The watch thread: pocket, wrist, sporty, showy? You name it!
- Thread starter windhoek
- Start date
Mr Cat
Owner
who would want a sekonda lmao
JensenHealey
pfm Member
Seiko have a service centre in, I think, Basingstoke. Used to send my Kinetic there.
MikeMA
pfm Member
A slightly more optimistic way of looking at it is that at least a decent mechanical watch will be working and serviceable after ten years, unlike most battery powered watches which, in my experience, will be long dead. Whether this makes economic sense is another matter. I've never actually had a watch serviced unless it's stopped working or I've broken something!
zygote23
pfm Member
Last time I priced a Seiko service it was £60
Looks like its more now:-
http://www.seikoservice.co.uk/srv402.jsp?parmForm=srv402.jsp
Looks like its more now:-
http://www.seikoservice.co.uk/srv402.jsp?parmForm=srv402.jsp
Mikeandvan
Banned
https://www.apple.com/uk/shop/buy-w...d=AOS-UK-Aff-PHG&product=MQ152B/A&step=detail
Anyone else think these are a future design classic?
Anyone else think these are a future design classic?
paulfromcamden
Baffled
Services from the official service centres can be eye-watering. They also have a reputation for swapping out 'defective' parts - so your treasured vintage timepiece passed down from your grandfather comes back with a completely new dial for example and no longer looks like your watch.
Independent watch specialists are better value and often more sympathetic.
Here's an example price list: https://watchguy.co.uk/price-list/
MikeMA
pfm Member
Exactly. If you want the Alpinist just buy it, enjoy it, and stop fretting about what may or may not happen in ten years time. We could all be dead by then!
gintonic
50 shades of grey pussy cats
no -
Exactly this. The 6r15 in the Alpinist and similar is famously reliable and regularly goes 10yrs, sometimes even 20, without needing service. By the time that comes around both the case and you will probably be looking considerably less fresh. One of you can be restored for about half the cost of replacement. If you don't want to sign up to this then spend £10, £20, or £50 on a quartz, change straps and batteries as necessary, and when it gets scruffy or damaged just throw it out and get another.
flatpopely
Prog Rock/Moderator
My Omega Speedmaster 3511.50. Bought from new and runs like a dream!
And to keep Joe happy.................
This is my dress watch and is an utter bargain at sub £400.
And to keep Joe happy.................
This is my dress watch and is an utter bargain at sub £400.
windhoek
The Phoolosopher
Exactly!
tones
Tones deaf
I can only speak for the locals (in my case Bucherer in the Zürich Bahnhofstrasse), but I find them extremely knowledgeable. I told them that I wanted my old warrior as original as possible, and he promptly pointed out that that hand was not original, having been replaced in an earlier service (well, we're talking about a watch that is nearly 50 years old). He knew because the luminous coating couldn't possibly be that bright after all those years.
Somewhat more worrying was that he told me that they may not have the parts of some of the older models, at which point the price of repair becomes prohibitive. He sent it off to Rolex for a quote, which while rather expensive, did not fall into the prohibitive class (the watch has enormous sentimental value).
Rolex does a brilliant job - the thing gets dismembered, all the seals are replaced, the case is polished, the crystal (plastic on those old models) polished or replaced, it came back looking like a brand-new watch.
SteveG
pfm Member
There are several of my automatic watches that have cost more to service than the watch is really worth. I like the watches though, so don't mind paying.
Rockmeister
pfm Member
so much here I disagree with (and in the OP quoted).
My first Seiko was a Seiko 3 bought in Bahrain in 1976..an automatic that is still useable today, tho I stopped wearing it when I bought a Rolex Explorer 1. That watch was sold on ten years later at considerable profit (reason one for buying a good swiss watch), but was never as accurate as the Seiko. I never serviced it or the Seiko. More recently I was gifted an IWC Spitfire...another good swiss automatic. I think it's and the Rolex's movements are very similar in quality. After 5 years I took it to an IWC dealer and asked for a service cost. I left again. Luckily, on another forum, there lived in Brighton a very very nice bloke who happened to run a Swiss watch specialist repair company. His quote was 7 times less than IWC's, and the job he did was at least as good, if not more thorough. IF I were to sell the watch, this non authorised service might dent the used value a tad, as may the non IWC leather strap he supplied from Italy. It too was nicer than IWC's original and also about 1/3rd of their price.
Moral of this rant is, DON'T go to a makers service center for your service unless cost is no object OR you intend to buy and sell watches for profit.
As to reliabilty of Japanese quartz, provided you buy from the decent makers, like Citizen and Seiko, they will, IME, outlast and out timekeep anything similar from switzerland. I had to kill my last seiko in order to justify a new watch...simplest of Seko quartz watches and the damned thing ran for18 years, no service, 3 batteries, and was STILL going (actually still IS in a cupboard, I just checked...last set 18 months ago, it's currently 2 mins slow).
I think this watch thing is really down to what you want from a watch. If it's jewellery, then there's lots and lots of makers doing that and with decent timekeeping to boot. If just timekeeping, Japanese quartz is unbeatable VFM, but for heritage, you have to buy something well engineered. I admire seiko, but their master series is never going to compete with Patek or Breguet even if the inside is at least as well made.
-alan-
pfm Member
^ Agreed.
On the service/repair front, I bought this from new, and had it for about 3 years before it began to stop intermittently. That was about 10 years ago, since then I've been stuck debating whether to fork out the locally quoted 250-300 quid repair costs.
Kind of silly to be stuck in nowhere land, but I'm loath to fork out that kind of wedge for a watch which will in all likelihood go back into its box until it's due for a similar service again somewhere down the line
On the service/repair front, I bought this from new, and had it for about 3 years before it began to stop intermittently. That was about 10 years ago, since then I've been stuck debating whether to fork out the locally quoted 250-300 quid repair costs.
Kind of silly to be stuck in nowhere land, but I'm loath to fork out that kind of wedge for a watch which will in all likelihood go back into its box until it's due for a similar service again somewhere down the line