How to make a grown man cry...

[AB]

By telling him his £4k Rolex is a fake.

I was in my local watchsmiths before, and he was in the process of telling him. He actually cried. Went outside to the car where his kids were hanging out the window wondering what was going on. They soon shut up when he told them.

Bad day... he bought it in Italy, reckons his wife is going to kill him.

[LukeBird]

I reckon I'd cry as well...!!

[ShadownINja]

Bugger. Anything else to the story? Dodgy pub?

I expect a swift whack with a G-shock to the nuts would bring a tear to my eye.

[AB]

Nope, allegedly a small jewellers.

[ShadownINja]

AB said:

Nope, allegedly a small jewellers.

I don't think the size of your family jewels will matter if you take a blow to the scrot... oh you meant...

Hope he can go back and get it sorted out!

[NJH]

My god that is awful. Just proves the old adage though about buying from known trusted sources, or at least ones you can get your money back from easily.

Contrary to what a lot of ppl think the experienced watchsmiths can tell pretty much anything about the state of the various Rolex/Tudors in seconds. I took my wife's Tudor sub into our local specialist (Watchworks) a while back, I was confident it was real but wasn't sure about the Sapphire as I thought it was an aftermarket replacement and should have had a plexi. He looked at it for all of 2 seconds and said no, its original Rolex Sapphire and the watch was made to have it. It doesn't have any crown etching and he didn't give away how he could tell. Another specialist the other week told me about a guy had a genuine sub but the bracelet was a copy replacement, hence devaluing the piece by a good few hundred quid. Buyer beware definitely.

I hope the poor guy gets somewhere with the Italian jewelers but TBH I am amazed he bought over there as when I looked around on the net for nice vintage Tudors and Rolex they seemed more expensive in Italy then anywhere else.

[sparkyhx]

ouch was it 2nd hand or brand new? The jeweller may have been duped as well it it was 2nd hand. if it was brand new then its obvious they knew and may be scam merchants

Can he not 'claim' thru his credit card

[Miguel Alvarez]

Poor guy.

[AB]

I dont know, I'm sure he will do some investigating.

The guy I go to for watch stuff says he used to make the casings for Rolex and Omega. Has one hell of a collection.

He said he would love to clean my Omega as he loves the Omega movement, really into his watches.

Had a Rolex movement in bits in a container on his desk that he was currently in the process of cleaning!!

[pistolp]

Im sorry but he must be a mug, it isn't difficult to tell if a watch is a fake. I have a few rolexes and I have never seen a fake that is even mildly convincing once you actually get hold of it.

[jshell]

pistolp said:

Im sorry but he must be a mug, it isn't difficult to tell if a watch is a fake. I have a few rolexes and I have never seen a fake that is even mildly convincing once you actually get hold of it.

You've only seen the rubbish copies then, some are unbelievable in their accuracy.

[BermyAndy]

jshell said:

pistolp said:

Im sorry but he must be a mug, it isn't difficult to tell if a watch is a fake. I have a few rolexes and I have never seen a fake that is even mildly convincing once you actually get hold of it.

You've only seen the rubbish copies then, some are unbelievable in their accuracy.

There is a thread on the IWC forum - it wasn't until the factory had stripped a watch down that they knew for sure it was a fake. Externally EVERYTHING was spot on, internally it was only minor things that gave the game away.

For the actual factory to have to go to this level of detail to prove its a fake just goes to show how good some can be

[NJH]

We also don't know to what extent the watch is a fake, if he spotted something rare and interesting that looked a bargain he could easily have bought a franken. We just don't know the full details, and tbh this is the area that worries me far more then the fake modern subs. Try looking around on the net for vintage Omega SM300's and Blancpain 50 fathoms for example, loads of franken bitza watches knocking around, even the experts can't agree on all those that are real, what is NoS and what is new replacement parts, and scarily enough this reminds me that the last franken/fake 50 fathoms I recall seeing on the net came from Italy. It sounds crazy but in those cases its worth it for the fraudster to sink a grand to 2 grand into a one off to try and make it look real knowing that its market value may be several times that.

[NJH]

jshell said:

pistolp said:

Im sorry but he must be a mug, it isn't difficult to tell if a watch is a fake. I have a few rolexes and I have never seen a fake that is even mildly convincing once you actually get hold of it.

You've only seen the rubbish copies then, some are unbelievable in their accuracy.

Except the movement, you can't make even a top quality ETA look, feel and work like a Rolex caliber and it would just never be worth the expense of putting a Rolex movement in a fake case, unless it was to build a replica of something super rare like a milgauss or original explorer II. And despite what the proponents of replica's say there are a lot of fake chinese ETA movements out there masquerading as 'genuine swiss' movements. Its illuminating to follow Dan / OWC blog over here;
http://watchandclockforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=147&...
That thread is a bit of a rant but if anyone reads through his other updates you can really understand the guys anguish some of what he says is pretty controversial stuff indeed and not what most may think.
http://watchandclockforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=147&...

I applaud what he is trying to do but so far his experience of trying to build a decent quality watch from Chinese parts has not gone at all smoothly.

Edited by NJH on Friday 12th March 12:24

[Fittster]

NJH said:

jshell said:

pistolp said:

Im sorry but he must be a mug, it isn't difficult to tell if a watch is a fake. I have a few rolexes and I have never seen a fake that is even mildly convincing once you actually get hold of it.

You've only seen the rubbish copies then, some are unbelievable in their accuracy.

Except the movement, you can't make even a top quality ETA look, feel and work like a Rolex caliber and it would just never be worth the expense of putting a Rolex movement in a fake case, unless it was to build a replica of something super rare like a milgauss or original explorer II. And despite what the proponents of replica's say there are a lot of fake chinese ETA movements out there masquerading as 'genuine swiss' movements. Its illuminating to follow Dan / OWC blog over here;
http://watchandclockforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=147&...
That thread is a bit of a rant but if anyone reads through his other updates you can really understand the guys anguish some of what he says is pretty controversial stuff indeed and not what most may think.
http://watchandclockforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=147&...

I applaud what he is trying to do but so far his experience of trying to build a decent quality watch from Chinese parts has not gone at all smoothly.

Edited by NJH on Friday 12th March 12:24

Breaking old Zeniths to fake Rolex Daytona might well work.

Aren't ETA's made in China?

[NJH]

Only unsubstantiated rumours on forums say that parts of ETA movements are made in china, in an ETA factory. This is understandable as it would be allowed under the swiss made rules. What causes confusion is that there are loads of movements floating around with ETA on them that are either known to be Chinese or are masquerading as genuine swiss built movements. This is what Dan was talking about in his blog where he bought 20 movements from a broker and 15 of them turned out to be Chinese fakes with ETA stamped all over them, what he goes on to say though about other small watch brands is pretty controversial. He seems to be implying that the low end small makers are using fake chinese ETA movements.

[NJH]

Fittster said:

Breaking old Zeniths to fake Rolex Daytona might well work.

Interesting you mention that one as I have never got the Daytona, held a couple but just can't see the attraction. Then when you consider that it used to be priced much lower and of course you can pick up a vintage Zenith for a fraction of the cost just makes it all look silly. My one WIS regret from last year was not jumping on the early 70's el primero that Neil / Chronomaster had.

I don't want to scare anyone any more then necessary about the dangers of frankens, but this company has started again http://www.squale.ch/ , check out the 1521 - 026/A looks classic don't it? Stonking good VFM might buy one myself. Someone over on TZ-UK was saying these are all old cases and dial/hand sets at the moment so effectively exactly the same case as used in the legendary Bund FF (fifty fathoms). Now source the correct AS movement secondhand, get one of the specialist acrylic bezel restores to fill in the bezel like a Bund FF, custom dial and hands and there you have it a good few grands worth of NoS Bund FF for the collector and a easy couple of grand profit. The worst thing is only a handfull of ppl in the world could probably say with any authority if it was the real deal or not.

[glazbagun]

Not a good day. Things like this would terrify me out of starting my own watch retail business. Though when you've been handling them daily for 20 years, I guess it becomes second nature.