Rolex Cost is the Name?

[wws 0]

Just joining and looking around. I have been a watch junky and finally wanted to dive to something "high end" like the Rolex, but once I see the prices I cannot yet fathom it. I love the Explorer II, but even used I cannot bring my self to spend this much cash. I travel a bit for work and I remember some colleagues ran over to Pisa to buy the 30 dollar "Rolex" on the street and it only lasted 3 months or so ... so I am hesitant on the reproductions for sure. I would even bring myself to forking over a grand if I had a good quality reproduction I could trust.

 

... are the parts that good or is it just the Rolex name that costs so much on something like a Explorer II? I see stainless and sapphire that other watches have without the name for much less ... but no precious gems or metals to drive the cost so it must be the NAME BRAND ... am I right or is there something else?

 

... one other though ... could you have one built from Rolex used or new or generic parts cheaper? I could even see myself getting into learning to build my own if this were a feasible path ... no idea where to start on this and I could fend off the hunger for this by adding yet another one to my many hobbies that seem to suck money ... if I could buy a good rep. of a Explorer II that I would not dive into a hobby that likely in the end would cost as much as if I just sucked it up and bought a genuine right now ... help!

Edited January 5, 2013 by wws

[Mazz 62]

Welcome aboard mate

 

A good place to start reading are the stickies at the top of the page in the noob link in my signature

 

[jeffw69 0]

Oke.

[Bash64 17]

Welcome to the forum.

 

Many here have had their reps for years with no problems. Having said that, sometimes things go wrong - they do with the gens also, but you have less expensive options to solve the problems with a rep.

 

The quality of the good reps cannot be compared to the Canal Street or Pisa versions, the trusted dealers here offer some very good products. The Rolex experts here could do a better job of answering your questions about building a Rolex, but the process would be expensive and there would be genuine parts that would be very difficult to source. In the end, you would still not have something that Rolex would recognize as genuine. There are some fantastic Rolex reps on the market and some modified reps (check BK's area) that are very close to the genuine article. Even the cheaper Rolex reps will be very difficult to tell from the gen unless you are reasonably familiar or have done lots of research.

[trailboss99 997]

Yes you pay for the name. And the advertising budget, the sponsorship of various events and the salaries of a crap load of middle managers when you buy a gen. Back about eight years or so ago the cost of making a 16610 submariner was around 500 bucks. At that stage they sold for for circa 5500 dollars.

 

If you are happy to spend the bucks buy a tc sub: http://www.rwg.bz/board/index.php?showforum=226 Put a gen insert and pearl on that and no one will know the difference unless they try to set the time (the gen time sets in the same direction you wind unlike an ETA). If you really want to spend a grand, get a gen crystal for it as well.