1655 cartel build

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Kilowattore

Content Contributor
Feb 4, 2018
311
849
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1655 cartel build

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After a couple of high end builds which used expensive parts I felt the need to go back to some more basic stuff.

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You know, I do like to build watches with HQ parts as they satisfy my eye for detail, but at the same time (from a modder's perspective) a "basic" build made using as many parts coming from the donor watch as possible represents a true challenge, and a playground where you can really grow and show some skills.

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I had this 1655 laying in my drawer that was waiting for his destined dial to arrive from Vietnam. I was looking at it and thinking "Hey look at this, it appears cartel has improved their orange GMT hand, now it's very nice!", I thought it would be cool to use it but the dial was still showing those incredibly ugly neon orange markers. I thought they where beyond any chance of salvation, but maybe I was wrong.

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The dial I used on this build went through a lot: I aged it, relumed it, textured it and aged it again then matte sprayed it. I was happy with the dial, then my thought was "how far can you go?" and I decided to complete the build using only cartel parts.

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Same as I do with higher end builds, this cartel case went through a heavy reshaping session in order to remove metal from the lugs side and correct the ugly OOB case shape.

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CG's have been retouched accordingly and lugs drilled to accept 2mm gen-spec springbars.
Cartel bezel was aged to match, while plexi was left untouched as that's how I like them on rolexes.

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I think the final result is nice despite its limits, but I do know each one of us looks at his own son with an often too kind eye, let me know what you think about it :)

A few more pics:

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That's it for now, hope you enjoyed the pics!