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Watch treasure hunting report

me1969
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McKinley McKinley
You see M1?? I see M3 with my jewelers loupe. Dang, close, but I think it is from 1963. For a few minutes there I thought I had a birth year Sea King. And I have googled up some photos and there are other late 50's and early 60's Sea Kings without the whale. I believe it must have been a later feature? Thanks for all the info.....you guys are the best!

McK
Yes, you are correct. I hadn't magnified it so with my old eyes I thought it was an M1 but once I zoomed in on it I saw that it is an M3.
Very cool watch. Bulovas are underrated, they have made some beautiful watches.
 
vintage hab
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me1969 me1969
Good find! I always look for watches at garage sales and although 99.9% of the time there are no watches or the watches they have are quartz junk it's that .1% that makes it worth it.
And it's usually the same story, I ask the one having the garage sale if they have any watches, and most of the time they say "You know, I do but didn't think to put them out" then they go root around the house and come out with a few.
I've found some incredible pieces.... a mid 60's Seamaster that looks incredible & a very unique Longines bought together for around $25 at a sale and the best piece yet, a pre-revolutionary 18k solid gold, 1/4 repeater Verge Fusee I paid $75. It was appraised for around $6k.
That’s the stuff dreams are made of…
 
JwRosenthal
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me1969 me1969
M1 is the date code so it was made in 1961.
And, I thought the Sea King had a whale on the dial? Mine does and most I've seen also have that but I don't know when they started putting them on the dial.
Whale didn’t go on the dials until late 60’s. That was part of a whole line of “Sea/Surf”
Watches from the late 50’s- early 60’s- all part of the waterproof novelty.
 
me1969
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vintage hab vintage hab
That’s the stuff dreams are made of…

These are just 3, I've found many many by asking. Like I said, 99.9% of the time I come home empty-handed but sometimes you get lucky.
Just last week I picked up these 3 pocket watches for $20 and when I got home I posted them to a pocketwatch collectors FB page and within an hour someone offered me $100 for the Waltham. (It turned out to be John Aldridge, he is a very well known drum engraver who ahs done work for many famous musicians)
The Hampden is a William Mckinley model that I'll have serviced. It'll make a nice addition to my collection.
Anyway, I only go to sales that seem like older, established homes (no children's clothes, toys, etc visible from the road) and my motto is ask ask ask. If they don't have any I go to the next one.
 
PWs.jpeg
allwoundup
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McKinley McKinley
Happy to oblige:

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And now that I have the name Sea King to go on, am I right that the G in front of the serial number means this watch is from 1962? If so, it is actually a birth year watch for me! I know a lot of you guys have birth year Rolex's or Speedies, but this would be my first birth year watch, Bulova and for a quarter or not. Kind of cool!

McK
As others have noted, your watch is a 1963 Sea King....I believe it is a Sea King "A", similar to the linked watch watchsteez.com - 1963 bulova sea king "a" ref. 2345 time-only watch (stainless steel) Great find! Congratulations!!
 
TheGreekPhysique
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Resurrecting this thread:

First I wanted to thank @janice&fred for inspiring the hell out of me to get off my ass and do the boots on the ground work.

Last week I decided to start visiting some Mom n Pop jeweler shops in my hometown. Largely came up empty handed but I was able to snag this guy for pretty cheap.
IMG_1921.jpg





I also went to the Chelsea flea market in New York. The Russians are still there but there prices are INSANE. To the point where negotiating is not even worthwhile as your purchase point should be about a third of their asking price.


This weekend there is a bi-annual flea market in the town next to mine that runs Saturday and Sunday. I got there about 15 minutes before it opened at 8am and there was already a line about 200 people long waiting to enter. Again I came up largely empty handed. The only thing I was able to find was this:

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Don't know much about it but plan on doing some research tonight if I get time. I did want to share a few pointers that I feel will help others in the future.

1) Go to each and every table and ask if they have watches. Do not specify if you want Men's or Women's as a large amount of the public seems to deem vintage watches as "woman's" due to their small size and you might miss out on some stuff because of it.

2) After mentioning to each table that I was looking for watches several stated that they have a ton at home they they didn't bring because they thought there was no interest. After a brief discussion several stated that they would come back tomorrow with whatever they had at home. I wasn't planning on going again tomorrow but now I will.

3) I didn't specify that I was looking for "automatic", "mechanical" or "quartz". Again, it seems a majority of the public can't differentiate between them. Also, I did not specify they had "to be working." I told them I also fix watches (I don't) but that also seems to open up a lot of doors. If you come across anything remotely worthwhile even in not working condition it would obviously be worth it to just get serviced by your watchmaker.

Anyways hope you guys find this interesting and I plan on reporting back again. #BootsOnTheGround baby!
 
TheGreekPhysique
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Alright so here is the report from this morning.


Day 2 at the flea market:

As promised one of the ladies returned with all the watches she had at home (the other 2 forgot but said they would call me.) She must have brought about 300 watches in total.

I came away with this:
IMG_2010.jpg



46 in total. Mostly Timex but there were some other ones in there as well. I am going to share below ones that I thought were pretty cool.

IMG_2011.jpg


LE Jour chronograph. Never heard of it before. Swiss made it seems with "T's" so I am assuming its tritium. Pretty large as well. And who amongst us doesn't love an Orange chrono hand 😉. Gave her a wind and she started right up. Chrono function seems to be working fine too.

IMG_2027.jpg


I am guessing this one is fake as the Longine print looks kinda funky.

IMG_2020.jpg IMG_2019.jpg IMG_2016.jpg


Interesting case on this one. Lug profile remind me of the UG poulrouters kinda. Also swiss. Love the applied hour markers which look similar to my beloved 2849.


IMG_2021.jpg

Funny enough I found another watch from a different booth that has the same logo on the dial as the caravelle I found yesterday. TBH haven't had any time to research it yet.

IMG_2022.jpg IMG_2024.jpg



Westclox. I absolutely love the lume on this one. Snapped a quick pic but this doesnt do it justice. Case looks very crispy. There is a sticker on the back. Maybe the original one?
67010496776__9E4CFAE0-F1EE-4B4D-8134-79E771CAA4C0.fullsizerender.jpg IMG_2023.jpg IMG_2018.jpg IMG_2014.jpg


Delcard Alarm wrist watch. Another one I have never heard of but plan on reading about. Looks like I got a lot of work ahead of me. Plan on slowly learning how to service and fix these guys up and sell some off and keep others. Any info on any of them is of course welcomed.


Anyways pretty good haul overall. I hope you guys enjoyed the report and found it somewhat entertaining. I plan on updating every now and then on future adventures!
 
TheGreekPhysique
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allwoundup allwoundup
@TheGreekPhysique thanks for sharing your watch hunting adventure. Looking forward to seeing some of your treasures cleaned up. The black Le Jour chronograph is likely powered by Valjoux 7734. Here is a link to an article about Le Jour chronographs which you might find of interest LeJour Chronograph 7733: The Poor/Smart Man’s Chronographe du Jour (twobrokewatchsnobs.com)

Cheers!

Thanks for the article. Interesting read! Most of the LeJour that I have seen seem to list the jewels on the dial while mine doesnt. Despite that I doubt its not genuine as there seem to be very little monetary interest in investing time to redo one of these dials.

I did find a similar PVD LeJour chrono sold on Hodinkee in the past-https://shop.hodinkee.com/products/1970s-lejour-pvd-chronograph?variant=30959278030923. I think that means I am rich. With the hodinkee hype and the new interest in chronos from the moonswatch release I should be able to sell this for 3-5k. 😉😜😁
 
rob#1
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Nice haul, congratulations. Literally a different watch for each day of the year 👍
 
janice&fred
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TheGreekPhysique TheGreekPhysique
I know I know I am still watch baby! A lot of these more obscure brands still allude me.

Oh my comment was my jealous reaction of you snagging the LeJour chronograph. The fact you didn't know it was special at the time merely makes it all the more upsetting that it was you not me! 😁
 
Syzygy
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janice&fred janice&fred
Lord Have Mercy!
Was thinking the same, and it made me grin that the LeJour chrono was the one you posted as first up close picture...that's the one that jumped out at me initially. Dibs!
 
TheGreekPhysique
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Syzygy Syzygy
Was thinking the same, and it made me grin that the LeJour chrono was the one you posted as first up close picture...that's the one that jumped out at me initially. Dibs!

yea I didn’t know much about it but I just hypothesized that due to its size and it being a chronograph that it would be worth the most. Especially in todays market.
 
FREDMAYCOIN
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Very nice find. How about treating us to more pictures of the LJ chrono? Thanks
 
TheGreekPhysique
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Also, I always feel my photos are higher resolution on my phone than when they finally get uploaded here. Not sure what I am doing wrong.
 
janice&fred
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Sorry I been negligent in my contributions to this thread. I'll try much harder and hopefully y'all will pile on and continue to post your finds as well.


Well our gaggle of bikini-clad watch hunters in the tropical Philippine islands have been busy this past week. Along with about 30 other vintage watches in our latest package received they managed to snag a couple of all original sun scorched Omegas. Both running great but gonna have our guy clean and lube 'em so they are safe to wear. Both appear to be '50's but I'm not gonna try to pry open the backsides to peek inside as I only open screw backs with my limited ability. These are examples of true tropical dialed watches 👍

Hope you enjoy 😀

IMG_6401.jpg IMG_6403.jpg IMG_6405.jpg
 
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