Show Patina on your GMT Master 16700 or 16710 Tritium Dials

[ArmanA]

Nice to see other patina'd Cokes!

[Chasseur]

Could you tell me when ROLEX stopped the tritium for the luminova

[swish77]

Originally Posted by Chasseur

Could you tell me when ROLEX stopped the tritium for the luminova

About 1997-98.

[A.S.R]

All these watches are just gorgeous.

[sea-dweller]

Looks great!

[Sherbie]

Still waiting for my 1993 16700 start to turn. The hands have a duller look to them vs the white gold surround plots, but i have noticed this on a few other 16700 as well


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[ryanpatrick]

Circa 1989 16710. Not much patina.




Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[eton97]

Just back from the spa....



Sorry. Just realised this thread isn't for 1675's

[Sky21]

Originally Posted by eton97

Just back from the spa....



Sorry. Just realised this thread isn't for 1675's

The other watches in this thread may get patina like yours, but that lovely fuscia bezel insert is all early 1675.

[chows99]

Originally Posted by saskmh

There are a number of folks who would prefer to have that original hand in place over a replacement luminova hand regardless of the missing lume. It's all personal taste.

I've found that in the world of tritium dials the majority of collectors frown upon a mismatched hand set with a mix of tritium lume and luminova.

Hi,

How about different shade of patina between the dial & the hands? Some gmts in the 80s/90s have such an issue but the hands are original. Different level of patina is due to different supplier of parts. Do you agree?

[Sky21]

Originally Posted by chows99

Hi,

How about different shade of patina between the dial & the hands? Some gmts in the 80s/90s have such an issue but the hands are original. Different level of patina is due to different supplier of parts. Do you agree?

Different shade of patina is perfectly acceptable to most, especially with the later tritium watches. The hands tend to age a bit differently than the dial plots, but the important point is they are all tritium. When the hands are replaced with luminova hands that is when a lot of people lose interest.

[chows99]

Originally Posted by Sky21

Different shade of patina is perfectly acceptable to most, especially with the later tritium watches. The hands tend to age a bit differently than the dial plots, but the important point is they are all tritium. When the hands are replaced with luminova hands that is when a lot of people lose interest.

Any easy way to tell if the hands are tritium? Thanks for sharing!

[swish77]

Originally Posted by chows99

Hi,

How about different shade of patina between the dial & the hands? Some gmts in the 80s/90s have such an issue but the hands are original. Different level of patina is due to different supplier of parts. Do you agree?

I gotta say, it bugs me. I know it happens, although I'm not sure it's more prevalent in GMTs in the '80s/'90s. I've seen it in a lot of watches of different references. Spider dials can be original too, and those also would bug me.

When I'm buying vintage, I look only for watches with matching patina on the dial and hands. I'm a stickler for that. However, over time, it can change, of course, so a vintage watch that has matching patina in, say, 2005, might not have matching patina in 2017 even though the parts are original.

[saskmh]

Originally Posted by chows99

Any easy way to tell if the hands are tritium? Thanks for sharing!

Its simple. Shine a bright light or sunlight on the dial... if the lume glows green for more than a few seconds then its luminova. Some tritium dials may glow for a few seconds then die due to the phosphorus used on the tritium mix. I have an old tritium Omega dial that does this.

[datejust24]

The dial of my newly acquired 16710 changing from gloss to matte....I love the change....that counts for patina, no?
IMG_0313.jpg

[LnL]

I got a 16760 in a trade, a few years ago. It is my daily wear. Remember the Swatches back in the 80's, where you could change colors/looks? That is kind of what I ended up with.

It came with Coke, Pepsi, and solid black bezel inserts. I have an Oyster and a Jubilee bracelet for it. And a big surprise, which I did not expect, is that it arrived with newer dial & hands installed, along with the original dial & hands.

Some day, I may have the original dial/hands reinstalled. But for now the lume on the installed dial/hands works very well, and comes in handy at times.

[Karbo]

16700

[chows99]

Love my patina-ed dial and waiting for my hands to turn Latina too!

[Spyder555]

Originally Posted by LnL

I got a 16760 in a trade, a few years ago. It is my daily wear. Remember the Swatches back in the 80's, where you could change colors/looks? That is kind of what I ended up with.

It came with Coke, Pepsi, and solid black bezel inserts. I have an Oyster and a Jubilee bracelet for it. And a big surprise, which I did not expect, is that it arrived with newer dial & hands installed, along with the original dial & hands.

Some day, I may have the original dial/hands reinstalled. But for now the lume on the installed dial/hands works very well, and comes in handy at times.

Are there any opinions on what happened to this dial? Is this changing due to moisture, Trit degradation or something else? It's very interesting and I'd love to hear your opinions on this. TIA

[Sky21]

Originally Posted by Spyder555

Are there any opinions on what happened to this dial? Is this changing due to moisture, Trit degradation or something else? It's very interesting and I'd love to hear your opinions on this. TIA

From what I have seen, the dials on the 16760 had this issue quite a bit. Similar to the known degradation of the hands on the 16750, finding an original dial with no issues is quite rare.

[LnL]

I personally have NO idea! I really did not even look very closely ad the dial, when I got the watch, and just stuck it in the safe. It was a couple years later when I took a CLOSE look it, and saw how gnarly it actually is. I keep it in a windowsill now, so that it gets more sun and continues to age.

[chows99]

Cream patina on my lovely 16700