Okay, here's a conundrum for you:
I have a 45+ year old (non-Seiko) divers watch. The lume is dead as the proverbial doornail. The lume on the hands is cracked and on the hour hand about half has fallen out. So the hour hand needs replacement lume. The '$64k question' is: how much lume do I have the repair facility replace?
Possibility #1: just the hole in the hour hand. That would, I think, look pretty weird, but to a purist, maybe the minimalist option would be the best?
Possibility #2: just relume the whole hour hand. That might look weird, too, as the hour hand would be different from all the other lume on the watch face.
Possibility #3: relume all 3 hands but leave the lume in the hour markers on the dial alone. This, IMO, would be the most logical.
Possibility #4: complete relume: all hands and all hour markers on the dial. This would look the best (from a non-purist standpoint) as all lume on the watch face would be uniform, however, it surely wouldn't satisfy any purists.
So, if the watch needs some lume repair anyway, how far is enough / how far is too far?
BTW, just to answer the most logical question you're thinking now, it's an IWC Aquatimer from the late '60s. A beautiful watch with the sunburst dial and unpolished case and original signed bracelet - which I don't want the service center to touch. Oh, in answer to your next most logical question: NO! I don't want to sell it.
Your opinions, please?
Regards,
Jeff Emslie