Hello all. I need some help understanding any "issues" with a watch I have and that I am interested in selling. I posted it on WatchUSeek several days ago, and heard feedback from two folks who are MUCH more knowledgeable than me on vintage Omegas that there are some potential issues. I decided to post here to see what you guys think. The watch is a very nice Speedy on a 1039/516 bracelet. I understand that the caseback, dial, hands, and movement all seem to be from different Speedy variants, and would not have occurred on the same model. My questions are these:

1) What are the specific issues that need to be addressed to make this watch "whole"? What parts do I need to swap out? My intent is to sell, so how much could this impact the price upwards?

2) Can I just sell the watch as is, disclosing the specific issues? If the price increase isn't that significant if I change out the parts, I may just want to sell as is to an "expert" in need of the parts that make up the whole.

Many, many thanks for your comments!

Here are the pics:

 

Wrong hands, wrong bezel, serial number too low for caseback. Nice bracelet, nice caseband and nice dial. Interesting assembly of bits.

 

As far as I can see, the only things that are wrong are the hour and minute hands.
For future reference, take any advice from members at WUS with a pinch of salt. You can count the members there that know even the slightest thing about vintage speedmasters on the fingers of one hand.

 

The serial number is too low for the caseback & bezel, but they are proper Speedmaster Professional parts. The hour and minute hands are not for a Speedmaster Professional model (they are for other Speedmaster models) so they should be replaced. Otherwise, I'd sell it as is, since a correct caseback and bezel (or movement swap) will be prohibitively expensive.

 

My best guess is that it started out as a pre moon -69, but now has the wrong bezel (should be DON), wrong hands (those are mk something hands), and the wrong case back (should be hippocampus only).
Dial, mid case and bracelet likely original.

I'd sell as is.

 

You might be better off selling the bracelet and end links separate from the watch head.

 

I'm going to throw in a wild card opinion which may not be popular around these parts but...

Maybe consider parting it out. In the end, selling each one of the parts individually may very well fetch you more than if you were to sell this all together.

Great DNN.
SW caseback.
Step Dial.
Chrono Hand.
Subdial hands.
Crown, pushers, and midcase.
Early 145.022-69 movement.
Bracelet (which I would sell separately regardless!).

Of course this would be time intensive but IMO may not be the craziest thing if maximizing return is concerned.

What could this list for as-is (without the bracelet)? $3000? $3500?
I think the parts value may exceed the low estimate.

I really would love to hear: What do others think?

 

March 70 production the bezel could be right.

I’m just flagging the hands. Might be early for the straight writing back.

 

Non-220 DNN bezels start showing up in late 1970 / serials around 3099x, a 2911x serial watch should have a DON

 

This is all VERY helpful information. For sake of argument...let's say I have access to all of the parts and it would likely be only a matter of digging through some boxes and cabinets. It seems pretty clear that a DON bezel (which I learned from this forum is a "dot over ninety" bezel) would clear things up quite a bit. About the caseback, is at least the movement reference (145022.69ST) in the current caseback correct? If not, what else would I need to look for besides the hippocampus? Also, about the hands, how do I know if I have the right ones?

Also, if the movement, stepped dial, case, and bracelet/end links all go together...that would at least be a good place to start. It sounds like that's the case, correct?

Many, many thanks to all.
J

 

Thanks added to my personal database

 

I think the hardest part to find will be the caseback...

ROI just won't be there to start sourcing parts for this guy if a sale is the endgame.

 

Yes. For hands, search Google Images for 145.022-69s, you'll get a better idea.

The movement reference is correct, but the caseback is wrong for the serial number range the movement falls into.

 

Thanks!

 

MWO notes that there are examples of the straight writing caseback on -69s from 1970 and that serial number falls smack in the middle. They note that there is a possibility that the backs are service replacements but they fall short of calling it. I wouldn't be tempted to call it out. Hands, for sure. Bezel ... my glasses are in the car ... I'm not being drawn into that one.

 

...unless ofcourse they are the knowledgeable members here too, that you can count on your hand ...

 

You caused me to get out my copy of MWO. I still believe the caseback is wrong for the movement.

From a close review of the MWO articles that cover the 145.022-69, the best that can be said is this was an early service replacement. It can as easily be said that the caseback is a relatively new addition, added by someone with imperfect knowledge attempting to increase the value of the watch.

The serial number is a million and a half below the earliest Straight writing -69, according to MWO and a million below the bezel change to DNN90. (I had painful occasion to learn this on another thread, regarding my -69 pre NASA serial number 28428149, which came to me with an incorrect DNN90 bezel, as another member here pointed out.)

Occam’s razor, I think the odds are strongly against the movement having left the factory with this caseback. My two cents.

 

No worries - I'm not really disagreeing, just saying that it's been noted there's room for debate. We all know that the movements weren't cased in numerical order and there's enough examples known to say that some movements were cased significantly out of sequence,

 

Well, if we’re going to use the ‘money judgment’ criterion, you’ll agree that all of us would pay more for a -69, in the same condition, with EITHER back on it, so long as it matched the serial number, rather than this watch, that requires a story to try to justify the apparent mismatch.

On the other hand, if you could conclusively prove that it left the factory this way — I dunno, maybe a photograph? I’m pretty sure the archive won’t distinguish between the various -69’s, but correct me someone if I’ve got this wrong — then you’d have a very valuable watch, a verified rarity.