While I certainly do not have the cash and personally do not have the desire to own a Rolex watch, I can appreciate them as much as I can appreciate any really cool car that is way out of my price range. There’s something about big dollar watches that I respect mainly because they represent a complete refusal to cheapen a brand, take shortcuts in materials or engineering, and they all have pretty interesting heritages as well. They are a total “want” item (for the most part) and they are often legacy items that gets passed through families and among people who have known each other for a long time. They are also among the earlier examples of precision machine work to tolerances and sizes that are nearly impossible to comprehend out of moving parts. When you see some of the gears and pieces that come out of this watch your eyes will probably bug out like mine did.
Again, I am not here trying to swing from the brass plated shorts of Rolex. I see this video as something that gearheads would dig because of all the pieces, parts, and other stuff that the guy manages to take out of this old school machine. Rolex started making the Submariner watch in 1953 and they are certified to be watertight to 300M below the surface of the water. You’ll notice that there’s a dearth of seals and other gaskets in this baby because the whole thing is so precisely fit together. Outside of the shiny metal parts, there is the skill and dexterity of the guy working on the watch. His tiny screw drivers and tweezers are like little extensions of his hands. He’s undoubtedly done this thousands of times and the film maybe sped up a little (it is turbocharged during reassembly) but the guy still has this act down pat!
We often look at huge machines that make bellowing noises, shape the face of the Earth, or rumble the very bedrock below our feet. This one does none of those thing but to me it is as amazing as those metal mastodons we talk about so often.
we should all strive for that level of detail