An Ebay 105.003

Now I have sympathy for New York dealers, as I imagine life is so intense that things get glossed over. They dont have time to slowly check things over, or they are just plain careless. Here is a Speedmaster offered on Ebay

Look at that! A nice full set, box and papers. Hold on, look at the papers, then look at the case. Something is not adding up. Asymmetrical reference on the papers and a straight lug case!

So papers show a 105.012 with a serial 24533975. This is not an asymmetric case. The dial is non pro so definitely not a 105.012.

These plots by the way are what I refer to as Algae coloured. Close spaced T marks indicate an early dial. But not a 105.012 dial, so has it had all the parts changed? We have to check the movement and case back:

Well its very blurry but we can definitely see the movement is 2282xxxx and not that on the document.

What about the case back? here we see its a 105.003-65

So my conclusion is that it is simply the wrong papers for the watch. There might be papers and the seller made a mistake, (New York rushing?) and the real papers are somewhere. I cannot believe this is a deliberate attempt to deceive as it is so blatant.

Is the watch worth buying?

Current bid, with 9 days to go, is $4500, so I am sure it will be bid to more. At this level its definitely a buy, but for how much longer? The main problem is of course the dial. Its a decayed, pond-life dial. No life, or colour to attract. So we have to remove a large chunk of value for the dial. The case is tired as is the bezel, but correct. We have to ignore the papers, (or ask the vendor if he does have matching ones and made an error in the photos).

There are not many correct Ed Whites on the market for less than $10,000 and any that are will have much to discuss. The question always is, can you live with a watch with issues if it is cheap, and how cheap is cheap?

Thats the fun of collecting these. For me, that dial will always make it a no. Unless we can factor in the cost of a new dial. Last time I saw, a nice Ed White dial was around $4500 if you could find it.