Oh Boy!

What a dial!
And it has the correct hands :-)

Missed my last one so much I'm delighted to receive this one.
Swapped the glass, replaced the lower pusher and gave it a good clean.

Ouch!

Always ensure that the person preparing your purchase for shipping is qualified to do so and isn't a total imbecile!
just wrapping it in card isn't really enough!
:-(

 And, yes, there was a watch inside - by a total miracle it survived intact!

Bremont Descent #002/407

Looking pretty good on the MB1 NATO.
Serial No.002.
Apparently No.001 is with Bremont.

 

Love this Autavia!

A pleasant distraction from the daily grind :-)

This is of course my project 11630T with lots of orange bits.

I've had it for over 10 years now and it goes through various phases and transitions including hand/dial/bezel swaps :-)
Just noticed the date is slightly off centre - might need more investigation...

KAF Autavia 11630; Killer Dial!

I'd forgotten just how glossy these Kenya Air Force dials are!

Couldn't resist a sneaky peek :-)

Viceroy, reassuringly inexpensive!

It's reassuring that while other Heuer values might be spiralling out of reach you can still pick up a nice, honest Viceroy with bracelet for a fraction of the cost :-)

Well, for now anyway...:/

Great to smell petrol again!

Don't get me wrong, I love the Land Rover, but after a long winter of diesel, it's great to get the Spider running again and appreciate a carbureted petrol engine for a change :-)
Also fitted a new Aluminium radiator all the way from California.
Remarkably, I seem to have connected everything back up again correctly first time round and have no leaks :-)

More bang for your buck? Steinhart O1V.

Can't think of much better value in a watch than this from Steinhart.
Nice vintage look with modern sizing.

Quality feels great and it shares the same movement with plenty of others selling for many times more.
It's a pretty good 'tip of the hat' to the Rolex Big Crown 6200 series.
Wears great and currently gaining less that 5 seconds a day - Bargain :-)  

Project Rolex 16800 Submariner

I fancied a bit of a change with my 16800 and I do quite like the no cyclops look.
So, after watching a few Youtube videos on how to do it, I took a small blowtorch to the cyclops - not for the faint-hearted :-)
I think it looks pretty cool, especially with the aftermarket 'red-triangle' insert.
Unfortunately the insert's a poor fit so I'm looking for another or I may just paint one of my spares.
Good thing is these changes are all reversible :-)

Breitling made some pretty cool boxes back in the day...

Love this one from the 70's :-)

 

 

 

Autavia 1163T, 1969, Jo Siffert

Perfect :-)

Autumn

And time for another new number plate option...

I think that it looks pretty good there and must be legal - correct reflective plate to BS AU145d spec and nowhere vertical to hang a regular one without disrupting the airflow to the radiator :-)

Autavia 11630 Kenya Air Force

Here's my very special 'Kenya Air Force' Autavia.
As a child I was partly brought up in Africa and have spent a lot of time in Kenya.
I used to fly quite a bit too and back in 2002 had the great fortune to get some hours in a Cessna 150 Aerobat out of Nairobi's Wilson Airport with the great Vernon Collins at the Aero Club of East Africa.
Vernon handled the radio while I did the flying :-)
What an experience being able to see some of the most amazing landscape and craters from above.
Incredible too seeing the ground literally disappear far beneath the wheels  as we crossed the great rift.

 

I'm not sure of the history of this particular Autavia but it has the correct (and very rare) dial plus the 'KAF xxx' stamp on the case back :-)

Only restoration work was a new crystal to replace the very badly chipped original - I was just too worried that it might crumble all together and damage the dial. As for the rest of it, I like the fact it's had a life and bears a few bumps and scrapes to show for it.

A sad footnote to this story is that the aircraft that I flew in, Cessna 5Y-AZX, was destroyed in a crash 3 years later, killing both occupants :-(

Rolex 16800

Best of all worlds, plus the more bumps and scrapes, the better it looks :-)

Wabi-sabi Monaco

From Wikipedia
"Wabi-sabi (侘寂?) represents a comprehensive Japanese world view or aesthetic centered on the acceptance of transience and imperfection. The aesthetic is sometimes described as one of beauty that is "imperfect, impermanent, and incomplete".[2] It is a concept derived from the Buddhist teaching of the three marks of existence (三法印 sanbōin?), specifically impermanence (無常 mujō?), the other two being suffering (苦 ku?) and emptiness or absence of self-nature (空 kū?).

Characteristics of the wabi-sabi aesthetic include asymmetry, asperity (roughness or irregularity), simplicity, economy, austerity, modesty, intimacy, and appreciation of the ingenuous integrity of natural objects and processes."

Sums up this Transitional Monaco perfectly :-)

2 old Trannies!

Some better shots of this old Tranny that I picked up on a German auction site last summer!

 

 

 

 

 

 

And here's my favourite Tranny, picked up many years ago :-)

 

 

 

These are of course very early 'Transitional' Monacos from 1969.

Illegal?

Ha! Much nicer black plates back on again.
Just for show of course :-)

Legal!

MOT'd and Taxed so fingers crossed for a dry weekend :-)

Autavia 2446c GMT - Proper Tool Watch!

Proper tool watch.
Ok, it has a chronograph to 1/5 of a second and with the 24 hour bezel plus GMT hand you can track a second time zone etc., but what if you've forgotten your compass?
No problem, with the watch flat, place the dial with the hour hand facing the sun - the GMT hand points North - how cool is that? :-)