Since most watches at that time were sold as movements and the customer picked the case they wanted and sometimes the would have a dial of their liking. So it could well be that the movement and the case are original to each other especially since there are no screw marks, the movement and case are from around the same time frame.
Posts: 1797 | Location: Michigan in the USA | Registered: September 19, 2009
Dave, Now I'm worried, in the Elgin Database it lists that serial number 13633343 as 1908, so what does that do to the likelyhood of it being original ? Thannks, Bill
Posts: 1278 | Location: British Columbia in Canada | Registered: May 19, 2008
I checked my Yellow Elgin book and it shows 1907-1908 and the dial and hands look like what most my early 1900 full plate movement have. The data above is from the Elgin site, below is my grade 348 and the dial and hands look alike to me.
Posts: 1797 | Location: Michigan in the USA | Registered: September 19, 2009
Thanks Dave, Ray and Claude again for all the input. Hopefully it is all original, I was hoping it was, just increases value and collectability. Thanks, Bill
Posts: 1278 | Location: British Columbia in Canada | Registered: May 19, 2008
Nice looking watches Dave. I note that the hands are different on both your watches than either mine or Claudes, in fact they are different on both of yours. Was there a feew different choices to be made at that time ? And I realized that you must have just misread the serial number, in future I'll type it in also. Thanks Bill
Posts: 1278 | Location: British Columbia in Canada | Registered: May 19, 2008
Although there were not a lot of grade 348's made I would venture to guess that Dave's is earlier than mine (11,xxx,xxx mine), Elgin did make whispy spade hands, then the ones like on mine and your 349, and then in the 20's spades hands so large you can see them a block away. The other set of hands on Dave's 349 are spade/poker hands, you also see this combination, maybe not as often as spade/spade but you do see it quite often. Nothing about any watch pictured that would have me question any of them in regards to the dial or hands. I take that back I dod see something on Dave's 349 that is a bit odd, Dave's 349 has a "demi-hunter" hunter hour hand on it, on some hunter cases the front cover had a small crystal on it and usually either numbers engraved or painted on the cover so that you could tell time without opening the cover. If you look at Dave's 349 it has a smaller spade or blip halfway up so if the cover was on it would appear to be a spade hand and the normal looking spade tip. These hands are hard to come by since you don't see a lot of demi-hunter 18s cases.
Posts: 1797 | Location: Michigan in the USA | Registered: September 19, 2009
