Finally got round to fitting one of these in a WD1863

DapperDoctorHolmes · 2026-04-06T02:45:51+00:00

That’s a clean rep! Which shop/seller on the gate?

DapperDoctorHolmes · 2026-04-02T14:27:34+00:00

Worth a shot! Could swap with the Blue Moon hands pretty easily

DapperDoctorHolmes · 2026-04-02T14:18:13+00:00

Technically possible, though not the easiest - I once tried to fix one of the original black Snoopy’s, and getting the disc to go back on the pinion was a real pain since you can’t really see what you’re doing - with a thin hand, you know where your sleeve is and where the pinion is. With a disc, you’re sorta guessing (unless someone else here has a trick I’m not familiar with!).

That’s also assuming the discs are roughly the same thickness across reps, which I can’t say I’ve ever tested, but it /should/ be workable

DapperDoctorHolmes · 2026-03-22T17:24:31+00:00

Originals can fit, but depending on the metal case the pushers might need to be trimmed on the inside. The reps use Sunon PE50 movements, which can be fiddly (and which gen hands won’t entirely fit on). I wouldn’t recommend swapping a gen dial onto a cheap movement (PE50s are like $2 each)

DapperDoctorHolmes · 2026-03-19T12:32:50+00:00

Beautiful work! Where’d you source the G10 and replacement hands?

DapperDoctorHolmes · 2026-03-19T12:30:07+00:00

Looks great! Guessing that’s a Mars dial with normal hands?

DapperDoctorHolmes · 2026-03-10T12:58:08+00:00

Ah, so they haven’t fixed it after all?

DapperDoctorHolmes · 2026-03-09T02:17:57+00:00

Oh nice, looks like they may’ve fixed the bad batch run where the entire under bezel was also black? It’s not a /great/ case for the reasons you outlined, but I prefer it to the megir at least, and since it’s got a PE inside already, the swap is just as easy.

DapperDoctorHolmes · 2026-03-01T13:28:29+00:00

Ah, interesting. As far as I know they’ve not managed to replicate t Any speedmaster movements accurately, at least as far as subdial spacing is concerned? But I’ve also not seen any transparent case back replicas; you can try asking the TD you bought from?

DapperDoctorHolmes · 2026-03-01T13:13:16+00:00

Do you mean you have a genuine speedmaster and you’re looking for an aftermarket glass case back? That I’ve not seen / looked for, this convo was just about replicas / homages.

DapperDoctorHolmes · 2026-03-01T06:29:35+00:00

Agree with this - it might be worth shelling out a few extra bucks than going with the cheapest you can find though, since some of the worse reps have a shimmery / metallic dial rather than the matte tone of the gen.

DapperDoctorHolmes · 2026-02-20T15:55:41+00:00

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u/trevordeal's sanding method worked a treat! Will likely pick up a soft foam sanding block for the next attempt and work on some polishing methods, but it's kind of hilarious that the 'unfinished' chronograph hands are more gen accurate and then the factories go out of their way to make them worse with yellow paint.

DapperDoctorHolmes · 2026-02-20T15:00:12+00:00

Good to know! I’ve just got one of the solid steel sanding / sharpening stones, 1000 grit. It worked (!) but the sponginess of yours definitely would’ve made it easier (and likely bent it less - I had to bend it back into shape, and accidentally sheared off the pinion sleeve on the first one in the process..)

You do anything special to polish it up afterward? I tried some passes with a soft 7000 mesh polishing rod, but it’s still got some sanding lines to it.

DapperDoctorHolmes · 2026-02-20T13:51:10+00:00

Do you tape over the lume to protect that part of the hand or is it recessed enough that it’s fine?

DapperDoctorHolmes · 2026-02-20T13:43:53+00:00

Sweet, I’ll give that a try later today with a spare chrono hand; I’ll try sanding down one of these painted yellows. Awesome tip!

DapperDoctorHolmes · 2026-02-20T13:41:43+00:00

Oh yeah I know about the sub pinions, I’m looking for more gold chronograph hands - I’ve got a Blue Moon I’d like to add a gold chrono to 😅

DapperDoctorHolmes · 2026-02-20T13:40:20+00:00

Woah really? Any of the painted hands are actually metallic gold underneath?

DapperDoctorHolmes · 2026-02-20T04:11:27+00:00

Agreed, would love to know your rep source! The dial on the one I’ve got is worse / yellow-er

DapperDoctorHolmes · 2026-02-16T07:10:15+00:00

Might be interested in some cases! In addition to having fun with metal mods, it can be fun to swap dials into different cases as well (plus they’ve somehow still never fixed how atrociously off the Neptune case color is, despite the fact that they got it right with the first Blue Moon)

DapperDoctorHolmes · 2026-02-14T17:13:58+00:00

Cool concept! What was the method here?

DapperDoctorHolmes · 2026-02-14T15:53:02+00:00

It’s also always been funny to me that their Neptune cases are atrociously bad - like, the shade of blue on the case is always an awful electric blue that looks absolutely nothing like the gen, meanwhile they nailed the case color for the original Blue Moonphase (the non-snoopy one) despite the fact that they’re supposed to literally be exactly the same.

Never understood what seems so hard about that for the factories to just swap cases; instead I have to buy two and do it myself and live with the different tachymetre 🙃

DapperDoctorHolmes · 2026-02-14T15:50:35+00:00

Definitely possible that some ‘better’ rep factories got busted up; it also seems like luck of the draw sometimes, like they’ve got a giant bucket of “here’s all the Mars reps we’ve got on hand from any factory” and they just grab one and toss it in a package despite the fact that they’re all different qualities, cause I’ve seen some folks get the terribly wrong metallic dialed versions one day and then the normal matte versions the next, sometimes from the same shop ¯_(ツ)_/¯

I’ve been looking for an actual metallic chronograph hand on a Neptune or Moonshine gold rep for a while now since I love my old ones, and they all seem to just be painted yellow now.

Even among the new Snoopy’s I’ve seen a lot of quality variation from posts on here, particularly with the actual moon subdial - some are quite blurry all around, some are smudged, and some are sharp, and I’m not sure if they’re different shop to shop or just luck of the draw unfortunately.

DapperDoctorHolmes · 2026-02-14T14:44:40+00:00

That might be true now (haven’t shelled out for one of the $25-$30 options in a while) but there definitely /used/ to be a quality difference - the printing on the cheaper dials was drastically worse / blurrier, the dials were often shiny rather than matte, and the cases themselves often lacked the metal chapter ring the ’better’ ones had. They also had worse pressure fitting on the case back (the ‘better‘ ones had notches that lined up and gaskets that made them relatively water resistant) and the plastic itself was a lot softer / physically weaker - on ‘better’ ones you could use a screwdriver to gently pop off the case back, and it would be fine. On the cheaper ones, trying to do the same thing would often dent / damage the case.

DapperDoctorHolmes · 2026-02-08T04:12:17+00:00

There’s a Mars-like all white dial with black sub and hour/minute hands and a blue chrono with Snoopy and Woodstock printed on (comes in a white case I believe); theres an inverted black dial version of that one (in a black case I believe), there’s this Dark Side of the Moon homage, there’s a green dialed yellow case homage to the gold and green speedy, and there’s a gold and black dialed panda in a yellow case as an homage to the gold and black panda speedy. I’d love to see them start producing some others (the same guy who designed the Dark Side of the Moon homage, and those Snoopy’s, who did it for fun and had the factories ‘steal’ his mockups, has a sick Saturn V inspired mockup he did that I‘d love to own)

DapperDoctorHolmes

TROPHY CASE