Watch Wednesday (8/18/10)

Hey look, it's a watch on Wednesday! How did that happen? Earlier today I was thinking about what to post, and I remembered that I should be doing a watch post this evening, and here we are.

I picked this up on eBay a few weeks ago for $25. It's basically a copy of the modern Rolex Explorer I*, except for the fact that it says "Alpha" on the dial. This is a fuzzy but presumably legal way to avoid being accused of selling knockoffs, sued for copyright infringement, or other such unpleasantness. (Yet somehow they are still allowed to call it an Explorer--go figure.)

Alpha is based in Hong Kong (I think) and they make lots of other versions of more famous watches, especially Rolex models. If you wanted to get one of these new, it would cost about $56 (shipping is included), which is cheaper than a fake Explorer online. If you just like how the watch looks and don't care what it says on the dial, then that's probably the way to go.

For an inexpensive, um, homage, it's not a bad watch at all. It has an automatic movement with a screw-down crown, though I would not assume that means this watch is water-resistant. All the markers and numerals and hands glow in the dark, which is always handy. The dial is a very nice shade of blue, and it's sort of metallic and light-reflective, as you can see. I understand that Alpha doesn't make this color dial anymore. When I saw it on eBay I thought it was black, but it was just a poorly lit photo and the listing didn't specify, so I got a bit of a pleasant surprise when it arrived.

You may notice that this watch has a metal bracelet, which is very unusual for me. I was going to just buy the watch from the Alpha site and get a leather strap for it, but I saw this one and I decided to wait until the end of the auction and see if I could win it. I had to remove a couple of links from the bracelet, but it was super easy because the links have little screws holding them in place, about the size of eyeglass screws. Then it was just a little too tight, so I put one link back in, but then I moved the position of where the end of the bracelet connects to the clasp, and... now it's a little on the loose side. See, this is why I don't like metal bracelets. I think I'll just get a strap for it like I always do.

*Update: I got the new issue of GQ the other day, and on page 261 there are three watches. One of them is a Rolex, and it looks very much like this watch, with what appears to be the same color dial, except it's not an Explorer but an Air-King. I wasn't aware that the Air-King was available with an Arabic numeral dial (I've only ever seen them with rectangular markers), but I'm pretty certain that the Explorer had this style of dial first.