Blancpain

DrStrong
[Rolex Moderator]
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Some remarks about the early Fifty Fathoms

I get more and more e-mails from collectors asking me questions about the early FF's in general, or questions about specific watches.

Apparently, some Rolex collectors are interested in Blancpain now and try to apply the "Rolex rules" to the world of 1950's FF's.

"What is the mk1 dial, the mk2 bezel, hown can I date my watch, are these hands correct for this dial", etc...

You people are in trouble, because from my 15 years experience of collecting these watches: 

- Blancpain does not have records anymore, so it is impossible to date a particular watch precisely. Besides, the number on the back has a different number of digits depending on the model and "customer" (Aqualung, LIP, Scubapro, etc...)... which does not make things easy

- these watches were produced in very low number - almost "by hand" - at the request of the buyer. It is not an "industrial" production like Rolex, so the dials, hands , bezels variations do not follow the same chronological logic as for other brands. I suspect the guys used different parts for every batch they made, just to drive the future collectors crazy ;-)

- most of these watches  - especially the early military ones -  were really abused of and not really waterproof. They had lots of parts replaced at service, so it is almost impossible to tell what is original or not on a particular watch.

The standardization of the FF's production arrived later in the 1960's - with the No Radiation variation - but the "Cousteau size" watches are a mess.

In other words, only a collector's experience, trained eyes and good personnal database can help.

Like in the good old days, before everyone could become an expert after 15 minutes on Google....LOL !!

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