Old Watch / Jam Lama: 001 / Omega Constellation 168.0044

prelude : One question that I am usually asked is how many watches do I have? Well that's a really tough question as I frankly don't have any clue? I try to keep a record on an excel sheet and that already has more than 300 listed, my guess is the actual number is probably closer to 400! Anyway I thought it would be fun to start listing down some watches as I wear them and share some details of them. They will not be in any particular order and some may have some movement pictures if I am servicing them at the time.

So let's start off with ...

# 001 / Omega Constellation 168.0044 (?)

Movement : 1001 (?)

Year : 1970 (?)

Condition : Dial 7/10

: Case 4/10

: Movement 6/10 (?)

Bracelet : Original Omega. My wrist diameter is 17cms (6 3/4inches) and there's still one hole to go.

Crown :Original Omega

Crystal : Original Omega

Serial no. : Case (?)

: Movement (?)

Well this Connie is a bit of a sad story. I bought it cheap knowing it had some issues..

Issue 1. Caseback is held on by 4 screws which push the caseback onto the gasket as the screws are tightened. Problem with this (and any other watch case which uses small screws on the back of the watch) is that sweat gets in and the screw gets jammed. On this watch there is traces of araldite or similar around the edges, I suspect when someone needed to get in, they could not get the screws to unscrew so they just forced the back off and once they were done they just glued the caseback back on. Sad.

Issue 2. The watch should hack, currently it does not.

Issue 3. The quickset for the date does not work. I usually find the parts missing on thiese watches as some components break and are quite hard to source locally.

Issue 4. The seconds hand has play and judders. This can be solved by adjusting the seconds pinion spring.. hopefully it's still there!

I will eventually get around to opening it up and see if I can solve some of the issues above but as it is now it performs well, running around +13 to 15 seconds a day, so I'll leave it as it is for now.

Since I haven't got round to opening the caseback, the case reference quoted (168.0044) is based on similar models I've seen on the internet... there may be some variation and I'll only be sure when I get around to getting the back off! Similarly I believe it has a 1001 movement as that seems to be what this reference is supposed to have. I will only know if it still has its original movement when I open it up, there were a lot of versions of the Omega 10xx series and most of them will fit in this case. Ranfft's excellent reference page has details of the various versions of this movement.

The band/bracelet is an original Omega and luckily fits me with one hole to spare! There are some pictures on the web of these models with leather straps and to be honest this case does not really go well with straps. The dial is not pristine but at least all the minute hash marks are present, in the Constellation script the 's' is missing its upper portion and there seems to be a blob of glue at the base of the 7 o'clock marker.

Some other pictures.

Full frontal shot