlier. By triangular hands, do you mean the sword hands? 10mm (tip to center of tube) should be the correct size for a 481.


These early lumed tri-compaxes did come with "alpha" hands as well.