Reply With QuoteWhat a great find, it’s absolutely stunning.
Felca 8115
The phrase 'New Old Stock' gets bandied about with gay abandon so forget I said it.
My newest addition is this vintage Felca Diver with unmarked case, unmarked crystal, bezel and sticker still on the caseback. I should also mention that it came on a soft, compliant, unmarked 19mm Tropic 2000 strap with it's original black plastic buckle.
I found it while on holiday in a 2nd hand jewellery/watch shop in the seaside town of Weymouth, UK.
It says 'WATERPROOF' 20 ATU as opposed to water RESISTANT so I have to assume it's very early 70's or late 60's.
- Tritium lume
- approx 36mm wide case
- tall acrylic crystal
- bidirectional friction coin edge bezel
- Swiss movement (haven't opened the case yet)
Felca was a Swiss brand which later became Titoni.
I've actually had this watch for a couple of months now and am rather enamoured with it.
My thoughts so far:
- The highly polished skin-diver style case has the illusion of being incredibly slim due to that mid-case line and at only 36mm sits easily on my 6½ inch wrist but certainly doesn't feel too small.
- Sitting under a thick acrylic crystal, the matt black dial is at-a -glance legible. Is fully printed and has tritium indices every 5 minutes except where the date window is chamfered down to the date wheel.
- The stubby little hour and oversized minutes hands perfectly match the dial colour and texture.
- The coin edged bezel has a good amount of resistance and that is the only thing that needed a small touch from my watchmaker. The sunken tritium pip was exposed to the elements so some clear UV resistant resin with good optical qualities was applied.
- The sticker covered case back has 'Felca-Swiss' embossed with 'WATERPROOF 20 ATU INCABLOC STAINLESS STEEL SWISS MADE and the code 8115 which might be the model number.
- The 28,800bph automatic movement doesn't hack but does have quickset date operated by the nicely sized signed crown. I'll get it serviced soon with some new gaskets installed but my timegrapher has a clear trace and running at +2 s/d dial up.
Beyond that I don't know very much about this watch so am happy to receive any comments or info from the collective.
Sent from my ONEPLUS A3003 using Tapatalk
What a great find, it’s absolutely stunning.
Can't add anything to what you already know but I love an NOS find and that is gorgeous!
Cheers,
Neil.
Lovely looking watch. The dial is in perfect condition
Enjoy
Wow! What a lucky find. Well done!
Very very nice
"Once is happenstance. Twice is coincidence. The third time it's enemy action."
'Populism, the last refuge of a Tory scoundrel'.
That's an amazing find!
Thanks guys. It was a lucky find and I hadn't even heard of Felca at the time. It's practically been stuck to my wrist recently.
Superb! What a find. The signed crown is a nice touch.
What a find indeed! Cannot believe how thin the mid case looks and how elegant the design is!
Very nicely done indeed.
In the Sotadic Zone, apparently.
Very nice indeed, those Tropic 2000 straps are really nice too, I’ve a couple and they are very comfortable.
Cheers..
Jase
Yes, the strap is quite a revelation. I've got an original basket weave tropic but the design on this looks quite sort of space age and the way the keeper, the strap AND the buckle has what I'd describe a three facets is quite something.Originally Posted by JasonM
Bristol GTG / Redbar organiser
Last edited by jason.humphrey.180; 31st July 2022 at 18:36.
I hate to say this but I think there's something not right with that watch. Felca divers were pretty much always branded as "Seascopers" apart from some of the "Worldtime" watches. The only other similar one I've seen was on a German forum and this was also NOS, which just adds to my suspicions to be honest - it may even be the same watch.
This dial (again, NOS) also features on this Felca Compressor - again I believe this watch to be dodgy:
Last edited by Lampoc; 31st July 2022 at 21:07.
Update... I opened her up and found an ETA 2784 with no watchmakers toolmarks on the screws and a deeply engraved Rotor signed "FELCA ROTOMATIC 25 JEWELS SWISS MADE".
Pretty sure it's genuine as I had dodgy Oris in the past and the Swiss movement inside it was wrecked compared to the rest of the watch.
Bristol GTG / Redbar organiser
My thoughts are that it is much closer to being genuine.
Why?
A few things that the fakers do not do well.
Excellent quality dial printing including serifs on the FELCA the linear indices and 12
Signed crown
Good caseback engraving (including the fact that the 8115 lines up at the bottom, reading frm the outside, but all other script is to be read from inside the circle)
Matching movement engraving
Matching dial + hand lume colour
Hand design not "generic"
All the Felca branding is identical, with the sort of "TF" combo on crown, dial and caseback.
However, I do see a small amount of evidence of case refinishing. See the crown side profile photos, there is texture on both sides of the case (which would be normal for the Skindiver cases).
It looks lovely though, and having seen it in the flesh, it is exactly that, lovely.
PS - I do agree that the Compressor picture in post #14 is dodgy, the dial print finishes way too far off the edge of the dial for that to have been original been to the case.
Last edited by sweets; 2nd August 2022 at 15:03.
Its great skin diver for sure. Completely genuine. Great find.
Titoni watches (they dropped the Felca brand name decades ago) who are still a family owned company sent me this PDF from their archives.
Bristol GTG / Redbar organiser
What a fabulous find, gorgeous.
Sent from my iPhone using TZ-UK mobile app
That's fabulous. I've tried to do similar research with Revue-Thommen and G-P before and not managed to get anywhere so it's really great that they came through with that.
In the Sotadic Zone, apparently.
That's great.
Good to see that some manufacturers still keep their old documents.
Cheers,
Neil.
What a great looking watch and even better find!
Delayed update. Had the movement fully serviced as it’s become one of my most worn watches. Took it to vintage 70’s watch proponents, Horological Underground who also managed to sort out the hacking lever and pressure test it.
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Fab-looking watch, and love the strap: if Titoni have any sense they'll reissue both before too long!
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