[PinoyPogiman]

Wrist watches; just like Headphones are not complete without being followed up by quality pictures!

 

[Aevum]

the X33 atleast was pretty,
 
the Z33 is... of questionable visual value.
 

 

[DrSheep]

Quote:

the X33 atleast was pretty,
 
the Z33 is... of questionable visual value.
 

Yes, it is a crazy watch... for crazy people .

 

[Tsujigiri]

My current favorite in my collection:
 
Breitling Airwolf
 

 
The Pro 2 bracelet on it is incredible, absolutely no play between the end links and the case. I also quite like the internal slide rule operated by the bezel via a gear system, and the vertical line texturing of the dial (this is one of the few later Airwolves with this pattern instead of the starburst).
 

 
The turbine caseback was also one of my main motivations for going with this model. Besides looking great, it amplifies the alarm, and I can say that the alarm is indeed loud.
 

 
Accuracy is rated at +/- 15 seconds per year due to the thermocompensated movement. It's got a 1/100 second chronograph, countdown timer, UTC time zone, second time zone, 2 alarms, perpetual calendar, night vision compatible backlight, and a few customizable options. The displays can also be turned off to make the dial all black, and there's an end of life indicator to let you know when the battery is about to go.

 

[noxa]

I'm liking the Airwolf, i saw the Stealth Airwolf the other day and i was very impressed.

 

[XxATOLxX]

Just picked up the Laco a few days ago.
 
 

 

 

[roadcykler]

Finally got my Orient back yesterday after about 6 weeks. It's a thing of beauty imo.

 

[mjrussell91]

 
Big watch man myself. Been wearing them everyday for nearly as long as I can remember. Currently I'm sporting the Citizen AN3418 52P. Very impressed with it. Analogue time, because seriously who wears a digital watch? Quartz battery, which lasted probably 3 years (only just replaced the original battery). Water proof (enough for my needs, anyway). Mostly I really liked the design, large and 'chunky' without being overbearing or gaudy. The rose gold offset by black is delightful.  Date is handy (but you have to be careful once a month to make sure it's on the correct cycle - annoying but what can you do). Build quality is very nice, durable and sturdy. Fairly heavy but not excessively so, just enough to let you know it's metal and there's something inside there. I've put a few scratches on the sapphire screen, mostly from bumping computer cases at work (and drunken shenanigans which have left a mark or two). Overall pretty satisfied. I like the design and it just works (can't remember the last time I changed the time) and isn't going to give out on me any time soon.

 

 

 
And speaking of watches. I'm currently in the market for a new mechanical watch. Bought a cheap one on sale off Amazon (like, ~$85), but the thing was flimsy. Scratched the micron-thick gold plating off with a brush against a concrete wall at work, and broke the screen the first time I knocked it off a table (yeah, probably shouldn't have done those things but my other watches have held up with similar wear and tear without much incident). The watch looked badass though, with the visible gears and mechanisms, and clear back so that some spots could be seen completely through. So I'm looking for something with a leather band, visible mechanism, black/gold colours should anyone have any suggestions.

 

[nk77]

Quote:

 
Big watch man myself. Been wearing them everyday for nearly as long as I can remember. Currently I'm sporting the Citizen AN3418 52P. Very impressed with it. Analogue time, because seriously who wears a digital watch? Quartz battery, which lasted probably 3 years (only just replaced the 

 
Exactly! And truth be told that first picture made me dislike the watch but the photo of you wearing it, easily pulled me over the line. Like the colours!

 

[mjrussell91]

Quote:

 
Exactly! And truth be told that first picture made me dislike the watch but the photo of you wearing it, easily pulled me over the line. Like the colours!

I have to be honest. The commercial pictures didn't have me convinced at first, either. The gold was way too pale for rose gold, but I still liked the design. It was only when I spotted it in store and found the colour to be far more gold than the picture would suggest, that I fell in love with it and bought it that very day.

 

[DrSheep]

Quote:

I have to be honest. The commercial pictures didn't have me convinced at first, either. The gold was way too pale for rose gold, but I still liked the design. It was only when I spotted it in store and found the colour to be far more gold than the picture would suggest, that I fell in love with it and bought it that very day.

Yeah, that's a common problem with stock photos, as most of them are overly bright and looked washed out.

 

[nk77]

Could be worse. It could look better on stock photos and look crap on your wrist!

 

[appophylite]

I lost activity on this forum for quite a while because I disappeared to move to a new city, start a new job, get married, buy a new house, and generally have a very busy year. But I came back because ….well, I just had a story I wanted to tell
 
So my journey through WISdom (WIS = Watch Idiot Savant) started back when I was 13. This was when I moved to India with my sister and my mother. My father stayed behind in the US to finish up work before he planned to join us, but made a point to come to India to visit for at least one to two months every year. During that time, since the family expenses were fairly lower (lower cost of living in India, plus he was living as a bachelor in the USA), he was able to upgrade his personal watch twice. The first major upgrade was to a Seiko Chronograph/Alarm which was his first ever chronograph. Later he switched to a Seiko Kinetic. Prior to this, he had owned about 4-5 other watches – mostly Citizen and Casio brands. These last two were the first that ever caught my eye. I loved them both, and I couldn’t wait until he upgraded next and I could get my hands on one of them.
 
Fast forward to 2001 and the entire family moved back to the USA. While we were sorting through stuff at the new house, I came across my dad’s collection of older watches and asked if I could use one. Given the green light, I selected a nice Citizen that he had with a gold plated case, gold dial, sun/moon sub-dial, day and date dials. I used if for about 6-7 months though the first half of high school, before it finally hit my dad that I was starting to get into watches.
 
That Christmas, I got to open this present from my parents:
 

 

 
This was the first real watch I was officially able to call my own. It was a Pulsar Chronograph with full chronograph function. Brass case with steel coating, black dial, 3 sub-dials, all easily legible – as far as I was concerned, this watch was perfect! And to this day, it still is! The only reason I don’t use it anymore is because I really ran it through the ringer over 10 years of on and off use during heavy field work, and finally decided that I needed to retire it before I destroyed it. It was not alone, however. Over the course of 12 years, I’ve received several other watches that I’ve rotated through more than a dozen watches including another Pulsar, a Seiko Kinetic, Titan Edge, Skagen, 2 Wenger Swiss Army watches, Tommy Hilfiger Automatic, Kenneth Cole Automatic, Aviator, Fossil, Marathon, Casio, HMT, Guess and finally, my current EDC – Raymond Weil Quartz Chronograph.
 
During all of this, there was one watch that stuck out as a grail for me. The first time I saw it, I didn’t think too much of it, but then I read more and more about watches, more and more about the history of this specific model, and realized that the watch and I share a bond, I didn’t realize at first. The more I read, the more attached I became. I started saving the for the watch using whatever earnings from my paycheck weren't going towards paying for room and board while I was at college. I figured that, by the time I was set to graduate in 2007, I'd have enough to purchase the watch as a reward for graduating. However, when I finally reached that date, I realized that, starting on a new milestone in my life, with a new job out of college, I might need to hold onto the money for at least a year or two as a rainy day fund. I figured, with my new full time job, since I was moving back in with my parents, I'd have lower bills and expenses and I'd be able to save the money again easily.
 
By 2008, I finally had the money needed in hand, with a substantial enough savings squirreled away, that I could finally afford to purchase the watch guilt free. Since I didn't have a boutique available locally, I figured that I would order the watch at the nearest boutique on my way back to the field for work, and then pick it up again on my way back home. I was all set and ready to this while I was house-sitting for my parents while they were out of town on vacation. And then, two days before my parents were supposed to come home and I was to head back out, my mom called - my father had just suffered a rather severe heart attack and was in critical care at the hospital. Without another moments delay, I managed to get some friends' permission to keep the family dog with them, purchased the first ticket I could get my hands on with 24 hour notice and high-tailed it out to India (where they were on vacation). I spent an entire week with them, was able to see my dad through bypass surgery and ensure that he was healthy afterward and then escorted my sister back home (It would have been her first time flying abroad without parental supervision and my parents didn't feel comfortable about that.) Once I got home, I made sure she and our dog were alright and then headed straight out to work.
 
It wasn't until I got home 2 weeks later (and nearly 5 weeks after my mom called) that I had completely forgotten about the watch. It had been the last thing on my mind, and actually still would have been had it not been for the fact that I went online to check my bank account and seen that the bill for the airline ticket had finally hit my statement. I realized that, if I wanted to keep my savings intact, I had to figure on the fact that I had just spent the money I had saved for the watch on an emergency ticket to India (Dam, tickets are expensive). Well, as many people have stated here in WUS, even though many of us may be WIS, it doesn't change the fact that family is family and a watch, in the grand scheme of things is just a hunk of metal. I knew that if I saved up for it twice, I could do it again just as easily.
 
Well, my father came back from India in March 2009, having been released from the hospital in stable condition. The next 4-6 months were just a whirlwind of changes being made around the house and in our lives in general adjusting to the new situation, Winter was closing in on us and a terrible truth dawned upon my mother - just before going to India, my parents had purchased and taken ownership of a new house that I actually helped move into while I was house sitting for them. Unlike the old house, the new house had a very large driveway in front of the house, a large RV pad on the side, and a steep, winding access road down to the house from the main road. All of this resulted in a very long, and strenuous shoveling job during snow-fall. Even though they had a snow-blower, the doctor had forbidden dad from doing anything strenuous for at least a year including using a shovel or pushing a snow-blower. Since I was home for 2 weeks a month when I wasn't in the field, I could easily take care of things when I was around, but how would they do all the snow clearing when I wasn't home? The entire area took me about 2 hours to do on my own, but neither my sister or my mother were particularly handy with either the snow-blower or the shovel. Well, we were shopping around one day, when something on a used car lot caught my attention. We drove up and discovered a gentlemen who was being transferred to South Carolina and looking to offload his Honda ATV with installed winch and winch-mounted snow plow. My mother and I immediately realized that this was the perfect solution - I could use it when i was home to cut the entire operation time in half, and Dad could use it when I was out of town and have to put in little to no physical effort to move the snow. Since mom and dad were still paying the bills from the hospital and operation earlier in the year, I footed the bill on the ATV. As I handed a check over to the gentlemen, it amused me to realize that, once again, I had just made another large purchase using my watch savings. Onward to saving again...
 
2010 perhaps lead to a most amusing year - 2010 marked my father's 50th Birthday. My mom pulled me and my sister over to let us know that she wanted to purchase something big and special for my dad. After my sister walked off, my mom further confided in me, that since my sister was still a student and saving for herself, my mom didn't want to burden my sister with the cost of a big gift. Rather, she was thinking, we could throw my dad a little party with close friends, and my sister could pay for that while my mother and I purchased the gift on behalf of all of us. I immediately recommended a good, new watch for him, as he was now going on 9 years with the Seiko Kinetic he purchased in 2001. She was a bit put off about the idea because she had just purchased a new Movado Museum for him the year before for their anniversary, and my sister and I had purchased a new Heirloom Cuckoo Clock for both of them as well, and dad never used the Movado in the previous year. However, I reminded her that, more likely than not, the Movado Museum was not dad's cup of tea and we needed to think more in line with what he'd want in a watch, but never purchase himself. My mom tasked me with searching for the perfect watch, which I found 2 months later - the new Rolex 11610, Black dial and gold center links. It was the perfect watch - sports watch, 40 mm, just the right amount of gold without being too much. I showed mom, and even she agreed that it was perfect. One problem though - we had no local AD for Rolex. While I was at work the next week, I called my nearest AD (nearly 400 miles from home) and talked to them about coming in on my way home. When I got to the AD, unfortunately, they did not have the 11610 in stock. Since it was so new, they hadn't received any for sale yet, but they did still have the older 16610. I handled the older Sub, but it didn't quite speak to me the way the pictures of the new one did online. I asked them if there was anything they could do, and the sales-lady went off to make a quick phone call. She returned a few minutes later with a smile on her face - another West Coast AD did have a few planned for stock and said that one was not reserved yet and could be shipped to them if there was a guarantee of purchase. Sight unseen, I immediately placed the security deposit down and told them to hold it for me.
 
2 days before my father's birthday, I was back in the AD because they called while I was at work again to tell me that the watch was in their hands and ready for me to pick up. When I got to the AD, I knew that we had made the right choice - everything about the watch was perfect for dad!
 

I stepped out for just a moment to rush to the bank and cut a cashier's check to pay for the watch, came back and paid for it. While they took the watch back into the store to give it one more quick cleaning, polishing and inspection before handing it off to me, I wandered around the display cabinets. BTW, the AD happened to be a Ben Bridges, and at the time, they were about to drop certain watches from their displays. Wouldn't you know it - my grail watch was sitting right there in their display. The sales-lady smiled when she saw me drooling over it and let me try it out on my wrist. She tried to convince me that, if I had already spend what I had on the watch for dad, the cost of my grail as well wouldn't be too much more. While I agreed with were to a degree, it was just too much money out of pocket at once, so I turned down the offer. I knew that once again, I had given up my grail for something else, but the smile on dad's face when he saw the Rolex would totally be worth it! And it was! To this date, he has never worn another watch and almost never takes it off!
 
 
Flash Forward to 2012. For 2 years, I was unable to save additional money for a luxury watch purchase since I had bought a new car in 2009 to start a loan history. Until March of 2012, I was paying monthly payments on the car (0% interest for 36 months!); but finally, I was done, and the car was fully paid for! Right around that same time, I got an offer for a new job, which was a progression for my career, but would actually end up being a bit of a pay cut because it was a full time office job instead of a field job (the field jobs are dangerous and long hours so the pay is significantly higher). I was also getting married in June, which meant there were lots of expenses and money spent on many things that year that took a lot of precedence (my ongoing school tuition - working on a part time PhD, my wife's ongoing tuition, furniture for the apartment, etc. Many, many things that had much more importance than a watch.
 
We are now at 2013 and approaching the end of this long-winded post/story. In April, my wife and I found the perfect house to purchase as our first. Now, for the first time, all of that saving and scrimping over 13 years, and taking out the loan on the car instead of paying all upfront for the loan history, and not frivolously spending all of my money when I got it like so many of my other friends finally paid off. I was able to lock in a loan quickly and catch the very bottom of the bank lending rates, and was able to pay enough on the down payment to zero out mortgage insurance, minimize HOA insurance and reduce my monthly payment to appx, what I was paying in rent for the apartment. All said, we are moved in, paying a mortgage and slowly purchasing furniture to fill the house.
 
A couple of months ago, when we just moved in, my parents asked me if I had made sure all of my finances were in order and that we wouldn't be getting in over our heads. I assured them that I had done the math and made sure to stay within the means of my paycheck, and that I still had more than enough saved up to pay for the furniture that we would have to purchase. I jokingly did mention that now, my grail watch which had evaded my grasp for nearly 10 years at that point, was probably now another 10+ years out of my reach. They both laughed and told me to save pennies and I'd have it soon enough
 
Now, in August, my dad came down to town for a business meeting and suggested that we do lunch together. At lunch, he surprised me by handing me a bag and saying it was for me. I opened the bag, and pulled this out:
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
 

It's my grail watch! The one-and-only Omega Speedmaster Professiona 1861 with Hesalite Crystal. I've been wanting this for 10+ years and I finally have it on my wrist. And all because I have one of the best families in the world!
 
 
Oh yeah, I did mention that I have a special bond with this watch? My birthday is on July 20th

 

[shane55]

Quote:

Edit....
 
 
A couple of months ago, when we just moved in, my parents asked me if I had made sure all of my finances were in order and that we wouldn't be getting in over our heads. I assured them that I had done the math and made sure to stay within the means of my paycheck, and that I still had more than enough saved up to pay for the furniture that we would have to purchase. I jokingly did mention that now, my grail watch which had evaded my grasp for nearly 10 years at that point, was probably now another 10+ years out of my reach. They both laughed and told me to save pennies and I'd have it soon enough
 
Now, in August, my dad came down to town for a business meeting and suggested that we do lunch together. At lunch, he surprised me by handing me a bag and saying it was for me. I opened the bag, and pulled this out:
 
 

 

 

 
 
 

 
 

It's my grail watch! The one-and-only Omega Speedmaster Professiona 1861 with Hesalite Crystal. I've been wanting this for 10+ years and I finally have it on my wrist. And all because I have one of the best families in the world!
 
Oh yeah, I did mention that I have a special bond with this watch? My birthday is on July 20th

 
 
Well... happy belated birthday, and congrats on getting your holy grail. All the best.
It's a real beauty. Wear it well.
 
Cheers.

 

[nk77]

@ appophylite - A good read - thank you very much for that. Always wonderful when there is a story behind the watch.