Breitling Navitimer A23322 franken project

[Ferax 801]

I have decided to franken a BP Navitimer A23322. Here is the base watch that I will use:

Was thinking about buying a gen panda dial, but it is impossible to get one so I will stick with the rep one. Maybe one day I will be lucky and then will change for the genuine one. I was also thinking about buying an old dial and have it renovated - a guy in my country could do it for about 150 euro. Example:


I already bought a Hamilton 7753 movement and gen hands:

The crystal will be replaced with the prof 2xAR crystal.

The rep strap will be replaced with genuine Breitling novo nappa strap + rep buckle.

The biggest problem for me is to find a date wheel for the 7753 movement. I have been searching it for about 2 months, no luck so far. If I will not be able to find one I might use the trick that one of the RWI members showed me:
"Taking out the middle gears, getting it smooth, making it thin, then gluing it to the other disk."

It will take some time to get this project done, but I hope it will be really nice :) 

[APjumbo 3,031]

I was going to start my own thread on my build but for the sake of keeping this info in one place maybe Ferax won't mind me adding on.

 

I had read this thread a while ago and wanted to do the same build.

Using a BP A23322 as a base, found a gen dial on RWI, which came from germany ebay I think. The subdials are a nice white instead of the creamy pink tone.

The gold wings on the gen dial are applied thicker/higher and look better. The gold wings on the rep in comparison look like flat printing.

 

I got a Hamilton 7753 from energo on RWI as well. It was a toss up if I should even use it as the a7750 was working well and has a quick date set.

The 7753 does not have a quick date set function, and the A23322 does not have a button on the side of the case like a panerai does for pushing the 7753 quick set date button at 10:00.

So looks like this will have to live on a winder, or turn the crown a zillion times to set the date.

 

The hardest thing to source on this watch is the Gen datewheel made for a 7753. Hence the above posts on shaving down the rep datewheel and gluing onto the gen 7753 datewheel. I had planned to do this until I pulled the watch apart and realized that the 7753 datewheel I had lined up fairly well with the gen dial.

So, the date font is off, and some dates (1-9) are positioned the wrong way, but, I knew I would fuck up my first attempt at shaving down the rep datewheel. I have a second BP rep but didn't want to butcher two reps just to make one watch.

So I decided to stick to using the 7753 and the stock gen 7753 datewheel. This made the whole build super easy.

 

Of course it wouldn't be a proper APjumbo build if I didn't fuck the keyless at least once so I didn't waste any time and got that out of the way.

Luckily it is the easiest keyless in the world to reset. Pull 4 blue screws, pull off the top plate (dial side), remove a screw holding a tab thing  down, move a twisty plate thingy, re install, voila!

Dial pics, it is hard to show how the rep dial has a pinkish tone on the subdials, but if you have the rep in hand you will see it right away. The gen dial is more silver white/tuxedo

Gen on right or bottom ( the one with the mucked up indices)

 

Date font differences, rep (proper font) is more fancy. (rep on left 7753 on right)

 

Rep dial on 7753 with 7753 datewheel

 

Gen dial on 7753 with 7753 datewheel

 

 

 

[APjumbo 3,031]

Measured the stem to cut it to length. I wanted to test fit before I installed the hands,in case I fucked the keyless again, didn't want to install all these hands twice.

 

So it turns out the 7753 stem is fat and the stem from the rep 7750 is skinny.

The rep crown will only fit the smaller diameter rep stem, fortunately the rep stem seems to work just fine on the 7753.

 

The rep has a frozen hand on the 3 oclock subdial. Luckily, it is just lightly glued on and is a proper hand and not just for decoration. It fit just fine on the 7753 subdial with the other two rep working hands.

 

I had read about how  chrono centre seconds hands are difficult to deal with. Without a proper movement holder you risk pushing out a jewel or something.

It came off the 7750 just fine, and was easy enough to press onto the 7753 but getting it perfectly aligned is another story, it had to come off and on a few times as when I pressed down it would twist a degree and not be dead straight.

I ended up breaking it loose from its tube, then had to use a pin on the bench to punch it back onto to hand. what a nightmare. I may be looking for a gen chrono seconds hand or extra rep hand after all, it will do for now but isn't quite perfect anymore.

 

Rest of the assembly went great, except it is not keeping good time, running way way too fast (1/2 hour per day)

I tried using a timegrapher app, and while doing so read that it is probably magnitized. I used a magnet app to see that it was in fact magnitized so am presently letting it unwind itself so I can try out my demagnitizer.

It has been a few days and its still running, so am patiently waiting and will update with some pics soon hopefully.

 

so essentially I have now spent a ton of money to still have a Chinese watch, but now with less accurate date font, beat up dial, a date that isn’t easy to change, and a working chrono that I won’t use.

The whiteness of the subdials and pop of the gold wings does look nicer. If I were to do it again I may consider sticking with the 7750 and rep datewheel.

A gen tachy ring thing would be nice, so that the lines are closer to the edge of the bezel.