View single post by Graham
 Posted: Wed Dec 1st, 2010 06:02 am
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Graham



Joined: Sun Sep 21st, 2008
Location: Cape Town, South Africa
Posts: 2724
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 When I was a student in law school in the early eighties, I had to be quite inventive to make some money.  My parents couldn't fund my many hobbies and interests, amongst which was scuba diving.  I had a friend with a jewellery store, and he sold various brands of watches.  I lusted after a diving watch, but had to make do with my only watch at the time, an Orient quartz gold plated oyster styled dress watch.  At the time my friend had these Royce diving watches in stock.  I wanted one really badly, but couldn't afford one.  However, I ended up selling 3 or 4 of them to fellow divers who were well heeled at the time.  Of course there was some commission in for me, but sadly not enough to ever get my own Royce.  They sold out soon.
Anyway, last week I cleared out some junk from a closet, and found a B&W pic I had taken of one these divers all those years ago. It claims to be "professional marine" on the dial.  I remeber the inner bezel as being orange, with a black dial and good tritium on the hands and markers.  The hooded lugs were quite unusual, curving sharply.  It came with a classic rubber strap.  I can't remeber the WR rating, but it might have been 100m only.  It was an auto with the locking crown at 12. Very uncool in the heyday of quartz!

Has anyone here ever laid eyes on such a piece?  I did find various Royce watches on the internet, but nothing like this.  The style appeals to me now even more than all those years ago!  It might even be a good project for one of our own 3T boutiques!

Any feedback is welcome.  I remember the watch as "huge", but it was probably around 42mm. Big for those days.

Oh, and by the way, that Orient? I still have it and use it to set all my autos to!subtlelaugh.gif

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Last edited on Wed Dec 1st, 2010 06:05 am by Graham