Officine Panerai

Hahaha!!! Made you look!!

Anyway, I just wanted to share a little story with you all.

Back in 2001, while researching the El Primero movement on the net, I came across the  brand called Panerai.  What grabbed me was amazing bracelet design and the size of the watch.  I just had to get one. I eventually purchased my first Panerai, the 124 power reserve.  It is and continues to be my first love Panerai.  It is one of my most accurate time pieces and I use the power reserve to guage the reserve on the rest of my collection.  It was also my daily beater and boy, was it used and abused.  It went into the ocean, the pool, the garage and the gym.  I dropped it, smashed it and after a big night on the drink, bounced it off walls as I tried to make my way to the nearest cab stand.

Anyway, about 5 weeks ago, I took it to the HK boutique and mentioned that I needed a service.  The winding was rather stiff and it probably needed a good lube job.  I also mentioned that if possible, could they clean it up a bit. Fast forward 5 weeks and I got it back.  My wife was with me when I picked it up. When she saw Patricia, the HK boutique manager, return the watch to me, she said "Is this a new watch?  You promised you weren't going to buy another new watch!"  Took a while to convince her it wasn't a new watch.  The operative word being "NEW"!!! 

The Panerai service centre did an AMAZING job.  My 124 looked brand spanking new. 

Every scratch on the two part bracelet were gone.  This meant that the service centre took apart the stainless steel and titanium parts of the bracelet and completely repolished them INDIVIDUALLY!!! I had a few links that had deep dings, I am sure these were replaced.

The entire titanium case was repolished.  In particular, all the dings and scratches around the screw holes at the lugs (from slipping screwdrivers during rushed strap change jobs) were GONE!!! 

A new bazel replaced the one that was banged up. 

Even the scratches on the case back were polished out (either that or they replaced a new case back with the correct millesimation).

If I knew they were going to do such a stand out job, I would have taken shots of my beater.  In fact, I am a little upset since I NO LONGER HAVE A BEATER!  I am actually looking forward to putting a few dings back into the 124 just to add some character.  Believe it or not, I actually miss the old 124.

Anyway, here are some scans of my brand new beater, which Panerai only made in one series of 500 pieces. 

My sincere thanks to the wonderful team at the HK boutique and the folks who worked on my 124. 

Gaz

 

 

 

This message has been edited by Gaz on 2008-09-07 05:36:18

No message body

They don't make new ones anymore, I'm with you're wife on this one,,,,

 

 

Asi

It does look like the real thing... I think... No expert myself but I think it definitely looks all right, you know...

Congratulations. Great looking watch.
This message has been edited by BCL on 2008-09-07 08:12:42

I also can attest to the fact that Panerai sure repolishes and rebrushes each individual link in the metal bracelet from my own personal experience when I sent in my ex-PAM52 chrono w/ bracelet in for service.  The bracelet had tons of scratches before; and when I got it back from service, it looked absolutely brand new.  Must take forever to unscrew and refinish each link and then assemble all pieces back together.

Thanks for the story!

Cheers,
Anthony

Love to read it. Thanks for sharing. ;0)

certainly not a fake

hope all is well Gaz