<walking on eggshells...> - recognizing cosmetically enhanced 1675's?

Ludi

Mine is a 1675 from 1965, unfortunately dial and hands where changed through previous Rolex services, bought 2850£ 8 years ago, service paper included.

Pic below is prior of service, heavily polished, mismatched hands (tritium though):



Then, I had it fully serviced 3,5 years ago, including laser welding treatment at Laboratorio Portanova, to bring the watch case to its initial specs, including those lovely square crown guards; cost me an extra 950£

Below is the result:





So basically, I spent 3,8K ... and consider myself pretty happy with it even if some purists might say my 1675 is a kind of a franken.

I’d say I see my 1675 the way I see my SM300 Watchco, a solid watch for any everyday wear with a strong taste of vintage in it. (oh yeah I’ve fitted a submariner bracelet too 🙄)



Battered watches full of scars are for my military watches collection .... can’t even imagine refinishing any one of them actually.

Ludi

Mine is a 1675 from 1965, unfortunately dial and hands where changed through previous Rolex services, bought 2850£ 8 years ago, service paper included.

Pic below is prior of service, heavily polished, mismatched hands (tritium though):



Then, I had it fully serviced 3,5 years ago, including laser welding treatment at Laboratorio Portanova, to bring the watch case to its initial specs, including those lovely square crown guards; cost me an extra 950£

Below is the result:





So basically, I spent 3,8K ... and consider myself pretty happy with it even if some purists might say my 1675 is a kind of a franken.

I’d say I see my 1675 the way I see my SM300 Watchco, a solid watch for any everyday wear with a strong taste of vintage in it. (oh yeah I’ve fitted a submariner bracelet too 🙄)



Battered watches full of scars are for my military watches collection .... can’t even imagine refinishing any one of them actually.

watchknut

Um...where did you have that casework done?

Those crown guards are insane! And that is the reason why I am skeptical about all of these crazy condition cases popping up.

LAWW will recut a case, but they will not add metal to lugs to make thicker...once you do that, you are getting into murky waters.

ANALOGUE

This is really scary and impressive at the same time. It is impressive to see refinishing results. The level of competence needed - wow!

But really scary since these watches will be sold as all original sooner or later... I see the following sequence before me:

Seller 1 (that refinished the watch: "it is Serviced an refinished"

Seller 2: "It is Serviced and hands are relumed"

Seller 3: "Hands are probably relumed"

Seller 4: "Hands are possibly relumed, but I don't really think so"

Seller 5: "to the best of my knowledge, its all original"

And that is if everyone is fairly honest, the sequence can of course be 1 or 2 persons long as well... 🙁

Too much money to be made in being dishonest 🙁

Lonestar

Merci @Ludi for sharing your experience and the results... This is exactly the kind of before/after analysis I was hoping to see, similarly to what @djmusicman has shown can be done to fix botched crown guards. This is enlightening.

If one factors in @ANALOGUE 's sales pitch evolution model, which is something I had in my mind too but he described it perfectly, and we add all the dial/hands refinishing techniques mentionned in the past 6 pages, this means there is no friggin' way to figure out what is original vs. what isn't.

@Ludi's watchco comparison is very appropriate - watchco's (and cousin's and the other's!) SM are a genuinely enjoyable product... they sell for 1/3rd to 1/4th of the price of a genuine one, and none of the sellers is trying to make any possible buyer that they're the real deal.

Thanks everyone - this thread is beating all my "learning experience" expectations. Those who posted that precious information that usually remains hush-hush but to a small proportion of the collectors have all my gratitude.

jfmiii

the last few years have seen crazy advances in what the forgers can do. to be honest, im not sure id be comfortable purchasing anymore vintage Rolex from anyone besides the creme de la creme dealers, "barn finds" not withstanding. here is my 16750 i bought several years back. im not sure if it is unpolished or not but it is damn close, imo.

ANALOGUE

Or will it just lead to huge premium for the very top top notch dealers?

Archer

I agree that the regularity with which perfectly matching patina comes up is a little more than suspect.



Yep - they can be laser welded, polished, then tumbled to give that "unpolished" look, so in my world that word is pretty much meaningless.

And although it's not a GMT, I'm pleased I bought my 1680 from the original owner - it's the only way to know if the watch hasn't been played with IMO...

djmusicman

All the tell tale signs of a refinished case here... just kidding but if you did find out that yours had been refinished then it would still be the same watch. It's just polishing technique. If yours does ever get dinged up and needs a polish then I guess you'll instruct the watchmaker to use a good old fashioned and honest polishing wheel 😉



How do you think the top dealers manage to consistently find untouched watches?

https://www.rolexforums.com/showthread.php?t=397937

Sold for CHF408,500. So were the bidders all ill informed idiots or were they bidding on a fantastic looking and historically important watch and could live with the possibility that a few parts might have been changed over its 60 year lifetime?

ANALOGUE

Basically, When you can't tell the difference between two watches, they got to have the same price?