There should be a warning on this forum!
Discussion
HereBeMonsters said:
ShadownINja said:
HereBeMonsters said:
ShadownINja said:
The discovery of TZ-UK and TWF was my downfall. Got a bit bored of new purchases; only bought one in the last month. I think. 
Have to admit, I am getting bored of having to drive down to the delivery office and queue up to pick up the parcels...
Get a bigger letterbox or deliver to your workplace.
I just took a look at the shop on ebay, hoping that they had more of the same. No chance, guess you lot beat me to it.
Even doing a search on the net returns zero hits. That looks a truely lovely watch and at that price cant really see you going wrong if you managed to get one.
Anyone got any ideas where else might have that exact same watch ?
Even doing a search on the net returns zero hits. That looks a truely lovely watch and at that price cant really see you going wrong if you managed to get one.
Anyone got any ideas where else might have that exact same watch ?
You can also get it in stainess steel
http://thumbnail.image.rakuten.co.jp/s/?@0_mall/a-...
http://thumbnail.image.rakuten.co.jp/s/?@0_mall/a-...
http://thumbnail.image.rakuten.co.jp/s/?@0_mall/a-...
http://item.rakuten.co.jp/a-leger/c/0000000780/?p=...
1 pound = appx 150 JPY, that mini monster in black is 19,800 (132 quid)
http://thumbnail.image.rakuten.co.jp/s/?@0_mall/a-...
http://thumbnail.image.rakuten.co.jp/s/?@0_mall/a-...
http://thumbnail.image.rakuten.co.jp/s/?@0_mall/a-...
http://item.rakuten.co.jp/a-leger/c/0000000780/?p=...
1 pound = appx 150 JPY, that mini monster in black is 19,800 (132 quid)
WTD said:
You can also get it in stainess steel
.... and justseiko have 1 of them listed here for £123 delivered: http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Seiko-5-Sports-Auto-Scuba-Di...or what about this one?... black face/bezel on s/s. £118 delivered. Nice. http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&am...
or this baby orange monster for the same price. Japanese made too.
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/SEIKO-5-MENS-2009-SUBMARINER...
Edited by JohnnyE on Thursday 12th November 13:19
A different seller has just listed 4 of the black titanium finished ones. They're the K version and he's looking £145 a piece plus postage. On my iPhone and can't grab the item number off the eBay app but search for "seiko 5 divers" and you'll find them. The most recently listed one.
No reply from my seller as to whether they have any more yet.
ETA: search for Snzf53k1 and you'll find 3 auctions for the black one. Cheapest is £129.99 and it's in the uk.
No reply from my seller as to whether they have any more yet.
ETA: search for Snzf53k1 and you'll find 3 auctions for the black one. Cheapest is £129.99 and it's in the uk.
Edited by JohnnyE on Thursday 12th November 23:15
Excellent, thanks for the info.
Just trying to decide between:
The SNZF53K1
& the SNZE83JK1
On the SNZF53K1, does anybody know if the days of the week are all in the blue colour that the picture seems to show?
Just trying to decide between:
The SNZF53K1
& the SNZE83JK1
On the SNZF53K1, does anybody know if the days of the week are all in the blue colour that the picture seems to show?
Edited by Dave_ITR on Friday 13th November 03:13
Edited by Dave_ITR on Friday 13th November 03:14
Monday-Friday is black. Saturday is blue. Sunday is red.
ETA: Found another black made in Japan one but you'll have to pay the duty on it as its in Singapore. Still works out about the same money though:
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/NEW-SEIKO-5-SPORTS-MONSTER-D...
ETA: Found another black made in Japan one but you'll have to pay the duty on it as its in Singapore. Still works out about the same money though:
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/NEW-SEIKO-5-SPORTS-MONSTER-D...
Edited by JohnnyE on Friday 13th November 08:22
JohnnyE - I'm both very grateful, and somewhat a bit embarrassed. You see, I rather liked that watch you showed a pic of. I already have a plain steel Orange Monster, and whilst it's a very nice piece of watch, it has become my size yardstick... as in 'NO WATCHES BIGGER THAN A SEIKO MONSTER' since my wrists simply aren't meaty enough for them.
You'd have thought that a shimmering black / haematite finished version (very similar styling) would be more lairy and even less suited to my day job. But, hell, I've got a decent collection and if my choice of watch is going to be *that* much of a big deal to my clients, then I've got plenty to choose, from subtle vintage small stuff, to 'de facto City boy watch' that won't be looked at twice, to rather special pieces (in my world, so it's relative... I've not spent more than £10k and unlikely to, really). Including a 'special' piece that won't draw attention either (except to a watch geek) - but it's stuck in Switzerland being operated on
Something about it just looked really cool. It's not black like a Black Monster. It's not black like a Night Monster. And my arms are as honky as you can possibly get (blonde hair, blue/green eyes, grow a beard and it's ginger with white flecks) so no swarthy dark-skin 'coolness' for me. But I really reckoned it'd still look cool - a slightly ceramic / barely iridescent black bracelet (that titanium carbon nitride *really* adds texture and sheen to the colour - it's *nothing* whatsoever like the plain, utilitarian black coating you get with PVD on titanium or aluminium, as per on my Porsche Design PAT. And hopefully the coating will be tough enough to last longer than the PVD 'blackness' on the PD watch did, which is sadly now trashed) and a slightly smaller overall size than the Monster would be OK on my white-boy skinny wrists.
And, for me, it's always been about new materials technology, interesting elements, alloys and textures.
So whilst I'm very grateful that you posted this up - I have to apologise, for immediately after reading your post I fired up eBay and bought the last one. And, even more embarrassingly, it appears that I have mine before you have yours....
So to try to make amends, here's a very short review of the watch given that I've only worn it for 25 minutes:
Aesthetically, it takes cues from the Monster. Crown is at 3 rather than 4, and it's clearly a little more 'muff diver' than 'commercial saturation diver'. The crown (on mine) doesn't screw in, but Seiko thoughtfully made the crown nicely abrasive, very much like a medieval mace in texture. Lots of tiny pyramids so easy to grab hold of and make adjustments, even for weakling fingers that spend their entire time writing documents on computers, and even for chronic nail-biters like I... I don't have any strong fingernails to get most watch crowns in to the winding position. There's enough purchase on the 'mace' that I could easily get the watch set up with thumb and forefinger alone. Action is *very* smooth and a league ahead of the Monster (I tried all of these tests back-to-back with my Monster, apart from sizing the bracelet). In keeping with a unscrewed crown, two hefty crown guards are used instead. And even though they add horizontal width to the watch, it still *feels* smaller than a Monster, even though there's NOTHING in it on the wrist. In fact the 5 looks like it's got longer lugs, but they curve round the wrist so don't make it look any bigger than the dial and bezel. Biggest difference in 'chunkiness' is that the Monster has the extra metal surround to the bezel, which makes the bezel look more cumbersome than it actually is.
Functionality-wise - it's the same movement as in the Monster, though my Monster was not 'Made in Japan' so probably has a Singapore movement. The 5 'feels' better engineered - which I'll bet 100% is just better assembly, correct lubrication, and the fact that the 5 is brand new whereas my Monster is a couple of years old
My Monster has English and French day words, the 5 has a bizarre mix of English and some middle eastern script. I don't know enough about the various Arabic languages to guess so I won't. But it's flowy, twiddly and backwards. Date change is silky smooth, again a properly assembled and lubricated movement. Other functionality - well the Monster has the pin-collar bracelet adjustment method (is it superior? It seems fiddly... it's bound to be more expensive to implement so why not use screws?) and I was expecting the same fiddle with the 5 - but no, the 5 uses bog-standard cheapo split pins. A bit of a shame on a watch that (like a few of the Seiko 5s) punches well above its weight in VFM and looks. It looks expensive enough to deserve screwed links... hell even $60 fake Rolexes get virtually-identical Oyster bracelets with screwed links and 316L steel! But it's made up for by the fantastic titanium carbon nitride coating. I've already waxed lyrical about this so I won't again. I just hope it's as tough as the immediate 'transition metal carbide / nitride == tough and hard as hell' mental image I get! The big functionality difference between the 5 and the Monster is the bracelet clasp. Personally I prefer the 5's bracelet because the links don't taper and if you have skinny wrists like me, taking loads of links out doesn't look silly. My Monster has a big jump between the non-removable links and the first removable one... I had to take a LOT of links out of the Monster But the Monster clasp has the 'diving' extension, which adds a couple of centimetres to the length without tools. The 5 doesn't - apart from that, the clasps are identical, down to the security clasp folding over from the other side, and the need to press two sprung buttons to release the clasp. It's only cheap pressed metal (as were Rolex's, of course) but it's great design. No chance of accidental loss of either of them.
Usability? Well both the 5 and the Monster are paragons of clarity with fat indexes, big hands and little in the way of frippery. The neat touch (on all Seiko 5 type movements?) of having Saturday and Sunday different colours is cool. A quick (but sadly unscientific) lume test showed the Monster to have noticeably superior lume. I dangled each watch a set distance from my desk lamp for a specific number of seconds and then compared them. The Monster was brighter and the dot on the bezel is useful as it'd tell you whether you'd turned the bezel or not. The 5 is still bright, but couldn't compete with the Monster. Perhaps if I could 'charge' them with natural light (plenty of ultraviolet) or a UV lamp then it'd be a better test, since my desk lamp is incandescent (though a halogen jobbie) and probably doesn't emit enough UV to excite the pigments properly. The 5 doesn't appear to have any lume on the bezel - I'm not a pro diver so no problem to me, but equally the 5 isn't marketed as 'DIVER'S', whereas the Monster is (the Monster claims 200m depth, the 5 claims 100m depth. Both adequate for me). However the bezel on the Monster is a bit fiddly to turn IMO - the chunky bezel protector gets in the way, and it's only really practical to turn the bezel from one position. The 5, however - well it's the best external 'diver' bezel I've used. The ratchet works well, but it's comfortable to turn, not too easy, but you can grab it from any angle and turn it. As good as the Rolex SD I had. The only 'better' diver bezel is in my IWC Aquatimer but it's internal and a cool design.
What else? Well the 5 has a display back. That, I suppose, marks the lack of 'diver' focus of the watch, and shows that it's in the 'diver style' but not the real deal. The Monster has a big hefty steel caseback with a crashing wave motif on it. But.... I *really* love the display back... I guess I'm a tart. The dial on the Monster is a plain orange. The 5 has a cool hobnail finish (hey, a sports Seiko with guilloche) on the black dial - you need to look closely, but the detail is there.
So all in all... too damn right I'm glad I bought it. It's not really smaller than the Monster if you get the calipers out but crucially it *feels* it on the wrist, so I don't feel like 'this is the biggest watch I can possibly wear' like I do with the Monster. The titanium carbon nitride finish is awesome (question for the experts - the Black Monster only has a black face, right. The Night Monster has black bracelet and case... is it this cool almost-ceramic black, or a traditional PVD coating? If it's the titanium carbon nitride, the Night Monster would be the top dog, IMO). It's comfortable and secure. It's usefully lighter than the Monster. And it's not as utilitarian... there are nice design elements when you take a closer look.
Anyway, another essay from me (delete it if I'm boring everyone)....
Monster:
New 5:
You'd have thought that a shimmering black / haematite finished version (very similar styling) would be more lairy and even less suited to my day job. But, hell, I've got a decent collection and if my choice of watch is going to be *that* much of a big deal to my clients, then I've got plenty to choose, from subtle vintage small stuff, to 'de facto City boy watch' that won't be looked at twice, to rather special pieces (in my world, so it's relative... I've not spent more than £10k and unlikely to, really). Including a 'special' piece that won't draw attention either (except to a watch geek) - but it's stuck in Switzerland being operated on
Something about it just looked really cool. It's not black like a Black Monster. It's not black like a Night Monster. And my arms are as honky as you can possibly get (blonde hair, blue/green eyes, grow a beard and it's ginger with white flecks) so no swarthy dark-skin 'coolness' for me. But I really reckoned it'd still look cool - a slightly ceramic / barely iridescent black bracelet (that titanium carbon nitride *really* adds texture and sheen to the colour - it's *nothing* whatsoever like the plain, utilitarian black coating you get with PVD on titanium or aluminium, as per on my Porsche Design PAT. And hopefully the coating will be tough enough to last longer than the PVD 'blackness' on the PD watch did, which is sadly now trashed) and a slightly smaller overall size than the Monster would be OK on my white-boy skinny wrists.
And, for me, it's always been about new materials technology, interesting elements, alloys and textures.
So whilst I'm very grateful that you posted this up - I have to apologise, for immediately after reading your post I fired up eBay and bought the last one. And, even more embarrassingly, it appears that I have mine before you have yours....
So to try to make amends, here's a very short review of the watch given that I've only worn it for 25 minutes:
Aesthetically, it takes cues from the Monster. Crown is at 3 rather than 4, and it's clearly a little more 'muff diver' than 'commercial saturation diver'. The crown (on mine) doesn't screw in, but Seiko thoughtfully made the crown nicely abrasive, very much like a medieval mace in texture. Lots of tiny pyramids so easy to grab hold of and make adjustments, even for weakling fingers that spend their entire time writing documents on computers, and even for chronic nail-biters like I... I don't have any strong fingernails to get most watch crowns in to the winding position. There's enough purchase on the 'mace' that I could easily get the watch set up with thumb and forefinger alone. Action is *very* smooth and a league ahead of the Monster (I tried all of these tests back-to-back with my Monster, apart from sizing the bracelet). In keeping with a unscrewed crown, two hefty crown guards are used instead. And even though they add horizontal width to the watch, it still *feels* smaller than a Monster, even though there's NOTHING in it on the wrist. In fact the 5 looks like it's got longer lugs, but they curve round the wrist so don't make it look any bigger than the dial and bezel. Biggest difference in 'chunkiness' is that the Monster has the extra metal surround to the bezel, which makes the bezel look more cumbersome than it actually is.
Functionality-wise - it's the same movement as in the Monster, though my Monster was not 'Made in Japan' so probably has a Singapore movement. The 5 'feels' better engineered - which I'll bet 100% is just better assembly, correct lubrication, and the fact that the 5 is brand new whereas my Monster is a couple of years old
My Monster has English and French day words, the 5 has a bizarre mix of English and some middle eastern script. I don't know enough about the various Arabic languages to guess so I won't. But it's flowy, twiddly and backwards. Date change is silky smooth, again a properly assembled and lubricated movement. Other functionality - well the Monster has the pin-collar bracelet adjustment method (is it superior? It seems fiddly... it's bound to be more expensive to implement so why not use screws?) and I was expecting the same fiddle with the 5 - but no, the 5 uses bog-standard cheapo split pins. A bit of a shame on a watch that (like a few of the Seiko 5s) punches well above its weight in VFM and looks. It looks expensive enough to deserve screwed links... hell even $60 fake Rolexes get virtually-identical Oyster bracelets with screwed links and 316L steel! But it's made up for by the fantastic titanium carbon nitride coating. I've already waxed lyrical about this so I won't again. I just hope it's as tough as the immediate 'transition metal carbide / nitride == tough and hard as hell' mental image I get! The big functionality difference between the 5 and the Monster is the bracelet clasp. Personally I prefer the 5's bracelet because the links don't taper and if you have skinny wrists like me, taking loads of links out doesn't look silly. My Monster has a big jump between the non-removable links and the first removable one... I had to take a LOT of links out of the Monster But the Monster clasp has the 'diving' extension, which adds a couple of centimetres to the length without tools. The 5 doesn't - apart from that, the clasps are identical, down to the security clasp folding over from the other side, and the need to press two sprung buttons to release the clasp. It's only cheap pressed metal (as were Rolex's, of course) but it's great design. No chance of accidental loss of either of them.Usability? Well both the 5 and the Monster are paragons of clarity with fat indexes, big hands and little in the way of frippery. The neat touch (on all Seiko 5 type movements?) of having Saturday and Sunday different colours is cool. A quick (but sadly unscientific) lume test showed the Monster to have noticeably superior lume. I dangled each watch a set distance from my desk lamp for a specific number of seconds and then compared them. The Monster was brighter and the dot on the bezel is useful as it'd tell you whether you'd turned the bezel or not. The 5 is still bright, but couldn't compete with the Monster. Perhaps if I could 'charge' them with natural light (plenty of ultraviolet) or a UV lamp then it'd be a better test, since my desk lamp is incandescent (though a halogen jobbie) and probably doesn't emit enough UV to excite the pigments properly. The 5 doesn't appear to have any lume on the bezel - I'm not a pro diver so no problem to me, but equally the 5 isn't marketed as 'DIVER'S', whereas the Monster is (the Monster claims 200m depth, the 5 claims 100m depth. Both adequate for me). However the bezel on the Monster is a bit fiddly to turn IMO - the chunky bezel protector gets in the way, and it's only really practical to turn the bezel from one position. The 5, however - well it's the best external 'diver' bezel I've used. The ratchet works well, but it's comfortable to turn, not too easy, but you can grab it from any angle and turn it. As good as the Rolex SD I had. The only 'better' diver bezel is in my IWC Aquatimer but it's internal and a cool design.
What else? Well the 5 has a display back. That, I suppose, marks the lack of 'diver' focus of the watch, and shows that it's in the 'diver style' but not the real deal. The Monster has a big hefty steel caseback with a crashing wave motif on it. But.... I *really* love the display back... I guess I'm a tart. The dial on the Monster is a plain orange. The 5 has a cool hobnail finish (hey, a sports Seiko with guilloche) on the black dial - you need to look closely, but the detail is there.
So all in all... too damn right I'm glad I bought it. It's not really smaller than the Monster if you get the calipers out but crucially it *feels* it on the wrist, so I don't feel like 'this is the biggest watch I can possibly wear' like I do with the Monster. The titanium carbon nitride finish is awesome (question for the experts - the Black Monster only has a black face, right. The Night Monster has black bracelet and case... is it this cool almost-ceramic black, or a traditional PVD coating? If it's the titanium carbon nitride, the Night Monster would be the top dog, IMO). It's comfortable and secure. It's usefully lighter than the Monster. And it's not as utilitarian... there are nice design elements when you take a closer look.
Anyway, another essay from me (delete it if I'm boring everyone)....
Monster:
New 5:
Wow. Great review! And now I can't wait till mine arrives in the morning! I'd asked Stephanie to hold off a day so it arrives when I'm here.
So what is this watch?! Mini monster. Mini neo monster. Mini night monster?! I've heard all 3. Don't suppose it matters. It looks the danglies in your pic.
Was the strap easy to shorten? I ordered a cheapo kit off eBay which arrives tomorrow. This will be my first go at adjusting a bracelet myself. Any pointers gratefully received.
Johnny
So what is this watch?! Mini monster. Mini neo monster. Mini night monster?! I've heard all 3. Don't suppose it matters. It looks the danglies in your pic.
Was the strap easy to shorten? I ordered a cheapo kit off eBay which arrives tomorrow. This will be my first go at adjusting a bracelet myself. Any pointers gratefully received.
Johnny
Nolar Dog said:
Is that the SNZF53-J1?
The very one. 
Utterly pleased to bits with mine. A very sturdy watch with a lovely finish. Its like a soft sheen coating and the view back is a nice touch for a newbie like me - its my 1st automatic. As stated by cyberface, the bezel and crown feel REALLY well made. Highly recommend this one.
Johnny
Edited by JohnnyE on Wednesday 18th November 12:18
Only the 1 on the go at the minute that I can find...
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/NEW-SEIKO-5-SPORTS-MONSTER-D...
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/NEW-SEIKO-5-SPORTS-MONSTER-D...
JohnnyE said:
Only the 1 on the go at the minute that I can find...
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/NEW-SEIKO-5-SPORTS-MONSTER-D...
No idea why, but it's not there anymore....http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/NEW-SEIKO-5-SPORTS-MONSTER-D...
A bit of an impulse purchase! 
Good man yourself!!... welcome to the neo monster club!Gassing Station | Watches | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff