Posted by There’s a bit of a summer lull going on in the 1040 universe it seems. Relatively few new examples have hit the market, so my serial number observations have slowed recently. I’m overdue for an update, so hopefully I’ll get to that in the coming weeks.
On top of the lack of new serial number data, there haven’t been many interesting 1040s for sale lately – much of what is on the market now has been on the market for months. There was one minor oddity that caused me to raise an eyebrow recently, and that is a Speedmaster 125 for sale with a service bridge. The watch was from the German seller Zeitauktion.com GmbH, although I saw the listing on both Chrono24 and eBay. The watch has already sold.
This is the first service bridge I’ve seen with the service “R” serial number (not sure what they call it) stamped on the bridge of a cal. 1041. Cal. 1041 movements had the original, full serials stamped on the bridge, so this isn’t necessarily surprising, just a first for me.
As I mention in my Collector’s Guide for movements, service rotors are not uncommon and they are easy to spot. The rotor is normally where the “R Serial” is stamped. This one also has a service rotor which doesn’t include the R serial.
I’m not sure what it says about the history of this movement. It certainly looks clean, but at least the rotor and chronograph bridge have been replaced at some point. Were they replaced at the same time, different times or is this a complete service movement? Who knows.
I’ve added the photo to the movements guide as well.