Recently received as a gift from a fellow collector. He knows that Bulova is my special interest. I can not seem to find a photo of a dial such as this, except on the Hamilton version. Note: 24 Hour indice. Note: Recessed Sub dial. It Looks like a cross between the "Night Warden" and a Military ORD... Have you folks seen another like this? I'd appreciate any input...
Alan
Hello again Alan, this is a very nice watch. There are a couple Bulova watches that are very hard to properly identify. The Accutron Spaceview and all Military watches are so popular that they are quite often 'put together' (assembled from components from several watches or watch parts). The people that create those watches don't do it so much as to deceive as they do it to fill demand, they generally don't present them as authentic. If this watch had been handed down from a father or grandfather, it's provenance would be unbroken and known. In the case of Spaceview watches, even having purchased them from a Bulova dealer doesn't verify authenticity as dealer quite often made them up to satisfy demand.
We do not have WW II issued watches with this dial but we do see this dial on Viet Nam era watches. That doesn't mean it isn't authentic, it just means we haven't seen it before. My guess is that it's either a replacement or a refinish to non original spec.
I think would classify this watch as "Military Issue".
In reply to Hello again Alan, this is a by Geoff Baker
Geoff
Thank you for the thoughtful answer. I will re-explore paying special attention to the Vietnam era dials.
Cheers, Alan
I agree with Military Issue ID
In reply to I agree with Military Issue by jabs
Guys,
One can find this exact dial face complete with recessed subsecond hand, but branded as Hamilton.
Companies who had military contracts w/ the government were probably given specs for dials, and they were very similar across companies, with one of the differences being company name on dial.
I'm good with the "military issue" ID for now, but I'm being lazy (and too busy) to research much further now.
Maybe one of our Military buffs will chime in on the possible ID.
Thanks and let's hope a military version expert chimes in
We could add to this a variant or 'ORD DEPT', which we now know to be a category of watch that this watch falls into.
In reply to We could add to this a… by mybulova_admin
Admin,
I mentioned in another thread that at one time the site did have an 'ORD DEPT' subcategory for the Military issued stuff, where it went is anyones' guess.
However the correct ID for these 15J wristwatches with the sub-seconds dial is the '10AK'.
fwiw
- refer to page 67 of TM9-1575 War Dept technical manual in the database.
'Model 10AK'