Question; Why would the swiss make such an inferior watch when we know some of the best watches were of swiss origin? I look at swiss makers Patek , Vacheron, Rolex, and the list goes on. Its difficult for me to comprehend these companies would lower their standards and produce "junk". Or were there some lesser known swiss makers flooding the market.

I look at examples of these "Fakes" and to me they look a little better than the american dollar watch. Ive never held one of these swiss watches, all my exposure has been pictures here at 185. Im looking forward to hearing your thoughts and comments.

The actual story of Swiss fakes could be a book length one, but in short, when some Lower end US sellers with Swiss connections started seeing what the US makers were accomplishing, they "thought" they could get it copied cheaper in Swiss sweatshops. They were wrong! Even the Dollar Watches ran longer.

Here is an interesting example I found. It doesn't look all that bad.

Steve

Swiss fake.

Steve, three things;
First, we really learned how to make dials from the Swiss, and this is the ONLY thing we couldn't improve significantly for our machine-made watches, hence metal dials on so many later US-made models, "climaxed" by the plastic purgatory dials of the Late 40's, early 50's.

Second, The cases the SWisser's were in were often the same as American-cased watches, and that was good because they were less worn out as after the movement broke, the watch went in the dresser drawer, leaving us some pretty nice condition "used" cases.

Third; I would bet 2-1 that if you started taking that watch apart, you would find the back "plate" is a dummy, "jewels" and all, under which the "real thing" presides.

Hi Dave, I had the same opinion as you. Let me expand a bit here, do you think the swiss makers I mentioned tried to stop the inferior production of these watches,or were they too busy to care.2)Did the introduction of these watches hurt the reputation of the high end swiss watch companies during this time? 3)Did these watches find a sizable market and how well were they accepted as a option to the American watches made at the time.4) How long were they available in the states, when were they first available and when did the importation stop.

Mike,

To paralell Swiss watches, the same could be said about the Japanese on rush of electronics. Everyone waould laugh and say yeah right, Made in Japan. Now look at the quality of things coming out of that country. You can't go to an appliance store looking at top of the line electronics with out it being from a Japanese manufacturer. Now the joke is Made in China and at the rate we are giving our technologies to them, they will one day be giving the Japanese a run for their money all at the expense of us Americans. The Swiss came full circle as did the Japanese and one day China as well. Got to put a stop to the unfair trade deficit.

Steve