Could you please help me authenticate this 1601?

[adiorandomhero93]

Hey Trf I want to thank all of you very much for helping me so much the past week looking at other 1601's for me. I appreciate it so much! I just really want to be sure I know what I'm buying and if I choose to send it to Rikki or RSC that they will service it for me without having to replace anything on it to get it back to authentic standards.

I think I finally found the second 1601 I want to add to my collection but before I pull the trigger and send the money I wanted to post the pictures the and have you guys take a look at it first.

http://s1310.photobucket.com/user/ad...brary/tt1601dj

As far as I can tell just about everything looks ok to me but I know most of you are much better then I am and I would really value your opinion on this one very much.

My usual concerns are is the dial, hands, bezel, date wheel, and case all original and authentic rolex? Does the bezel or case look over polished? The hands and the dial look to be in excellent condition, the hands look like original rolex and the dial doesn't look like it was repainted or relumed....can anyone confirm this?

The only 2 things i saw that worried me were the model number and the serial number look like they are a different font, is this ok and is this normal?

The only other thing that stood out to me was the rotor on the movement. It seems to be very dark in color. Is this just the picture or the angle of the picture with the flash on giving it that look? It's hard for me to tell....

Thank you all again so much and please let me know if you have any questions. I always appreciate any iof I can get so please don't hesitate to chime it.

Thanks,
Shane

[AbsolutelyROLEX!]

Looks all good to me, nice watch

[mjclark32]

X2

[adiorandomhero93]

Thank you both very much I appreciate your input

[TimeToGo]

Looks like a very nice watch, congratulations!

My eyes are not the greatest but is there a rubber seal on the case? If not, take it to a watchmaker to install one and get it pressure tested. You should be good to go!

[77T]

Re: the rotor on the movement. It seems dark because of the angle of the rotor's edge falls away in the picture so less light was reflected - making it look darker...

[adiorandomhero93]

Originally Posted by TimeToGo

Looks like a very nice watch, congratulations!

My eyes are not the greatest but is there a rubber seal on the case? If not, take it to a watchmaker to install one and get it pressure tested. You should be good to go!

Thanks for your response! I noticed that too, it looks to me like the rubber gasket is stuck on the outer edge of the caseback. Can anyone confirm that? Do the rubber gaskets on the 160x's lay inside the case or are they put on the caseback itself?

Thanks,
Shane

[adiorandomhero93]

Originally Posted by 77T

Re: the rotor on the movement. It seems dark because of the angle of the rotor's edge falls away in the picture so less light was reflected - making it look darker...

Thank you so much! That's what I was hoping it was, I appreciate your response.

Shane

[adiorandomhero93]

Can anybody comment on the serial font being fatter then the reference font? I have seen that on a bunch of other 1601's I was looking at..and some had the same font on both. I wonder why that is?

[crowncollection]

All looks good

[adiorandomhero93]

Originally Posted by crowncollection

All looks good

Thanks so much crown!!

[kooltzar]

Looks fine.

[Cc1966]

[dpa94114]

don't let the quality of some photographs confuse you. Some older jewelers who are now trying to compete with all of these upstart youngsters actually have some gorgeous older watches - but aren't as savvy with making their watches look as good as other people (often with inferior products)...

Esp. when u start comparing things u can barely see with normal vision (like the relative size of font).

[adiorandomhero93]

Originally Posted by dpa94114

don't let the quality of some photographs confuse you. Some older jewelers who are now trying to compete with all of these upstart youngsters actually have some gorgeous older watches - but aren't as savvy with making their watches look as good as other people (often with inferior products)...

Esp. when u start comparing things u can barely see with normal vision (like the relative size of font).

Thanks for your reply. I can understand that, I just wanted to make sure I looked everything over as close as I could because I didn't want to miss anything.

Thank you again very much
Shane

[adiorandomhero93]

Hi again everyone,

I just took this 1601 to the my local ad today and had their on site rolex watchmaker take a look at it and he found a few things wrong with it. First of all he stated that the dial was refinished. He said the printing was not bold enough compared to another 1601 he had. He also said that the all of the lume plots were not lined up with the hour markers correctly, especially the one at 2 o'clock...he said that one was way off. He also said the date wheel is aftermarket because the font on some of the numbers looked sloppy to him. The other reason he though the date wheel was aftermarket is because when you two digit numbers the fist number is too close to the inside of the dial and it almost cuts a tiny bit of the number off....which he said wasn't right. And he mentioned it looked like the spacing between the date wheel and the dial was too too large of a gap but he couldn't confirm that unless he started to take everything apart.

Please let me know if you fellow trf members agree with this, I would really appreciate it a lot.

Thanks
Shane

[Watch Chest]

Just from the pictures I would say this watch looks pretty good to me. I can understand the lum dots being a tad off but the dial printing looks genuine. Calendar does look off but they did make them different back then... Can't give you a definitive without it in my hands but it looks good and is definitely not bad for the age.

[crowncollection]

Interesting assessment. There are 8 different fonts on datejust date wheels. You need to remove it to see it in its entirety to know for sure. I have been overseas for 5 weeks so I am only looking on a small iPhone screen at your watch. I am back now and can look on a large computer screen later. Please take some dial shots, clear and dead straight on thanks.

[adiorandomhero93]

Thank you watch chest and crown collection very much for your responses. Your input here is appreciated by so much. Give me a few minutes here and I'll take some more pictures of the dial.
Thanks shane

[adiorandomhero93]

[adiorandomhero93]

Here are 2 I just took, I took one of 22 because that one looked a bit odd to me. Please let me know if you guys need more pictures or need me to take them at different angles. Thank you again so much,
Shane

[Watch Chest]

Here is a similar authentic dial that we have. No date wheel but you can check out the writing.

[Watch Chest]

photos:

[adiorandomhero93]

Originally Posted by Watch Chest

Here is a similar authentic dial that we have. No date wheel but you can check out the writing.

Thanks a lot for posting that for me. The writing looks very very similar between the 2. I have another 1601 I have that I purchased and know it's 100% original. The rolex looks a little bit bolder in my other 1601 so maybe they used different fonts? My first one is a 1973 and this one I just purchased is a 1970. It doesn't bug my a whole lot because I am plan on doing a dial swap anyway but the seller assured me it was an original dial that hasn't been repainted or relumed. Maybe it is original or maybe he didn't know. I'll give him the benifit of the doubt especially since I don't know and can't tell either.

Can you comment on the datewheel? And how close it is to the center edge of the dial? Or the 22? That bugs me more to be honest because if it's aftermarket I want to get an original datewheel that I can send away when it goes for service....and that is what's holding up from sending it away.

Thanks again I really appreciate your help,
Shane

[Watch Chest]

We are really good at authenticating dials. When it comes to the older date wheels it becomes a bit trickier. Without have the watch in hand there is no way we can tell.

Thank you Shane

[adiorandomhero93]

I understand. Thank you again very much


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[crowncollection]

i do not believe that dial is resprayed, no one sunbursts like rolex and it has appropriate fading, alignment test are passed on my big screen. This is what i believe MAY have happened, First are all the lume dots the same patina ?

These dials often have lume dots fall off, some repaint them, but if you can it is better to clean where the dot fell off, and if the dot is in one piece re-glue it back as the patina will match. i think the lume dot that is a bit off may have had this done and been put back slightly wrong imho

[adiorandomhero93]

David thank you so much for your help, I really value your input here. That makes perfect sense to me, I never even considered that possibility. All of the lume dots that are there apprear to be the same color and have the same patina. Thanks again very much.

Can you comment anymore on the date wheel issue? The date being so close to the center of the dial and almost cutting off the first digit of two digit numbers? Or the font? Some of the numbers just don't look right to me, 22 being one of them. The first 2 and the second 2 look very different to me. Again I am no expert at all but I have looks at quite a few different 1601's over the past year and none of them I have seen have the date so close to the center of the dial and none of them what apprears to be such sloppy printing of (some) of the numbers.

Thanks again David I really appreciate you taking the time to look this over for me and reply back to my comments. Have a great night!
Shane

[crowncollection]

Originally Posted by adiorandomhero93

David thank you so much for your help, I really value your input here. That makes perfect sense to me, I never even considered that possibility. All of the lume dots that are there apprear to be the same color and have the same patina. Thanks again very much.

Can you comment anymore on the date wheel issue? The date being so close to the center of the dial and almost cutting off the first digit of two digit numbers? Or the font? Some of the numbers just don't look right to me, 22 being one of them. The first 2 and the second 2 look very different to me. Again I am no expert at all but I have looks at quite a few different 1601's over the past year and none of them I have seen have the date so close to the center of the dial and none of them what apprears to be such sloppy printing of (some) of the numbers.

Thanks again David I really appreciate you taking the time to look this over for me and reply back to my comments. Have a great night!
Shane

I need a lot of photos numbers 3, 7, 6,9,13,17,19,22,26,27,29, and the colour

[adiorandomhero93]

Thanks again David for taking the time to help me like this. I just sent the watch out to get serviced yesterday and he should received it tomorrow. When he gets it I will ask him if he can take a picture of entire date wheel for me then I will upload that picture. If he won't do that for me I will take pictures of all of those numbers and post them when I receive the watch back from service. Thank you again so much again David I really appreciate it.

Have a good one,
Shane