Reply With QuoteA bit over the £100 mark ( £140) but I rather like the Titanium Tactical Frog interpretations .
I've seen a lot of positive reviews for the Seestern S434 and decided to get one after seeing the black & gold 'JPS' version.
It arrived yesterday and I would agree with the reviews.
With its applied indices, sapphire crystal, on the fly adjustable clasp, lumed ceramic bezel and generally well finished case and bracelet, it's an absolute bargain at £137 delivered (VAT included).
Of course it's a homage of a GO SeaQ, but that's a rare watch to encounter, such that few non WIS will realise that.
Definitely, the nicest AliExpress watch I've seen.
M
PS if you're an NH35 snob, the S435 is the same watch with a Chinese SW200 clone movement.
PPS In the interest of full disclosure, this stopped working within 10 days of arriving. Probably just bad luck as I've had a dozen or more NH3* movement watches without issue (the worst watch for that was Selitta SW200 powered - There was a loose screw in the movement!), but I've returned it for a refund as, truth be told, I didn't need another watch no matter how nice they look, although I might buy another of these some time, maybe a blue one.
Last edited by snowman; 19th January 2024 at 17:00.
Breitling Cosmonaute 809 - What's not to like?
A bit over the £100 mark ( £140) but I rather like the Titanium Tactical Frog interpretations .
Sugess S419 is very similar.Originally Posted by stevet1
Spotted this on HUKD earlier;
https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005...martRedirect=y
What peoples current feelings on these Chinese cheap and cheerful pieces. I had a couple during lockdown for fun by sold both.
I get the quality is getting better but they just lack soul.
Soulless is about right. I dislike that they're almost all blank copies of extremely well-known designs - so boring and unoriginal.
The reason I've 'bonded' with the "Depth Charge" cheapie I bought recently is that while its design is obviously a bit derivative (what isn't?), no part of it is actually a direct copy of anything else.
I wish the Chinese would make a lot more unique original designs.
A cautionary tale in which Aliexpress are involved...
I went on to Aliexpress over Xmas looking at the Pagani watches. Whilst I was there I saw a good looking Seiko Chrono Solar watch with Panda styling for around £50. I'm a complete sucker for Panda designs so on a whim clicked the Buy button. Everything seemed to go smoothly and I was given an estimated delivery date of 19th Jan.
Then I had doubts....it had a Seiko model number, and this checked out with the right watch, but in the UK the RRP was £500 - so how come I could apparently buy one from China for £50? What was I buying? I'm fine with hommages, but I draw the line at fakes. Anyway, I never looked at the tracking info until the other day as it wasn't due, but when I did, it said the watch had been despatched, but rejected by the logistics company and returned to sender, with nothing at all happening for the last 2 weeks. There is facility on the Aliexpress site to contact the seller, which I did, saying 'What is going on?' - I did get a response, but only to say that they will respond in the future.
This morning I get an e-mail from Aliexpress regarding a 'Problematic Product' and that the product had a 'potential non-compliance issue' ie its a fake. Not pleased but not surprised.
Aliexpress have a Refunds / Return button, which I pressed and selected the reason 'product returned to Seller' reason and I got an instant Success e-mail, and a notification from Paypal that a refund is on the way.
So....I guess the moral of the story is the old one of if it looks too good to be true, it probably is. On the plus side, it seems like Aliexpress' systems work rather better than you might expect!
The too good to be true mantra is a good one. On Aliexpress avoid the so called genuine items (they generally are not) and go for the homages instead. I also have found their refund process very good and in my experience the sellers either don't want the item back at all, or offer a partial refund big enough to make it worth keeping.
You were luckier than me - ordered a watch from Aliexpress four years back: the seller sent a nasty, cheap, wired 'phone headset! I complained and asked for a refund: Aliexpress themselves called me a scammer and closed my account - no refund. They really are a collection of unaccountable lying, thieving b******s. Closed account or not, I would never use them again.
I've used them a lot had very few issues and always received a full refund when items didn't arrive or partial if I had an issue with something.
The whole site and complaints procedure has improved a lot in the last few years
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Well as I said in my earlier post, AliExpress themselves have seemed to have acted very well in my case.
I'm not having a great day with Chinese watches - around the same time, I ordered a silicone strap from China via ebay. It arrrived today - looks good. Snag is, I ordered a 20mm wide one, the label on the wrapping says 20mm, but its actually a 22mm one! And I've already got at least 2 other similar 22mm straps!
Military homage from Ali, 'Escapement Time'. VH31 movement, so more of a sweep rather than ticking per second. Internal AR coating, 100M (allegedly) 38mm, screw down crown and caseback. Pretty nice as a very cheap grab and go.
[url=https://ibb.co/3cxqkKp]/url]
Went for a very cheap Tank vibe which I'd seen recommend in a few places. Have to say for £10 delivered it looks pretty good. The strap it came on was comfortable straight out the box but wanted a more casual look so put it on an orange silicone.
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A few weeks ago I put a Pagani Design GMT up for sale on the SC for what I paid for it. I’d sized the jubilee bracelet and worn it once. Decided I just didn’t like the “bling” factor of it. I got no interest in it so withdrew it to use the jubilee on something else.
Well the jubilee didn’t fit properly on the Pagani Design Oyster Perpetual homage and the Oyster bracelet just didn’t fit the GMT at all.
I couldn’t be bothered to refit the jubilee on the GMT so stuck a Zuludiver nato on it instead and left it sitting on my desk.
I’m away in the motorhome for a few weeks and picked up the GMT on a bit of a whim. Three days wear and it’s +/- 0 secs per day when checked against time.is! I’m rather surprised to say the least, the OP homage with a NH35 movement is around +10 secs per day.
I really like it on the nato and can see this getting a lot more wear going forward. An absolute bargain at the £70 I paid for it delivered
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I think the bracelet is often the weak link, pun intended, of these Ali-Express watches. At the moment I’m wearing a Steeldive SKX007 homage on a Hirsch Heavy Calf, Breitling spec, strap plus deployant and it feels like a quality watch. Dump the cheap bracelet and pop them onto decent straps for a better feel.
Ironically, I’m not a fan of Seiko watches in general and the SKX type divers in particular, principally because of v. poor timekeeping, non-handwinding, non-hacking, poor bezel alignment - I have owned at least 6 of them, including two bought new. The Steeldive solves all of these issues plus has a ceramic bezel and a sapphire crystal all for £87 when I bought it a couple of years ago. I see that Creation have the SKX007 for £404 right now, so the Steeldive alternative is a bargain for anyone wanting that style of watch.
I didn't buy this from AliExpress, although it might have been a bit cheaper if I had. I got it for £54.60 including shipping from https://addiesdivewatches.com.
Beautifully slim, screw-down crown, 100m water resistance, box mineral crystal. Quartz microstepper movement, to give the second hand a mechanical sweep (I think it's 4 steps / sec, it reminds me of a handwound watch I had in the 60s). 36mm.
Even the bracelet is decent. Secured by pins, but has a very solid, nicely finished milled clasp. I love the way the hands and the batons catch the light.
I really like the look of that, how are you finding it for time keeping and chrono functions. Is it totally solar, no need to worry about battery changes?A bit over the £100 mark ( £140) but I rather like the Titanium Tactical Frog interpretations .
Was there 140 to your door including customs?
Cheers
Kept to about plus 3 seconds since I bought it. Thought to wear it again today, lives in the shade when not worn so happy with its power, so far. Chronograph functions perfectly. Only quibble is that the bezel has 4 in stead of 5 clicks per 5 min marks, not an issue for me. Love the thing.
I didn't buy this from AliExpress, although it might have been a bit cheaper if I had. I got it for £54.60 including shipping from https://addiesdivewatches.com.
Beautifully slim, screw-down crown, 100m water resistance, box mineral crystal. Quartz microstepper movement, to give the second hand a mechanical sweep (I think it's 4 steps / sec, it reminds me of a handwound watch I had in the 60s). 36mm.
Even the bracelet is decent. Secured by pins, but has a very solid, nicely finished milled clasp. I love the way the hands and the batons catch the light.
Thanks for the feedback, I looked at a few more pictures and the dial seems to be inset quite a bit more compared to the non chrono version. So I've decided to go for that version instead, though I may well end up with both versions.
The Aventurine GMT is on amazon uk for 346. It's the end of the world as we know it. Well, it's only a bracelet.
THIN is the new BLACK
Sorry, missed the final question, £140 all in, no question of customs and the like.
After seeing notnowkayo's Tactical Frog chrono I went for this and so far I'm very pleased with it. Also slightly above the £100 but at £135 including FedEx delivery still great value I think.
Lume is supposed to be pretty good on these isn’t it?After seeing notnowkayo's Tactical Frog chrono I went for this and so far I'm very pleased with it. Also slightly above the £100 but at £135 including FedEx delivery still great value I think.
It would make a good holiday / pool side watch.
Don't know how long they lume lasts but looks promising.
Obviously it's light on the wrist and comfortable to wear on the supplied strap. Though I'll not doubt go down the rabbit hole of MN type strap options at some point.
Not bad at all.Don't know how long they lume lasts but looks promising.
Obviously it's light on the wrist and comfortable to wear on the supplied strap. Though I'll not doubt go down the rabbit hole of MN type strap options at some point.
Cheers
How is the bezel on this, in particular how many clicks? I bought a cheap aliexpress homage a while back that for some reason has a 90 click bezel! It looks great, but the bezel alignment really annoys me if I try to actually use it rather than just leave it at 12.After seeing notnowkayo's Tactical Frog chrono I went for this and so far I'm very pleased with it. Also slightly above the £100 but at £135 including FedEx delivery still great value I think.
Anything else weird or is it generally good? I've seen some others that look nice except that they have mis-matched lume between the dial and bezel, or other oddities that aren't always obvious from the main photos. I really like the look of the dial & indices on this one.
Mine has 48 clicks, (4 per 5 min interval. )
Last edited by notnowkato; 31st March 2024 at 17:15.
It's bidirectional 48 clicks, not super smooth but smooth enough for me. It does align at the hour batons so ok if your only looking for 5 minute set points and there's no play or wobble in the bezel. A work colleague showed me his Pigani GMT the other day and the bezel on the was awful.
Case seems well finished with no sharp edges and a screw in crown. I think the dial is lovely with a very subtle texture to it. All in all in very happy, if I was still buying high watches this would definitely push me to getting an FDX.
Hmm., mine has a wandering bezel, & the applied luminous indices do not line up with the minute hand.
Would not buy another.
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I know there were bezel alignment issues on previous versions, mine is the V4 and seems spot on.
Ugh. How hard can it be to make a normal 60 click bezel! It's weird how they put so much effort into making these surprisingly good for the money, and then do something that makes no sense and is presumably harder than just getting an off-the-shelf 60 click ratchet.
At least it sounds better than my 90-click one, which doesn't align to anything except even hours. Especially if you're aligning to the hour hand, which is something I do occasionally (normally to mark the ETA on a long journey). In that case it would give 15-minute increments, which is actually better than the usual 6 or 12 minute increments. Although accuracy is far more important when timing things normally, in minutes. I normally do the hour hand thing until it's within an hour and then reset to whatever is left in minutes.
I noticed a long not seen pal had what looked like a Speedmaster on and excused himself saying it was a cheapie, I had a look and must say it was a nicely turned out thing. Not as nice as my Speedmasters but, £100, brilliant value.New "speedmaster" arrived today
[IMG][/IMG]
Posted this somewhere else, thought someone might find it useful.
When I lived in the Middle East, there was a stationery/school supplies/crafting store called Al Rawnaq that piled it high, and sold it cheap. And I mean cheap. I always remember seeing a pack of fifty ballpoint pens in a box for about US$0.50, and just stopping to have a think about the economics of how that box of pens got to Qatar from China, with all the steps, and everyone making a sliver of those 50 cents. I couldn't see how it could be done.
Anyway, I picked this up for £55 this week (honestly, with one eye on SSSS4), and I am amazed. (Look on AliExpress, they can be found for less.)
Please ignore any fluff and bits on the watch - it's perfect. The bezel action is nice, the lume is OK. The crown is a little finicky, but the packaging and the strap are great. The crystal has a bevel cut into it, too.
Those Steeldive Willard's make fantastic beaters.
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I have the exact same Willard copy, but with a sterile dial, back before Steeldive decided to push its own 'brand' exclusively.
Having handled a couple of Seiko's own copies, I can confidently say these are the superior watch in every way.
Picked up this stunning VK64 chrono in the most recent sale.
This brand name is known to divide opinion but for the money, the fit, finish and quality far outweigh the cons of the name.
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For £90 total delivered this is remarkably good
Really light and comfy due to the 4 o clock crown and titanium case.
Improvements? 20mm lugs maybe and the lume is weak due to tiny coverage. Oh and the 6 and 9 are a little weird to my eye
Not quite under a tonne, but unworn for £119.
A proper automatic moon phase, with aventurine-style dial, big date, sub seconds and a lumed moon. It keeps superb time too.
I've ditched the frankly abominable strap and replaced it with a smooth, soft blue leather. Annoyingly it's 21mm lugs (why?), but it's a cracking piece all round for the cash.
This one arrived yesterday from the last Ali Express sale, a smidge over £100.
Love that bezel.
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That San Martin is a really handsome watch
Bugger, another watch I don't need ,but do..
Apart from the handset, it's identical to the BENRUS Type I including the bezel markings...This one arrived yesterday from the last Ali Express sale, a smidge over £100.
I own one of these. It's brilliant. Great timekeeper. Lovely bezel and crown actions. Built so well it belies it's retail price.This one arrived yesterday from the last Ali Express sale, a smidge over £100.
Yes and they have or had a limited edition with the Benrus hands as well, which wasn't available when I was browsing. I'd hope at some point they would do a Type II.
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Yes I agree the quality is excellent, as is the lume!
A type I or II with the original ladder hands without logo would have me interested.
Yes that would be my preference as well........ I'd be surprised if they don't release a version with the type ll dial.
Not tried one myself, but JOMW has a positive review of a (supposedly) 1000M diver from Addies which is selling for around £60 on AliExpress.
https://youtu.be/3YW_pWUcp40
Whether it's 1000M WR or not (probably not) is a bit of a moot point at the price, but it looks a pretty solid watch for the money.
Their NH35 powered 'Tuna'-alikes are about £50 on AliExpress, which seems remarkably cheap, as well.
M
Breitling Cosmonaute 809 - What's not to like?
£45 delivered from Aliexpress. It's an Rdunae RA03, a homage of the Benrus DTU-2A/P. It's an exceedingly close copy of the original in terms of case shape and lug width which I like. Hard to fault it for the money
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