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Restoring a Vintage Rolex GMT

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Re: Restoring a Vintage Rolex GMT

#31

Post by bad_alloc »

steveBK123 wrote: post #10

Old "tools" like vintage watches, cameras, etc are pretty cool. In my experience they were built to be more serviceable, but also due to less precise manufacturing, there were seemingly a lot more tolerances built into the designs. It's great watching people restore Rolexes, Leicas, etc. Similar to the video here, I have my grandfathers Rolex. He wore it while trimming hedges and doing all sorts of yard work. Why not…

> there were seemingly a lot more tolerances built into the designs.

Tolerances for good(!) watches are in the range of 0.01mm to 0.001mm for some components. With polishing and a lot of testing this can be achieved on manual machines.

Re: Restoring a Vintage Rolex GMT

#32

Post by bitexploder »

zuzatm wrote: post #19

I don't know why, but I find watch mechanics super fascinating. Few favorites for people with spare time (and lots of money if one wants to buy these): Tourbillon: a watch complication where the main mechanism is mounted on a rotating wheel so that gravity doesn't affect the watch in a single direction. Spring drive: A very recent mechanism that produces a perfect sweeping motion of the seconds hand. It combines both…

They are generally some of the finest machining and metal work you can buy, really cool stuff to see as a hobby machinist.

Re: Restoring a Vintage Rolex GMT

#33

Post by MSFT_Edging »

steveBK123 wrote: post #10

Old "tools" like vintage watches, cameras, etc are pretty cool. In my experience they were built to be more serviceable, but also due to less precise manufacturing, there were seemingly a lot more tolerances built into the designs. It's great watching people restore Rolexes, Leicas, etc. Similar to the video here, I have my grandfathers Rolex. He wore it while trimming hedges and doing all sorts of yard work. Why not…

I do urge you to get it serviced. Even though its sealed, long service intervals wear down the teeth of the tiny gears and hurt the watch in the long term.

Re: Restoring a Vintage Rolex GMT

#34

Post by medellin »

lexapro wrote: post #18
steveBK123 wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you said it yourself - case or no case. Look at all the people who use cases on their phones, theres an entire ecosystem for it that never existed for startacs. I think its evolved over time but it seems like the majority of people have some sort of case on their phones. Same for portable game systems like the Gameboy brick we all used naked vs all the cases on the switch, etc.

I only have a case so that the iPhone cameras don't stick out and I can lay it flat on the table without wobble. I know other people who have it because they want better grip or they just want to customize the looks of their phone. Protection is not always the #1 reason.

Also apple seemingly keeps making the factory case worse. I use to never use anything on my phone with the old iphones that had the all metal cases. Would drop it all the time and never had an issue.

Now i drop my phone once and the back is shattered. Honestly getting pretty sick of the direction apple has gone with the iphone. I just want the iphone 7 with better battery life and some hardware upgrades.

Re: Restoring a Vintage Rolex GMT

#35

Post by ubermonkey »

implements wrote: post #11
bjt2n3904 wrote: post #6

I bought a Seiko automatic that I wore for a while, until it stopped -- I think I got some sand in it. The watch shop asked for more than the cost of the watch to service it, so I watched a few videos and tried to do it myself. Make no mistake, those gears are TINY. Insanely so. I had imagined that I'd put them into place carefully, lining up the teeth... But they're so small it's closer to "well I dropped you into p…

It’s extremely hard to get a decent mechanical watch without the ‘date complication’ - which I thought was odd as it’s a pain to adjust it nearly every month, so much so that you can’t be sure the current display is even correct.

It's definitely true that it's harder to find no-dates, but they absolutely exist. I think one reason they persist is that not every collector is well-heeled enough to keep all their watches on winders.

I know if I go to the safe to put on, say, my Omega, I might just put it right back in there if the delta between the actual date and the date when the watch stopped is too large. LOL. I've got some no-dates (mostly dressier, hand-wound), or I can roll the dice on one of the other date-window autos.

I'm especially glad in those moments that I don't have any day-dates.

When I was a kid in the 70s, the Success Token most of the upper-middle-class men I knew opted for (if they opted for one) was a Rolex. It was usually either:

- A Submariner in all steel (think 60s Bond); or

- A steel Datejust on a two-tone Jubilee bracelet with a champagne face (a color scheme aped by a million Citizens and Seikos); or

- An all-gold Day-Date on a gold President bracelet (think Tony Soprano).

My dad took the middle path.

Re: Restoring a Vintage Rolex GMT

#36

Post by timr »

MSFT_Edging wrote: post #33
steveBK123 wrote: post #10

Old "tools" like vintage watches, cameras, etc are pretty cool. In my experience they were built to be more serviceable, but also due to less precise manufacturing, there were seemingly a lot more tolerances built into the designs. It's great watching people restore Rolexes, Leicas, etc. Similar to the video here, I have my grandfathers Rolex. He wore it while trimming hedges and doing all sorts of yard work. Why not…

I do urge you to get it serviced. Even though its sealed, long service intervals wear down the teeth of the tiny gears and hurt the watch in the long term.

The bigger issue with a watch that old (esp if it has been in a safe for 20 years) is that the lubricants have broken down and/or the gaskets have dried out and the watch is no longer waterproof.

Re: Restoring a Vintage Rolex GMT

#37

Post by timr »

implements wrote: post #16
alexgrover wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m not sure where you’re looking but every brand offers no-date watches in pretty much every style you might want

There’s a few very expensive purely mechanical no-date watches, but I haven’t been able to find an affordable one.

Depends on your definition of expensive, but you can find used Hamilton khaki field watches without date complications in the $100-$1000 range. Even some new ones are listed under $1k:

https://www.hamiltonwatch.com/en-us/collection/khaki-field.h...

FWIW, a $100-$500 Hamilton automatic field watch is a good deal, and not "expensive" by any objective measure.

Re: Restoring a Vintage Rolex GMT

#38

Post by bze12 »

it's cool to see all the smart little process details

- wood sticks to clean off the watch without scratching

- bright green mat for high contrast against small parts

- soft cushion pad made it easier to pick up parts on a flat surface

- the ring around the replacement main spring to make it easier to press into the barrel

(idk anything about watch servicing, just my guesses from watching the video)

Re: Restoring a Vintage Rolex GMT

#39

Post by mauvehaus »

lexapro wrote: post #18
steveBK123 wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you said it yourself - case or no case. Look at all the people who use cases on their phones, theres an entire ecosystem for it that never existed for startacs. I think its evolved over time but it seems like the majority of people have some sort of case on their phones. Same for portable game systems like the Gameboy brick we all used naked vs all the cases on the switch, etc.

I only have a case so that the iPhone cameras don't stick out and I can lay it flat on the table without wobble. I know other people who have it because they want better grip or they just want to customize the looks of their phone. Protection is not always the #1 reason.

Yeah, I find the surface texture of my 2nd gen SE to be hard to hold without a case. Also the camera thing you mentioned.

On the other hand, I routinely keep phones 5 years, and putting the case omit greatly increases the odds of it making it that long.

On the third(?) hand, cases themselves are kind of a crapshoot for durability. I cracked the corners of an Otterbox case, glued them, cracked them again, and finally switched to an aluminum Ghostek case that's holding up ok.

Re: Restoring a Vintage Rolex GMT

#40

Post by rcpt »

steveBK123 wrote: post #10

Old "tools" like vintage watches, cameras, etc are pretty cool. In my experience they were built to be more serviceable, but also due to less precise manufacturing, there were seemingly a lot more tolerances built into the designs. It's great watching people restore Rolexes, Leicas, etc. Similar to the video here, I have my grandfathers Rolex. He wore it while trimming hedges and doing all sorts of yard work. Why not…

> Old "tools" like vintage watches, cameras, etc are pretty cool.

Yes definitely. I just purchased a Tektronix 2232 to mess around with

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PYqE_F2USAM

My plan is to try making oscilloscope music (https://g.co/kgs/SmYmBL) and from what I read the old analog scopes make much better XY plots compared with new digital ones

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