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Ruski91

KW 359 V1 - Complete Review

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Ruski91

I have recently acquired the KW PAM359 and it is a piece of art work. I wanted to give everyone a full review of this watch including a pictorial and a comparison with gen. I have to say that while making this review, i learned that it is incredibly difficult to re-enact identical shots that you find online. Between the slightest changes in angle and lighting conditions, a picture of the same item can look entirely different. In any case, i tried my best to get as close as possible so that I can provide you all with a thorough review.

 

Anyone on the fence about these KW P.9000 models, don't hesitate - they are remarkable. I have tried on the gen and it feels and looks identical. I have been on this amazing forum for a while now and for me thorough reviews are some of the most valuable posts you can find. That being said, I hope you find my opinions and analysis helpful in some way.

 

First off, some background information on the genuine (Courtesy of Panerai.com):

 

PAM00359 LUMINOR MARINA 1950 3 DAYS AUTOMATIC – 44 MM

 

THE LUMINOR MARINA 1950 3 DAYS AUTOMATIC - 44 MM HAS ALL THE ESSENTIAL CHARACTERISTICS OF A MODEL MADE ALMOST 20 YEARS AGO by Officine Panerai, maintaining all of its solidity, reliability and water-tightness, while adding two new elements that give the watch great character: the P.9000 in-house calibre and a new dial. The dial is black with the classic sandwich structure, guaranteeing exceptional visibility under all conditions. In place of the bar markers, eight tiny Arabic numerals have been engraved on the plate, while the classic large Arabic numerals are present at 12, 6 and 9 o'clock. The colour is also different: the luminescent material is used to coat the hour and minute hands while the small seconds hand, the date and the writing are ecru-coloured in a shade reminiscent of Panerai's military models of the 1940s, the colour of which changed due to the natural ageing of the luminescent paste used at the time. From a technical viewpoint, the Luminor 1950 Marina 3 Days Automatic - 44 mm uses the P.9000 automatic movement, which was entirely designed and built at Officine Panerai's Neuchâtel Manufacture. The case of the Luminor Marina 1950 3 Days Automatic measures 44mm in diameter and is made of polished stainless steel, contrasting with the brushed crown-protecting bridge device. The Luminor Marina 1950 3 Days Automatic - 44 mm is watertight to 30 bars and the Panerai in-house movement can be admired through the sapphire crystal case-back.

 

******************************************

 

Technical Details:

 

MOVEMENT

Automatic mechanical, Panerai P.9000 calibre, executed entirely by Panerai, 13¾ lignes, 7.9 mm thick, 28 jewels, Glucydur® balance, 28,800 alternations/hour. Incabloc® anti-shock device. Power reserve 3 days, two barrels. 197 components.

 

p9000_front.png

 

 

FUNCTIONS

Hours, minutes, small seconds, date.

 

CASE

Diameter 44 mm, AISI 316L polished steel.

 

BEZEL

Polished steel.

 

BACK

See-through sapphire crystal.

 

DEVICE PROTECTING THE CROWN

(protected as a trademark) Brushed steel.

 

DIAL

Black with luminous Arabic numerals and hour marker. Date at 3 o’clock, seconds at 9 o’clock.

 

CRYSTAL

Sapphire, formed of corundum, 2.6 mm thick. Anti-reflective coating.

 

WATER-RESISTANCE

30 bar (~300 metres).

 

******************************************

 

Some Images from Panerai:

 

 

pam00359_front.pngpam00359_back.png

 

 

 

 

 

Review and Comparison:

 

Comparison+3.jpg

 

 

1. Luminor Panerai seems to be ever so slightly thinner on the rep. This of-course can just be an optical illusion as the pictures are not in fact identical. But you be the judge.

 

2. Flat and polished Canon Pinion looks spot on. I have herd that some of these had a slightly recessed CP, but I asked for my dealer to carefully choose one with a flat CP and they did! Looks great to me.

 

3. Numerals look fantastic. I can not see any differences. All of my research indicated that the rep and gen numeral spacing is off in terms of proximity to the inner bezel. For the life of me i can see the difference. We are talking about maybe 1 or 1.5 mm here. To the naked eye and without having the gen to take a real side by side, I can not conclude if this is accurate.

 

4. Crown guard from this angle looks fantastic. Great Reg. and TM. Engravings, clean and neat. Identical brushed finish. CG Pin is nice and polished. Crown itself looks awesome and has nice and defined 'teeth'. Crown guard lever itself is not as tight as I would like it to be. This is the second KW 359 i had in my hands and the first one had a tighter lever. So it is my understanding that there may be some miniscule variances even within the same factories watches - meaning 2 watches from the same batch may have slight differences. Shape of the lever is fairly on point and I am pretty happy with it compared to gen.

 

 

 

Comparison+5.jpg

 

 

1. Once again, CG shape and edges look nice and sharp. CG Pin is great and lever sticks out just the right amount.

 

2. Date font looks pretty good. Color is perfect. Size is questionable and it appears that Gen datewheel is ever so slightly thinner than the rep one. Once again this may be due to not having a real side by side photo comparison as these are look alike shots but not identical. So this may be an optical illusion once more.

 

3. CP is nice and flat once more. Looks great

 

4. Once more we see that numerals on the sandwich dial look phenomenal and the L Swiss Made L inscription looks great as well in terms of placement and size.

 

Another thing I can bring up here is the AR. The AR on the 312/359 line from Panerai is not very strong on the gen. This is not once of those watches where the crystal disappears. I have seen ALE address this matter on a thread before. Rep AR seems good when compared to gen.

 

 

 

Comparison+1.jpg

 

 

1. Im a little unhappy about the inside edge of the CG. While it is drastically over exaggerated in my photo, the inner edge of the CG is not as sharp as the gen. The outer edge is nice and crisp but the inner edge seems to be a bit softer/rounder as seen in the photo.

 

2. CG lever from this angle is not as flush with the CG as the gen counterpart. It is slightly raised. On the wrist you can not see this and once more the enlarged photo exaggerates the situation quite a bit. In real life it looks pretty darn close. Shape of the lever is pretty darn good as well. Miniscule differences exist of course but none the less - its close enough for my taste.

 

3. Something that hasn't been discussed that i notices is the thickness of the rotor on the rep p.9000 movement. As you see in the picture, the gen is thinner.

 

4. Officine Panerai and Logo are slightly thinner and much crisper on the gen. You will be able to see this more on my next photo, but you can still see it here as well.

 

Overall - lets just all agree that the rep p.9000 (This is the v1 - so A7750) is close but no cigar. We know the differences. Balance wheel at 11, etc. But the real in-house movement from panerai is a thing of beauty. I doubt we will ever get such detailed craftsmanship out of reps. Inscriptions and finishes are so nice and neat on the gen. On the rep they are nice from about 3 feet away, but throw a macro lens on your camera and you may not feel the same way about your beautiful rep movement. Just my humble opinion. This goes the same of the p.9000 that will use the St2555 as a base movement. It will still use decorated places and the decorations will not be as crisp and clean as gen. Please don't get me wrong, up until recently - we all had to look at these ugly unfinished 7750 movements and now we have these bridges that make the watch look significantly better, but this post was not intended to describe how beautiful the watch is, but rather to compare it to the genuine.

 

 

 

Comparison+2.jpg

 

 

1. See the detailed teeth of the KW Crown. Looks Fantastic. Also seen here is the CG lever mechanism which looks darn close to me. I like it.

 

2. Once more we can see the added detail on the Gen p.9000 rotor. The inner circle has fine detail which is just lacking on our reps. Keep in mind folks that this is nit picking and from more than 2 feet away this wont make a difference what so ever. Regardless, trying to be as thorough as possible so you know where this rep stands in comparison.

 

3. Another view of the CG Lever Shape - once again, looks pretty good to me.

 

4. Take a look at the engravings here - its nice, but at macro level, its not as neat. See how clean and sharp the lines are on each engraving that's on the gen. The reps just do not have this level of production (Yet - we hope)

 

This image also gives us a nice and detailed view of the Case Back. Not sure if it is sapphire, but crystal looks great. Likewise the engravings on the caseback looks darn close to me. Once more we can say that its just not as sharp as gen in some respects but close enough for a fraction of the cost.

 

 

 

Comparison+4.jpg

 

 

Here is a wrist shot comparison. No lines to direct your attention to on this one. But to be honest, i can't point out many differences between the two of these. Maybe some of you would be able to, but not me. Some may say that the datewheel on the rep is slightly recessed. Well on the gen it seems to be slightly recessed as well from all of the pictures that I have seen.

 

 

CONCLUSION:

 

Case: 10/10 - I can't find any flaws compared to gen

Bezel: 10/10 - I can't find any flaws compared to gen

Crown Guard: 9/10 - Just that inside edge seems to be a little soft for my liking, gen seems more crisp

CG Lever: 8/10 - Miniscule variances in shape and tightness when closing make me give this an 8

Crown: 10/10 - Looks nice and crisp

Crystal & AR: 9/10 - AR is not that strong, but same for gen.

Dial / Numerals: 9/10 - I love this dial. To me its stunning, but I give it this score due to spacing possibly being different in proximity to inner bezel.

Caseback: 8/10 - Looks great, but crispness is lacking

Movement: 7/10 - As stated above close but no cigar. If i were to redo this, i would have waited for a V2 with ST2555 so that at least balance wheel would be closer to gen.

Rep Strap: 7/10 - Surprisingly really nice quality. Breaks in nicely. One of the nicest fake croco straps I have ever seen/had

Buckle: 10/10 - Looks spot on to me. Didn't include it in the review as you have all seen it a million times. Standard 22mm Brushed Tang buckle for this one.

Appeal and Beauty: 15/10 LOL - this is quite subjective, but to me this is one of the most beautiful PAMs Ever. Looks amazing and definitely an attention grabber

 

Overall Verdict: 9/10 Go ahead and buy this watch with confidence. A Gen PAM359 will cost you $7,000 - $8,000. This rep is almost 1/25th the cost of the gen.

 

Now on to some artistic photos for a pictorial review:

 

 

My+Collection-1.jpg

 

 

My+Collection-2.jpg

 

 

My+Collection-3.jpg

 

 

My+Collection-7.jpg

 

 

My+Collection-8.jpg

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houndoggie

great pictures!

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Kleen™

Uuuuh, the lume on that dirty dial just makes it pop...

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Del

Great review! :clap:

 

Lots of detail here with some great pics too - must have taken a lot of time to produce this review. Very well done! :thumbsup2:

 

I also love the 359. :wub:

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onzenuub

That is a great review.

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Pihlippe

Great review! Might be my next pam.... :)

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Ruski91

Thanks guys! It did take quite a bit of time. But the rwg/rwi fora have helped me out so much in terms of learning about watches that i just wanted to return the favor for other members.

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ALE7575

This is a very good, well explained and nicely organized review

Many people will be introduced in this fantastic watch for this review

Congrats and keep the good job

 

ALE

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vinylspin

Thanks for the great review and very nice pictures, this could be next on my shopping list.

Edited by vinylspin

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P4GTR

Beautiful pics, great review... This is quality contribution.

 

That is one beautiful watch you have, too.

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PepitoGrillo

That's what I call a proper review.

Good work!

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myaz

I appreciate the effort that went into this review. Lining up side by side is a lot of extra work but makes the review more useful. Photography is superb.

I hope you will post more reviews of this caliber....and you know, in spite of a few minor flaws visible with a macro lens, and compared to your average Canal St. rep, that one is close enough for a cigar :clap::maty:

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Vbmrk

I'm currently in the process of building a franken 359 (gen dial and hands). During my research of the kw and zf 359, I came to realize that the REG TM. location on kw cg was slightly off as compared to gen. On this matter, zf was more accurate. Also, having had the kw v1 359 for a while, the dial went from black to tobacco brown very quickly. Now this could have been just the one I had, so it may mean nothing. However I have a buddy who has a gen 359 for nearly a year now and his dial is still pretty black (slightly looks tobacco brown at certain angles in certain light).

The rep lume (kw or zf) is no match for the gen. In my experience this holds true for any Pam with the dirty dial numeral colors, however I don't consider this a deal breaker. It is a rep after all. The kw clone p9000 movement is much better executed then the zf however. Also, kw qc is much more consistent then zf which goes a long way.

 

While I'm a huge fan of kw watches, for my franken I went with the zf as there's no real way to mod the location of the REG TM. printing on the cg.

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HeavyKrush

Great contribution Russ!

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FukuokaTen

Thanks for this comprehensive review of 359KW. Kudos.

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Not That Rich

Amazing pictures and review

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TheSav

Impressive review. Thanks for the effort.

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knoffie

Please pardon my ignorance but I am still learning. Where and from whom do I buy one? And cost? It look samazing

Thanks

 

Knoffie

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Ruski91

I'm currently in the process of building a franken 359 (gen dial and hands). During my research of the kw and zf 359, I came to realize that the REG TM. location on kw cg was slightly off as compared to gen. On this matter, zf was more accurate. Also, having had the kw v1 359 for a while, the dial went from black to tobacco brown very quickly. Now this could have been just the one I had, so it may mean nothing. However I have a buddy who has a gen 359 for nearly a year now and his dial is still pretty black (slightly looks tobacco brown at certain angles in certain light).

The rep lume (kw or zf) is no match for the gen. In my experience this holds true for any Pam with the dirty dial numeral colors, however I don't consider this a deal breaker. It is a rep after all. The kw clone p9000 movement is much better executed then the zf however. Also, kw qc is much more consistent then zf which goes a long way.

 

While I'm a huge fan of kw watches, for my franken I went with the zf as there's no real way to mod the location of the REG TM. printing on the cg.

 

This is really interesting input. I did not see any differences when comparing the CGs but i will take a look again. I wish i had a gen 359 in my hands so i go do REAL side by side comparison shots.

 

I went with the KW mostly because of the movement decorations and the reviews which i read initially.

 

In regards to lume - the KW glows like a torch when charged - but it does die out very quickly. I compared this to my brother in laws gen 090 and when charged the 359 is just as bright. But the 090 holds the charge much longer. I am not a big proprietor in modding my watches but if anything, perhaps reluming would be a solution to this issue. But to be honest, i have been pretty happy with the lume thus far.

 

I have to say that for me the 2 most 'disappointing' aspects to this watch are really the soft inside edge of the CG and the neatness/sharpness of the decoration on the movement and case back. I say that with a big grain of salt because i am really happy with this watch and we really do not have the right to complain when we are buying a replica item that is a fraction of the cost, yet so damn close to gen.

 

But since you are doing a franken project - i think it would be awesome if you could take a few side by side shots of the dials and hands. I dont think we can add them to this review since mine is KW and yours is ZF but none the less im sure it would be incredibly helpful to see the comparison.

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Ruski91

Please pardon my ignorance but I am still learning. Where and from whom do I buy one? And cost? It look samazing

Thanks

 

Knoffie

 

All of the trusted dealers here should be able to get this for you. Just ask for it by name. As for price - each dealer will have a different price, but ballpark between $348 - $388 (+ Shipping) depending on which TD you go for. Personally i got this one from Ryan at InTime as he is my go-to TD. Hope this helps

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ex660

great review there and the KW's 359 is on my list already and just pending to make order in the next few days.

however, after looking thru the photos in the review, the numerals for rep vs the gen is really very obvious a tell tale, especially for the 6 and 9's and size for 1,2,7,8 is different btw the rep and gen as well..

 

the numerals is always something that is easier to expose a rep if the accuracy is not thr...

with that... shalll reconsider again for this pam :(

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Ruski91

great review there and the KW's 359 is on my list already and just pending to make order in the next few days.

however, after looking thru the photos in the review, the numerals for rep vs the gen is really very obvious a tell tale, especially for the 6 and 9's and size for 1,2,7,8 is different btw the rep and gen as well..

 

the numerals is always something that is easier to expose a rep if the accuracy is not thr...

with that... shalll reconsider again for this pam :(

 

 

Really? I would have to disagree with you on this. I think they actually did a great job on the numerals. Especially 12, 9 , 6. Perhaps the smaller numbers are a tad bit thicker on the rep but take a look at the wrist shot comparison. Are you seriously saying that this 'jumps' out at you as a glaring difference. I dont think so - just my opinion but thats what the review is for - so that everyone can decide for themselves.

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WimadS

Very nice and extensive review! Nice watch too :)

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Sam Circus

Great review and photos ,this will be future watch!

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Vbmrk

great review there and the KW's 359 is on my list already and just pending to make order in the next few days.

however, after looking thru the photos in the review, the numerals for rep vs the gen is really very obvious a tell tale, especially for the 6 and 9's and size for 1,2,7,8 is different btw the rep and gen as well..

 

the numerals is always something that is easier to expose a rep if the accuracy is not thr...

with that... shalll reconsider again for this pam :(

 

 

Really? I would have to disagree with you on this. I think they actually did a great job on the numerals. Especially 12, 9 , 6. Perhaps the smaller numbers are a tad bit thicker on the rep but take a look at the wrist shot comparison. Are you seriously saying that this 'jumps' out at you as a glaring difference. I dont think so - just my opinion but thats what the review is for - so that everyone can decide for themselves.

 

I'm not sure what pictures you're comparing, but I can tell you the dial cutouts are quite accurate on the rep. I had a modder look at the gen and rep dial side by side and he was very impressed with how accurate kw got their dial.

can you show some pictures you're looking at showing this difference?

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