My favorite wristwatch, a Seiko Donna bought for me in 1978, has been on a journey (previous posts here and here).
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Left to right:
- 2021, before restoration: rusted and not running
- 2022, after restoration: working but with bogus replacement dial
- 2023, after replacing the bogus dial with a correct reproduction dial
The shop I sent it to last year, Total Watch Repair in Encino, California, did a great job getting it running again, especially since it had water damage and rust and hadn’t worked since 2001. But they slipped a non-Seiko aftermarket dial in on me. When I got the watch back I noticed the odd fading around the sub-dial but didn’t catch the missing Seiko identifying text at 7:30 and 4:30, and was unaware it was a bogus dial until a couple of months ago, when a Seiko fanatic spotted it on a photo I posted to a watch collectors’ group on Facebook.
I bought a reproduction dial from a specialist in parts for old Seikos and had it fixed, although that took a while … a friend in Oregon tackled the job initially but was unable to get the hands back on, and in the end I had to take it to a local watch repair shop.
It’s fixed now, with a dial identical to the one it came with. Of course the watch is no longer 100% original, which to Seiko collectors is probably a bad thing, but I’m happy. I do notice a bit of black gasket intruding onto the inner bezel near the one o’clock mark, but I see that in photos of other old Pogues and can live with it … god knows I’ve thrown enough money at this old watch, far more than it’s worth (me excepted … it’s worth it to me, but I’ve hit my limit).
At this point it’s increasingly apparent the watch will outlive me, so it’s journey has only just begun.