I'm curious to know what people think of this dial printing plate.
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Vintage-...217b5837c:g:zUQAAOSwGEJcXIIo&autorefresh=true
The UG fonts don't look right to me (pointy A and all that together with the unusual logo) and why would they use the same plate for different brands?
I'm curious to know what people think of this dial printing plate.
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Vintage-...217b5837c:g:zUQAAOSwGEJcXIIo&autorefresh=true
The UG fonts don't look right to me (pointy A and all that together with the unusual logo) and why would they use the same plate for different brands?
What is wrong with the sub dial hands? I thought that "peak" sub dial hands were a possibility on the Exotic Blue dial.
I have only seen 2 original owner 885108s (also in the 2,892,9XX serial) and they both have had the rectangular subdial hands. I have seen the peak subdial hands and a mixture of peak/rectangular subdial hands on this reference but trust these less than original owner watches. I’d welcome any information or resources as there is limited scholarship on the exotic ninas
I think Ninas and Exotic Ninas were built with whatever parts Universal had left in the bin.
Can I ask what your basis for this is?
Here's from Sala on Nina- translated from Italian by google:
In 1961/62 UG had lost the Pont Martel factory
Yea - the thing with Nina comes directly from a discussion I've had with Sala about the 60s and UG. Also given Universal's chaotic business history-
Here's from Sala on Nina- translated from Italian by google:
In 1961/62 UG had lost the Pont Martel factory, was in financial difficulties and did everything possible to get out of this situation.
To do this he used all the material he had in stock, combining it as best he could according to the needs.
It is no coincidence that many tricompaxes came out in that period, because they had many stocks of these movements that in that period
they were appreciated as now.
The much vaunted Nina Rindt, who now pay unjustified sums, is nothing more than the assembly of crates that had in stock
with a purchased Valjoux 72 inserted, as they had finished the movements for the Compax and also for the Uni-compax (Val.23)
Moreover, in that period all the watchmakers were going through a period of economic difficulty and were trying to overcome the crisis.
For this reason it is not possible for watches of that period to have certain references.
Universal in 60s was a business trying to survive the ups and downs of quickly changing industry and their sky-rocketing popularity at the same time. It leads to chaotic practices and some of the best watches ever made. But -to me- not all of them can be held under the microscope of today's collector with expectations of uniformity and predictability. They were a business trying to push product and stay afloat so if a handset fits the bill and it wasn't the handset that was used on the prior 100 watches of the same ref- so be it.
Everyone will have their own tolerance for what they are willing to accept. With UG- I've learned to give them some slack.
Didnt Zenith just buy out Martel in 1960, so UG lost access to their chronograph movements?
The timeline fits with UGs switch to Valjoux chronograph movements in the early 1960s...
Did he give a source for this information?
I recall he ended that communication with "This is my humble thought, not supported by anything other than my experience, since the archives no longer exist."
Id be keen to find out, if he happened to mention anything along those lines...
"They lost the factory in Pont Martel" is a very strange and dismissive way of saying "they were no longer supplied movements by their movement supplier, the Martel Watch Co".
But -to me- not all of them can be held under the microscope of today's collector with expectations of uniformity and predictability. They were a business trying to push product and stay afloat so if a handset fits the bill and it wasn't the handset that was used on the prior 100 watches of the same ref- so be it.
Everyone will have their own tolerance for what they are willing to accept. With UG- I've learned to give them some slack.
The 60's were a crazy time for UG. I think Ninas and Exotic Ninas were built with whatever parts Universal had left in the bin. Less concern about uniformity of handsets than getting the product out to market. That's not to say there aren't patterns with handsets/logos/dials etc but I don't think there were definitive hard and fast rules- at least that is my thinking now until someone can point to a diligent research or evidence on it. Also these are 50+ year old watches so were there changes, were there replacements, modifications??
here's another thread on these
I agree. There is no consensus on sub hands. very early ninas and evil ninas are normally seen wirh lolipop hands but are also seen with rectangular hands. Space compax models are seen with blues and rectangular that end with a spike.However, other confis (including lolipop hands) are also seen especially in later space compax references (second gen). Even catalogs shows a variety of hands on compax, space compax and exotics. info is scarce ... the 60s and early 70s with the influence of bulova where weird times for UG ...
Didnt Zenith just buy out Martel in 1960, so UG lost access to their chronograph movements?
The timeline fits with UGs switch to Valjoux chronograph movements in the early 1960s...
That didn't hang around long.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/1942-Vinta...graph-Ref-22499-Cal-285-Running-/313073033340
You can't even contact the seller, so my guess is they've had a change of heart or sold it elsewhere?[/QUOTE
