Is it real?

[jeff hess]

Since there is so much talent on this board, I was wondering what you guys thought of this band.

It is marked for the first quarter of 1966 and GF for Gay Freres and has a crown mark.

What do you think?

[jeff hess]

couple of more pics


19mm Rose gold. I detached it from a 1960's Rolex

[jeff hess]

There are no other marks

[stevemulholland3]

I would say because of the g.f. mark that it was real.however bracelets are not my forte'
so we will see what some others think.
by the way jeff,I have a couple of very interesting pieces that you might want to see.
will you be at your shop saturday?

[stevemulholland3]

oh wait,no rolex stamp at all??I would have a hard time believing that rolex would make anything and not put their mark somewhere on it..even in the 60's..

[jeff hess]

Steve,
come on over. ten until 2

---------------------

here has always been my problem with Gay Freres bands. Conventional wisdom is that they are correct. Gay Freres has had a long relationship with Rolex and some say that they were making the authorized bracelets for Rolex for many years especialy in the early years.

Typically, when they are sold at auction, they are referred to as "correct". Sometimes as "period". Sometimes as "later". (That is to say at legit auctions such as Sothebys, Christies, Antiquorum etc, this is the verbiage they use.....Steve would just scream FAKE! Terrinate it!) :) ;)

And My problem with these bands is that Steve might be right.

Although evidence is strong and compelling that these GF bands had an "association" with Rolex and even a partnership with Rolex (a simple google search will prove this), I wonder if these bands were simply "replacement bands" or perhaps just fakes?

Why? Because of the words "Swiss MADE" on them and yet, no Swiss hallmark!

Why? Was there a period when things could be made in Switzerland without a hallmark?
Did Rolex have a special arrangement with GF to make these bands for replacement purposes? Did GF run rampant making replacement aftermarket bands illegally using the Rolex trademark crown? Or is this one of those celebrated "similar" but "not Rolex" crowns?

Typically, my wife would have sold this band on the Rolex I bought it on. And mentioned these things in the listing . But with the hysteria that is going on (primarily from here) I could not risk it. eBay has no experts on staff and relies on information provided by others and I fear it would have been taken down, My wife would have been accused of counterfeiting and her search function would have been lowered, my fee's would have gone up or I would have been kicked off of eBay.

I am very interested in this issue of GF. I often see GF bands on other models, even V&C's sold at auction will have GF "period bands" on them.

But the SWISS MADE mark with no accompanying hallmark intrigues me. Any ideas or theories?

Jeff

[stevemulholland3]

I see what you mean about the hallmark,very interesting-I will run the scenario by a European friend of mine and see what he thinks.
I am leaving for west palm around noon tomorrow to go look at a 6536A military sub that has no serial numbers stamped between the lugs-which I have heard is plausible as the ministry of defense was said to have placed the serial number on the inside of the case,so I will check it out before my friend lists it for sale.I will bring the special piece I have acquired by your shop next weekend jeff.
lets see what I find out about this lovely bracelet now..
cheers,
steve

[tudorman8276]

...my vote-GENUINE.

...you have some great info in your book starting on pg 303.

...hard to say the age, but what I wonder about, is the "76" endpieces.

...band evolution is what it is thru the years, as with anything else. I would guess a production somewhere between 47 to 57. BUT, the ends do have me a bit cornfused

Stan.

[jeff hess]

Stan,

Thanks.

But the clasp clearly shows the date (of the clasp at least) to be made int he first quarter of 1966!

Jeff

And still, no Swiss hallmark! No rolex marking on the bracelet other than the crown mark (that may or may not be a true Rolex Crown)

[tudorman8276]

Originally Posted by jeff hess

Stan,

Thanks.

But the clasp clearly shows the date (of the clasp at least) to be made int he first quarter of 1966!

Jeff

And still, no Swiss hallmark! No rolex marking on the bracelet other than the crown mark (that may or may not be a true Rolex Crown)

...the crown was added later, he is a good jeweler.

...I missed the date....I saw that it had one, but did not look closely.

...HOWEVER, I PERSONALLY beleive this one to be 100%

Stan.

[Orchi]

Err buddies...Orchi concurs the bracelet looks to be in order...

EL 76 is suitable for 16008/16018/1603/16258...normally fitted
to 7206/8 Gold Rolex bracelet...

[jeff hess]

Orchi,

Why no swiss hallmark?

Anyone?


C'mon... get those search engines running!

this is a test!

Jeff

[springer]

Hess,

I believe the G. F. bands were not being made for Rolex during the 1960's and following years as depicted in your photos. As stated in your posts, I think G. F. was making a "look-a-like" crowned band and Rolex - at some point - put a halt to their operation, or there would be many, many more of the bands in circulation. As noted, G. F. made bands for other companies so their capability to produce these bands would not have been difficult with their resources.

I don't believe this band to be genuine, but Rolex or G. F. would be able to answer this question with more authority. Has anyone ever contacted them about the pictured band?

[jeff hess]

springer,

you said "Hess,

I believe the G. F. bands were not being made for Rolex during the 1960's and following years as depicted in your photos. As stated in your posts, I think G. F. was making a "look-a-like" crowned band and Rolex - at some point - put a halt to their operation, or there would be many, many more of the bands in circulation. As noted, G. F. made bands for other companies so their capability to produce these bands would not have been difficult with their resources.

I don't believe this band to be genuine, but Rolex or G. F. would be able to answer this question with more authority. Has anyone ever contacted them about the pictured band?"

=================================================

The band is genuine. We did not post it on ebay for fear of this forum, tho. Presently, eBay is listening to this group, but it we continue to turn in people with false information, they will not listen for long. our credibility will be lost.

GF supplied band to to rolex for many many years. These bands are common and routinely seen. I have owned hundreds of them over the years.

As to the hallmark? Switzerland only required Swiss hallmarks on watches. Not bands.

GF did not make rogue bands. they were straight and true. Good partners. rolex eventually bought them.

Be careful before jumping to conclusions. these are common.

Jeff

[springer]

Originally Posted by jeff hess

springer,

you said "Hess,

I believe the G. F. bands were not being made for Rolex during the 1960's and following years as depicted in your photos. As stated in your posts, I think G. F. was making a "look-a-like" crowned band and Rolex - at some point - put a halt to their operation, or there would be many, many more of the bands in circulation. As noted, G. F. made bands for other companies so their capability to produce these bands would not have been difficult with their resources.

I don't believe this band to be genuine, but Rolex or G. F. would be able to answer this question with more authority. Has anyone ever contacted them about the pictured band?"

=================================================

The band is genuine. We did not post it on ebay for fear of this forum, tho. Presently, eBay is listening to this group, but it we continue to turn in people with false information, they will not listen for long. our credibility will be lost.

GF supplied band to to rolex for many many years. These bands are common and routinely seen. I have owned hundreds of them over the years.

As to the hallmark? Switzerland only required Swiss hallmarks on watches. Not bands.

GF did not make rogue bands. they were straight and true. Good partners. rolex eventually bought them.

Be careful before jumping to conclusions. these are common.

Jeff

Didn't jump to any conclusions, J.F. was bought during the 1990's by Rolex.

I agreed with your bogus post here to see exactly what game we were playing - gotta know know the rules before you play, so give me a break. It was quite obvious what you are up to here. Personally, you need to get over it.

[stevemulholland3]

misprint..

[jeff hess]

Mr, Springer,

your last answer was tremendously transparent and what I would have expected.

My point is, as you have surmised due to your taking of the bait, that clearly, there is a lot of good old fashioned internet-piling-on going on in this otherwise wonderful forum, with many many auctions being Terry-nated with false or flimsy information.

And many auction houses, legitimate auction houses, sell watches with GF bands and, as they describe them "later bands". This is normal for an old watch to have a different band. And a differnent band on a 30 or 50 year old watch should be treated differently than a brand new blue sub with a "Fake" band.

Peoples livlihoods are at stake here.

You are the one who started a thread "Hess is up to his sly trick again" and led the charge to have my wife's perfectly good Rolex taken down, our search function lowered and our fee's raised with that rediculous Terry-nating of a perfectly fine watch.

And several others on here have have had watches Terry-nated erroneously.

The positive is that we are working with several groups now to help right these actionable wrongs (including working with Rolex Corp) and have four cases of iron-clad erroneous Terry-nating.

We have also made eBay aware of Rolex's actual response (as opposed to the speculative responses on this forum) to the older and later band issue.

This forum could be a HUGE force but eBay, and several other groups do not appreciate the "vigilante" and sometimes childish nature of this forum with calls to Terry-nate auctions for the flimsiest of reasons (odd screws, replaced band extensions, replaced bands, typo's or heavy handed repair or restoration by an Authorized Rolex service center etc) complete with emoticons of high fives, hammering heads and cartoon characters mooning people.

I take research of vintage Rolex seriously and I take counterfeiting seriously.
I traffic in the former and abhor the latter. And I learn something new every day. You should too.
(Katrina, my wife, who runs our ebay business has been trained in systematic methodology and teaches insurance companies evaluation and teaches a similar college course, and is very serious about what she does)
Think before you post.
Jeff

[springer]

Mr. Jeff you've been trying for a while now to set people up here with your posts. You placed your GF post up here with the premise from the 1680 submariner thread concerning the counterfeit band. You went on to discuss in this 1680 thread how bands with look-a-like crowns were or were not considered fake as this was a legal matter for Rolex. Then this silly posting about the "GF" band was made to see what you could "smoke out."

Then you go on to state, "you guys do a bang up job in finding fakes and scammers and I am firmly on the side of getting rid of cheats, liars, fakers and scammers. And running them off of ebay. They are the guys who give ebay a bad name! Keep it up!

But this one is so full of gray area that I worry that this seller might have his livlihood taken from him for a prettly flimsy reason. The watch is genuine. The watch is a nice scarce model. The watch is desirable. It "MAY" have a counterfeit band. It DOES have a band that is not original and the seller DOES note this."

Many options were noted in this thread by forum members that were available to the seller of this Submariner with the fake band. I see now that it is relisted without the band, as was discussed here.

As far as I am concerned, all of my posts here, are available for your research. I'm sure you will find that I have noted many items in Watchout that were not fake, altered or period correct. Being a power seller, doesn't exclude anyone from ebay's rules but places more responsibility upon the seller. In the end, ebay makes the final decision on whether to pull an auction, not anybody here.

As far as being, sly like a fox, well, I think you have shown that side once again Mr. Jeff. I did notice that when you relisted the GMT on ebay that you discussed previously, it was relisted as having a band that probably wasn't original to the watch.
I believe that was my contention in the thread when I posted this in watchout.

So, if I have erred in one of my opinions, I'd be more than happy to discuss it off-forum, as I'm sure others here would do the same. Maybe if you have information to enlighten members here, you should post it as such, instead of in the manner as we discuss now.

[jeff hess]

Your posts speak for themselves. I am just responding in kind to your allegations that the wife sold on by Wifes Ebay store was somehow fake or bogus and the resulting Terry-inzation. This has now been debunked by Rolex. Rolex responded that the watch and band were genuine and that it would NOT be confiscated by Rolex if sent in for cleaning (which is one of the things intimated by member of this board in getting it erroneously taken down) (we then relisted it immediately after talking to Rolex and after setting ebay straight).

AS to GF , for those that care, they were reknowned makers of bands for many Swiss companies. Here is one that they made for an early Corum Bridge. (This is a very early one, perhaps (speculative) made by the master himself Vincent Calabrese. Mr. Calabrese is a friend and I have sent an email pic of this watch to him. (He has left his own company recently and now works for Blancpain designing tourbillons and Karrousels and such.) Anyway... enjoy!

(And be careful of accusations)

Jeff, responding in kind :)

[ROGERB]

Originally Posted by jeff hess

Your posts speak for themselves. I am just responding in kind to your allegations that the wife sold on by Wifes Ebay store was somehow fake or bogus and the resulting Terry-inzation. This has now been debunked by Rolex. Rolex responded that the watch and band were genuine and that it would NOT be confiscated by Rolex if sent in for cleaning (which is one of the things intimated by member of this board in getting it erroneously taken down) (we then relisted it immediately after talking to Rolex and after setting ebay straight).

AS to GF , for those that care, they were reknowned makers of bands for many Swiss companies. Here is one that they made for an early Corum Bridge. (This is a very early one, perhaps (speculative) made by the master himself Vincent Calabrese. Mr. Calabrese is a friend and I have sent an email pic of this watch to him. (He has left his own company recently and now works for Blancpain designing tourbillons and Karrousels and such.) Anyway... enjoy!

(And be careful of accusations)

Jeff, responding in kind :)

Thank you for sharing pictures of this watch...truly an outstanding and unique timepiece. I hope other members see this!
regards
R

[Lol-x]

Originally Posted by jeff hess

Mr, Springer,

your last answer was tremendously transparent and what I would have expected.

My point is, as you have surmised due to your taking of the bait, that clearly, there is a lot of good old fashioned internet-piling-on going on in this otherwise wonderful forum, with many many auctions being Terry-nated with false or flimsy information.

And many auction houses, legitimate auction houses, sell watches with GF bands and, as they describe them "later bands". This is normal for an old watch to have a different band. And a differnent band on a 30 or 50 year old watch should be treated differently than a brand new blue sub with a "Fake" band.

Peoples livlihoods are at stake here.

You are the one who started a thread "Hess is up to his sly trick again" and led the charge to have my wife's perfectly good Rolex taken down, our search function lowered and our fee's raised with that rediculous Terry-nating of a perfectly fine watch.

And several others on here have have had watches Terry-nated erroneously.

The positive is that we are working with several groups now to help right these actionable wrongs (including working with Rolex Corp) and have four cases of iron-clad erroneous Terry-nating.

We have also made eBay aware of Rolex's actual response (as opposed to the speculative responses on this forum) to the older and later band issue.

This forum could be a HUGE force but eBay, and several other groups do not appreciate the "vigilante" and sometimes childish nature of this forum with calls to Terry-nate auctions for the flimsiest of reasons (odd screws, replaced band extensions, replaced bands, typo's or heavy handed repair or restoration by an Authorized Rolex service center etc) complete with emoticons of high fives, hammering heads and cartoon characters mooning people.

I take research of vintage Rolex seriously and I take counterfeiting seriously.
I traffic in the former and abhor the latter. And I learn something new every day. You should too.
(Katrina, my wife, who runs our ebay business has been trained in systematic methodology and teaches insurance companies evaluation and teaches a similar college course, and is very serious about what she does)
Think before you post.
Jeff

Please do not insult another member with generalizations. You say "Terrynate" as connoting the general and widespread activity by a member here of erroneously reporting questionable matters to e-bay.

In that regard you are insulting another or other members. Be specific as throw away expressions lend themselves to insult other members on this forum.

Just remember this and it has been said time and time again. No member here makes e-bay do anything. E-bay make their own decisions. You obviously have a significant financial interest in making money by the selling of watches from e-bay. If e-bay treats you in a particular way then your grievance is with e-bay.

This statement is totally misconceived:
The positive is that we are working with several groups now to help right these actionable wrongs (including working with Rolex Corp) and have four cases of iron-clad erroneous Terry-nating.

If a questionable item is reported to e-bay (as it is anyone who is an e-bay member is enititled to do including Terry Newton or anyone else) it is ultimately E-bay who decides to cancel an auction or not the private citizen who raise their issues in a bona fide good faith manner with E-bay. I seems that you don't want to understand this or ignore it notwithstanding that it has been said time and time again.

"Terry-nating" was a joke, a throw away line, which referred to TerryNewton raising issues as a a private citizen and E-bay member with Ebay. This you have applied a totally different meaning to with the intention of disparaging another member by stating that he has somehow made E-bay to remove or cancel legitimate auctions.

If a private citizen sees what appears to him/her an issue with any auction, they can as a potential buyer/bidder contact E-bay with their concerns. Now that is all that has to my knowledge ever happened. There is no such thing as Terry-nated. E-bay in their sole and absolute discretion can do as they please. TerryNewton (and I don't mean to specifically refer to him) or anyone else can raise issues that they personally find with any e-bay auctions. Intimidating or insulting people and accusing them of doing something (getting an auction cancelled) they did not do is to totally misconceive the true circumstances and the facts.

If you persist in disparaging another member (which is clearly outside the rules of this forum) then you will leave me no option but to take further action.

Regards

[jeff hess]

Terry and I have come to an understanding earlier this evening.

My only beef is that many on this forum which again, does a good job of policing scammers is that they seem to take very lightly the activity of taking down auctions that are NOT bogus.

I would extend my hand and apologize if Mr. Springer would do so as well.

Remember it was he who started a long thread that ended with a take down of a perfectly fine auction on my wifes auction site with the words, :Hess is up to his sly tricks again".

"Hess" in this case referred to my wife, and this auction that was taken down (and subsequently allowed to be put back up with an apology from ebay) resulted in a temporary problem that cost my wife many days of grief as she set out to work with Rolex, Ebay and her attorney about this wrongful takedown. It also caused here search function to be lowered and our fee's to go up. (We had a disount due to our excellent record which was suspended).
And when our search function was lowered this caused her yields to go down.

This rather nasty comment about "sly hess" resulted in mass chaos.

I urge everyone on this forum to think and compare and research before running to ebay with simple typo's, older or newer vintage bracelets on vintage watches (As the big auction houses say "later bracelets") and correct watches that have been restored, sometimes by Rolex, with genuine Rolex parts that may have not been original to the watch. This is perfectly normal in the world of vintage.

A far cry from some guy who is swtiching bracelets and selling as new or someone selling counterfeit bracelets or someone adding gold to a steel watch, etc.

Again, I have already come to an understanding with Terry several hours ago.

Jeff

And for the record, I have worked with Rolex in the past as well as with the FBI and other law enforcement agencies in routing out fakers and scammers. I love to nab them. But my wifes auction was not bogus in any way.

[jeff hess]

Oh and one more important issue if you will allow.

you said "If a questionable item is reported to e-bay (as it is anyone who is an e-bay member is enititled to do including Terry Newton or anyone else) it is ultimately E-bay who decides to cancel an auction or not the private citizen who raise their issues in a bona fide good faith manner with E-bay. I seems that you don't want to understand this or ignore it notwithstanding that it has been said time and time again."

With all due respect, this is not quite right.

In long conversations with several ebay execs from several departments over this issue in the past few weeks, it is quite the opposite.

They (at ebay) are babes in the woods. They rely on "trusted reporters" whom they SURMISE are experts. Ebay has no experts. The responsibility is really in the hands of this "trusted reporter". And believe me if a "trusted reporter" turns in too many things that are NOT bogus and worthy of being taken down, this person will be a "trusted reporter" no longer.

eBay has now been set straight on this issue.

We (this forum and those of us involved in this forum and other forums and individuals) need to keep our eyes on the prize. Bona fide scammers, cheaters and thugs. Not immature hobbyists who make mistakes or career people like my wife who enjoys a 99.3 percent positive rating with 50,000 positives.

Thanks. Jeff

I certainly extend my hand in friendship to all and indeed have a good relationship with most on this forum. I have sold watches to many and bought watches from many and we have helped one of your forum members when he had a problem.

[2careless]

After reading all these, I feel that the tactic of posting a band that is very difficult in order to smoke out different opinions, and then use his authority in this subject (i.e. Rolex only enforces hallmark on watches, not bands. I learn something everyday thanks!) to slam down publicly on others is something I will learn and use it only on my worst enemies.
Even though I enjoyed your book very much, Mr Hess, I don't think I would want to do business with you. Hack you don't need us small flies anyway

P.S. Keep up the good work guys on the fakers and counterfeiters!
P.P.S. Also keep up on the good work to "Keep the Bast*rds honest!"

[stevemulholland3]

I have to totally agree with that last statement unfortunately-that was pure
jeff this panel is a collection of individuals with varying opinions with the main goal of trying to inform buyers of potential problems with watches being auctioned.it IS ebays sole responsibility to cross check and reference anything that is reported,by them giving the members the ability to report auctions,they have NOT entered into any sort of contract and in no way can a person be held liable in any way for reporting auctions-even erroneously.
with that said I too have friends inside of ebay,and trust me that they will not be turning off the option to report any time soon.this forum has does much good,I have noticed myself that the amount of fraudulent auctions that where once so prevalent on ebay have started to slow down.sometimes you have to take the good with the bad-
I am a watch seller myself-and I have burned before.I think it is best to err on the side of caution when it comes to these auctions due to the proliferation of high quality fakes and spot on reproductions of rare and vintage pieces.
if you would like to help in this endeavor by offering your opinion then that is great,if not then I urge to you stop posting here as you are the only one who is tarnishing your image around here.
I have received more than a few e-mails regarding this post and your tone in this post,a lot of your past supporters now think you are a total
sorry buddy,I just call it like I see it.
oh yeah,and if ebay is so inexperienced at this auction thing as you like to portray,then how in the hell have they gotten by all these years.come on with that crap-your not dealing with juvenilles here jeff.ebay is a multi million dollar operation.they have panels of lawyers,analysts,and countless idiots who I am not quite sure what they do-let them hire some experts then.their profits are at an all time high and we sure arent getting paid for our "expert" opinion...

[Rockrolex]

OK. I think this thread has run it's course. It's closed.