Seamaster Professional 1000m ST166.093 from 1971/2!

This post is a long time coming!!!

I purchased this watch in early 2014, but it took ELEVEN months (and FOUR watch makers no less!) to pry the watch open for a complete servicing.

I had always wanted a proper, rugged vintage dive watch, but didn't appreciate the clunky look of the king of all vintage dive watches, the Ploprof 600m, so I'd been eyeing it's cousin, the Seamaster Professional 1000m 'Grand' with the left sided 'destro' crown, for some time.

These SMP1000s are exceedingly rare - this post suggests that only 150 pieces were originally made. Fifty were ordered by Prince Rainier III of Monaco (he apparently gave the very first one made personally to Jacque Cousteau!), with Omega manufacturing another 100 pieces for public sale.

Omega must have made a larger batch of these cases, cos in recent years, someone must have found a stash of these NOS cases, resulting in a trickle of pristinely NOS SMP1000s making their way to Ebay and various other online sites, thus diluting the value of the rare originals.

So this one's provenance is dicey - it comes from a known seller of these NOS, presumably reassembled, 166.093s, but this one was unusual in that it had an a worn early variant bezel (with the numbers going very close the the edge of the bezel), worn early variant dial (with a second, inner circle of 5 minute markers - absent in the later dial variant) in fairly good condition, in a newer case with the sunburst finish (rather than the original radial brushed finish) - see this discussion of early vs. new 166.093s.

The movement is the earlier cal.1002, and the serial number 3311xxx suggest a production date of 1971.

This tallies with the Vintage Omega Database and this post by Steve Waddington - the 166.093 seems to be first released in 1971/2 with the cal.1002 movement, and only in 1973 did it feature the newer cal.1012 movement.

So what I have is a 166.093 with the earlier cal.1002 movement, worn earlier dial, worn bezel, with possibly new hands and case.

If someone was reassembling this watch from parts, surely it'd make more sense to fit in the newer cal.1012 movement and a new dial and bezel, which leads me to cautiously suspect that I may have ownership of one of the original SMP1000m 166.093s, which somewhere along the way received a replacement case and hands, perhaps as part of a service, but even then, could the dial on mine possibly be in such good condition after so many years?
See this wonderful Nov 2014 review of an original SMP1000m and note how badly the dial has corroded over time - in contrast, mine is pristine! =(
I want the dial on mine to be in a poorer condition, dammit!!!

 

In any case (pun intended), it doesn't really matter - original or reassembled, this one's mine now and it ain't goin' nowhere!

In the flesh, it is a stunning watch - heavy, rugged and manly. I didn't like the Isofrane strap that came with it, nor the period correct mesh bracelet, so I fitted on it a waterproof leather strap - sacrilegious you may say, but hey, I'm never going to go diving with it!

Having said that, it certainly looks professional enough to go down to 1000m underwater (400m more than the Ploprof 600, and five times deeper than the Submariner, if I may casually add!), yet looks far less clunky than the Ploprof, and it sure as hell is a shitload less common than the dime-a-dozen Submariner! =P

*Update* I've since swopped out the waterproof leather strap for a chunky generic brushed SS bracelet that completes the hefty, macho tool watch 'look' better!

**Update #2** Although I liked the chunky generic bracelet quite a bit, it always bugged me that it was not an original Omega bracelet. So since I very much liked the Omega 1159 bracelet as seen in the flightmaster and Speedmaster MkIII, I thought...why not one of these on the Grand?
So after a long search, I finally found an over-polished one.
Does it work on the SMP1000m?
Well....it's still not perfect, but it does give it a slightly sporty edge!
Have a look at these 'wet' pics and decide for yourself!