Genuine Tudor 79090 restoration.

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tripdog

Member
Dec 22, 2018
11
19
3
A little bit of history first, for those who don't know:

The first Tudor Submariner was developed at the same time as the first Rolex Submariner, but for marketing reasons the Rolex Submariner was the first to be launched - because Rolex were the 'first' brand and Tudor was the newcomer within Wilsdorf’s businesses. The first Rolex Submariners were introduced in 1953 and a few months later in 1954, the Tudor Submariner followed. This model was given the reference number 7922 and it was almost identical to the Rolex Submariner.


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The Tudor Submariner 79000 series of reference (79090, 79190) was the 3rd and last generation of Tudor’s classic Submariner collection. They were introduced in the 1980’s and ran until 1999. The movement was ETA’s 2824-2.

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This is more of a re-restoration, as somebody had already done some work on the watch. It was probably initially purchased as an incomplete watch in bad shape. When I received it the case had been polished, but not very well - the lugs were rounded, the chamfers were inexistant and there were grooves running down the sides of the case from using the wrong techniques.

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The hands had been relumed white, which didn't match the dial. As you can see there is a champagne date wheel, when it would have been white from the factory - it's a genuine Tudor date wheel so maybe this was the only one available at the time - vintage parts can be very hard to find.

The crystal was badly scratched, the crown was aftermarket, the bezel ring didn't turn (Phong insert) and both the dial and hands were dirty.


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It's now all genuine Tudor with the exception of the bezel insert and the end links, which are there as a stop gap until the owner can source gen parts in good condition.


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I refinished the case, only removing what was necessary to flatten the lugs and restore the chamfers.

The crystal was polished, I stripped and cleaned the bezel assembly and used a new tension ring.

The hands were stripped of the white lume, cleaned and relumed to match the dial which was also cleaned up, retaining the original tritium lume.


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An Athaya pearl, lumed to match the dial and hands replaces the awful Phong pearl. A Rolex 703 crown and tube were fitted, as well as a restored 93250 bracelet


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This really is a stunning watch and I think the champagne date wheel helps to bring out the blue of the dial, even if it's not entirely original.


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Here, next to it's black dial version, which is all rep except for the dial and the movement, which are both genuine.


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Thanks for looking !
 

Rx4Time

Administrator
Staff member
Administrator
Dec 23, 2017
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Beautiful work! I love Tudors and this had me drooling..... To clarify, the bezel assembly is genuine, only the insert aftermarket, correct? How does it compare to the black dial one which is aftermarket? What was the base for the black dial, or will that be discussed in another thread?
 
OP
tripdog

tripdog

Member
Dec 22, 2018
11
19
3
Beautiful work! I love Tudors and this had me drooling..... To clarify, the bezel assembly is genuine, only the insert aftermarket, correct? How does it compare to the black dial one which is aftermarket? What was the base for the black dial, or will that be discussed in another thread?
Thanks !

It's just the insert that's aftermarket - Phong, and his pearls are awful so I fitted an Athaya which looks a lot better. Gen blue Tudor inserts are hard to find, they rarely come up for sale and consequently the prices get silly.

I don't know where the case etc for the black Sub came from - the watch was sent to me after being purchased on one of the rep forums. It had multiple issues, despite being described as a high end franken - the movement wasn't fixed inside the case, the tube unscrewed from the case along with the crown. The bezel ring wouldn't turn, it had a set of $9 eBay hands fitted to it which were a different color to the dial lume, the case was too thick, with huge CGs etc etc . It was probably a low end case off eBay.
Once re-worked it looked a lot better, but there are still differences between the blue and black Subs - the gen case is thinner being the most noticeable.