W.W.W. Grana. Chasing a myth has ended!!!
I was able to obtain this grail piece last week, after looking for it for over two years!
The last time I saw it was about 1 1/2 years ago, I bid high but apparantly not high enough, another collector and watch expert from Germany outbid me! I wasn´t going to let that happen again...
There are six sets of the "Dirty Dozen" registered...worldwide...mine would be the seventh...Scroll down to the bottom of the following page to see where they are:
http://www.sfu.ca/~mmh/BritishX.htm
The grail watch surfaced on ebay last week and I sent the vendor a mail with my offer which he took. An hour later I got another reply, saying he wants to back down because he won´t sent abroad, due to heavy losses in the past. I gave him my phone nr. and asked for his, which he willingly gave me. We talked on the phone, but to no avail, he refused to send abroad!!! What now I thought, I suggested I´d take the next plane to London, if he could meet me at the airport. He accepted, and I was on the late afternoon flight to London, with a return ticket. We met outside of the airport, money and watch changed hands, I was happy, he was happy, said our goodbyes and I went on to check-in to my flight back to Germany...
Too late, check-in was already closed for the return flight! **** OK, book me on the next flight...no more flights today, said the sweet girl behind the counter, next flight 7:40 tomorrow morning. ****
A night can really drag, time seems to slow down when you´re tired and wanting nothing more than a warm bed! You may have heard of the longest day, well this was my longest night!
Here´s the result of two years of searching to complete the set of 12.
...The dirty dozen...






Regards

Congrats on the find, I was reading on another site where you had detailed your flight to pick up this beauty. I guess you can change the signature at the bottom of your posts to “ No longer looking for the rest of the “Dirty Dozen”

Congrats again, I’m glad you found it and were able to get it before the masses started in.

Jimmy,
I know the Grana is the rarest of the dozen and quite hard to obtain, is there an estimate as to how many were made and how many might be left?. Also, in your collection, what is the watch in the first row on the top left ?. As you know I am fond of the larger cased watches and might have to start looking before the prices on these double

Ray

Ray the watch on the left is a WWW Buren:
As to your question about how many Grana were produced and how many left...well your guess would be as good as mine, I´ve heard of 1500 production total, but I haven´t found a reliable quote as till today.Considering how often/seldom they surface, I`d be surprised if more than 30-50 had survived.

PS... how can I edit the signature on the bottom of my posts, it says...Signature for Postings:
HTML permitted only if you have specific permission

Thanks Debbie, where would we all be without you?

Cant wait to see what "New Ventures” you look for

Werner

Congratulations on your completed collection!

Wayne