The Beginner’s Guide to Watches

Tips in Buying a Vintage Rolex

Speaking about shopping for a vintage Rolex can be an intimidating task and most of the time frightening because it entails a lump sum amount of money. And these days there are many replicates which are marvelously cloned and if your eye is inexperienced, they can pass a authentic pieces. There are brokers who try to sell you what seems like authentic Rolex watches but once you have bought one you discover that they are not as original as you were led to believe and so hurting its collectability and its value.

And so to protect us from these scammers, it is best to have some basic knowledge so that you will not be on the losing end the next time you wish to acquire a Rolex for yourself.

If you want to buy a vintage watch, remember that it is pre-owned and so you can expect some wear. Familiarizing yourself with the features of an authentic Rolex is important before you even look at the watch that you are interested in buying; these features in clued twin-lock winding crown, the bracelet, the safety locking device, and other important features.

The next thing to check is the condition of the dial. When it comes to vintage Rolex, the dial is almost everything. If you see a damaged dial then it is a permanent dial since dials cannot be cleaned nor polished. If a dial appear to be in good condition, you should still verify if it is original because it can also one that is refinished. If you are a novice in buying vintage Rolex, you might be surprised to know that most of the value of a Rolex watch comes from the dial. And therefore, for that particular reason, extra attention must be devoted upfront to this single part.

Most vintage Rolex have radium or tritium as based luminous on their hands and hour markers, and since neither of these materials are still being use by Rolex, then their presence is an excellent way to check if a dial or the set of hands is original. Tritium can easily be detected since it does not glow and it will have a brownish patina forming on its surface while radium, on the other hand, will need a special instrument for measuring radioactivity by detecting and counting ionizing particles, which is a Geiger counter. Going into the trouble of verifying the material is worth it because you need to be sure that the watch is authentic vintage Rolex.

There are other things that you need to check with the watch you are buying like references and serial numbers, the bracelet which should be correct for the watch, if the watch has been over polished or not, and if the watch comes with paperwork or service records.

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