Reply With QuoteWould an FXD Chronograph fit the bill?
Sent from my iPhone using TZ-UK mobile app
I'll be turning 40 in a few days. 2023 & 2024 have been especially hard years for me, yet here I am. I'd like to mark the 'special' occasion with a nice watch from me to me. I'd like to keep this watch forever.
These last 2 years have been slow years for watches where I onlly added and sold just a couple entry level dive watches from Seiko and Citizen.
I was lucky enough (strange times we live in) to be offered a 124060 Sub a few days before XMAS 2023. An expensive purchase of a watch that fits so many of my criteria that I did not feel compelled to look at other watches for some time.
Throughout the 2 decades of my dive watch collecting journey I have really come to understand what I like, so each piece in my collection fits a purpose.
I wanted a dive chrono in my collection for some years now. Just a few days ago I was again lucky to find a mint SMP Chrono from a decade ago. It's a superb watch for sure, but am not sure I can count it as the watch for my 40th. Still on the fence about it. It's a great, great watch but still a bit niche. Perhaps something more easy to wear everyday would be better to mark this occasion.
The watches I wear most of the days are the SMPc from 2011 on a Forstner President bracelet, the Pelagos on it's bracelet, a quartz Tuna of some kind. Whether the Golden Tuna on an NOC hook and loop or my trusty SBBN015 300m on it's wonderful bracelet. Sometimes I wear my mint SBDX001 (on my fifth one), but again, with its hardlex crystal, polished bezel insert and high weight, I don't wear it too often. Another outlier I have really started to enjoy again lately is my decade old EZM3F, fitted with Sinn shoulder-less spring bars which have to be cut to be taken out and a variety of Nato's I feed in through them.
I have had the Pelagos 42mm for over 5 years now which I truly wore and enjoyed everywhere. It's been a true workhorse. I am a very sentimental person. I like to create a bond with a watch and to do that I must be able to wear it on a lot of occasions and adventure. Most of them will be centered around the sea. Diving, swimming, kayaking, boating etc. but also hiking, running and travelling.
In an ideal world I think I'd get a Sub Date with a green bezel. But I'd never buy a current production watch over retail.
These last days, where I've been thinking which watch I would like to get, I find myself strangely drawn to the Navy Blue MN Pelagos FXD. I say strange, because I'm normally a bracelet kind of guy. Yet, the robust nature of this watch and it's simple no nonsense approach makes it a big draw for me. For some reason, having the year inscribed on the back of the watch also feels kind of good this time, given the occasion, but then I say it would be kind of too much to have 2 Pealgos'. I really don't know. On another day I would have been happy to just buy and see if that happens and if so just move it along, but give that I'm buying to mark a special occasion, I don't want to buy and just sell it later.
Do you think the FXD and the 42mm Pelagos can happily co-exist in a modest 10-12 watch collection? Can long time owners of the FXD share their thoughts and how was their experience with this watch?
These are WIS's issues. So thank you for sharing your thoughts with me :)
Would an FXD Chronograph fit the bill?
Sent from my iPhone using TZ-UK mobile app
I would have said the FXD and Pelagos are too similar in my opinion.
I've owned both and loved both but not at the same time.
Your existing Pelagos already has the strong bond so perhaps buy the FXD strap or similar aftermarket strap and you get the best of both.
Then you get to enjoy the hunt or finding something else that could join the collection
Are there other watches that are on a shortlist? Are you a dive watch only collector?
Thanks for input. Yes dive watch only :)Originally Posted by vortex89
Funnily (or sadly, depending from your pov) enough, there are no other new watches that pique my interest.
Could be a side effect of getting old, but all the usual suspects ie. Omega, IWC, Tudor, Breitling, Tag etc don't have any particular new watches that really appeal to me. They are either too big, too flashy, have display backs etc. If it was 15 or so years ago there would have been so many. Another SMP 300, A Rolex Sub or SD, a Superocean Steelfish and so it goes...
Soon enough, I might be 'forced' into vintage. I say forced, since vintage comes with it's own set of issues. But mostly I don't want to buy safe queens. I buy to wear and enjoy them everywhere, especially around water, so a new watch will always fit this duty better.
Doxa ? Omega PloProf ? Both watches with storied histories.
Nice watches to be sure.
I don't like the 45 minute counters. Find them near impossible to read and Tudor also don't mention anything re depressing the pushers underwater, which is a requirement for a dive watch chrono.
Considered the Ploprof. Beautiful indeed. But I can't stand display backs on dive watches.
Especially on one with such a history as the Ploprof. In my eyes it also shouldn't have a Helium valve, just like the Original, it should be monoblock and resist Helium penetration.
I told you I'm very particular with my dive watches :)
I never warmed up to Doxa tbh.
Last edited by buddy13; 12th November 2024 at 12:45.
I agree on 45min counters. The 30min counter on my Monaco was annoying.
Have you looked at the older Breitling Avenger Chronograph’s (similar to the one worn in Blood Diamond) pretty certain the pushers could be used under water.
Sent from my iPhone using TZ-UK mobile app
How about a CWC Automatic RN diver? Has plenty of pedigree, can take a beating (not on the wallet, though) and will look better for it. I have the quartz version and probably wear it more than any other dive watch I have, including a tuna and MM300.
Gotcha. 16600 Sea Dweller ?
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
How about one of the IWC Aquatimer models?
e.g.
https://www.watches.co.uk/iwc-aquati...4aAqAmEALw_wcB
and
https://www.watches.co.uk/iwc-aquati...AaAvx4EALw_wcB
Modern classics IMO
I nearly purchased a Tudor Pelagos and then thought. It looks similar to to my 16610 Sub and GMT Ceramic. I have other chronos too. A 1950s Flayback Panerai, Breitling Navi and Omega Moon. I sold my Sinn 356 and Damasko DC66. I will buy another DC66!
I have since diversified into regular DateJusts, a Panerai RadioMir, Vintage Omega DeVille and a IWC Big Pilot. I'd encourage you go a little left field from Chronos.
I went for the MN Pelagos :). I went new from AD since I liked to have the date of my birthday on the warranty card.
It's not perfect, but they did many of the changes I would have liked to see on my standard 42mm Blue Pelagos. They are very different watches. Even the blue color is much more muted, dark and 'Navy' than the OG. Having MN24 on the back is also a nice reminder of the anniversary I thought.
In order of importance (to me), these are:
- Chamfered edges on the back of the case
- Properly serrated bezel
- Properly serrated crown
- Thinner case
- One less line of text under pinion
The only thing I prefer on the OG is the bezel action, but I prefer the 120 clicks and full graduations on the FXD. Count up or down makes little difference to me. I can use both.
I would have preferred if it was 40mm but I still think it's a very cool watch to have in a small rotation with the very particular trait of having fixed 'bars'. I'm a bracelet kind of guy, but I think this will provide a refresh. The Julien Faure fabric strap that comes with the watch is very well made and super comfortable, but I will buy a Garmin Ultrafit 22mm Nylon Strap, since this does not pass under the watch, as seen on the Ultra Deep of another forum member here :) - https://youtu.be/xX3t9xgKMt4?si=7bHzAwSKZJrI8Gt3
For being such a no frills tool watch, it is also surprisingly wearable with a shirt. Quick photo from today at work.
Tudor Pelagos FXD by etienne spiteri, on Flickr
Posting Permissions