Legitimate thread bump situation…
At the end of October, I was browsing Ebay just to see what I saw and happened upon
this. (<--- not a link to anything I am selling, but to the actual one I bought)
Perfunctory Google search told me that it was your standard Chinese Mechanical mov’t watch that seems to be flooding Ebay these days, but peoples descriptions led me to think “hell, $38.99 isn’t a lot to cry about,” and went ahead for the Buy it Now option. One issue I had was that despite shipping from Northern California, the damned thing took over a week to arrive. That was more on the seller, not the item itself, though.
Anyway, when I opened it, I was expecting that I would have to manually wind the watch based upon the details of the sale, but when I moved it to take it out of the box, it started up, which suggests to me that the watch is self-winding. To test this theory, I did not wind it the night I got it, instead I let it die until the morning and THEN wound it after being very careful not to awaken it… I wore it all day Friday and Saturday, but not to bed and it was still up with no time gained or lost even to right now, and maintained the winding.
About the watch itself; a Breitling-style (Navitimer, I think) watch with an allegedly Stainless Steel band. I say “allegedly” because I own enough watches with actual stainless bands that don’t feel this cheap. I KNOW I will break this band in a month or less if I keep it.
Luckily, however, that is my only gripe with the actual product, and it can be addressed and fixed for less than 30 bucks. It will be replaced within a week or two.
In all, this watch is not as nice as, say… one of the ones that 32 Degrees makes, but it doesn’t pretend to be either, and the 32 Degrees ones are beginning to price themselves WAY more than I paid for the one I bought January last year (and still wear 6 days a week without issue). If presented with the opportunity to get it again, I would say “I might,” but that is pending the outcome of two more watches I ordered from Deal Extreme the night after I ordered this one. Those have not yet arrived, so the jury is out on them and I will make a decision when they do.
For now, though, I need to put a new band on this one.