OEM Guard on rep 51

[archibald]

I've been looking for a replacement CG for my doorframe dinged 51 for a while. Anyone who's tried to find a rep part knows how hard they are to come by, so when I saw an OEM guard offered on the bay, I decided to take the chance, since it was cheaper than replacing the watch, which was what I'd have to do otherwise.

This was a pretty interesting experiment which revealed a few surprises:

--There are only minor differences between the rep and OEM guards: The brushing on the lever is much more aggressive and the fit and finish (lever fit, perfectly drilled holes, cleanly fit pin, etc) is better but not significantly better.

--Since the OEM guard dropped right in (There is a tiny, tiny gap on the 6:00 end, which I will probably mill away even though it's mostly visible in the magnified pic) and since it is very close in appearance to the rep guard, I'm led to believe the 40mm auto reps are CNCed all the way. I bet the case, bezel, and back are also damn close to dead on.

--the crown on the 40mm reps are not too thin--it looks like the gap between the top of the crown and the bottom of the rep guard is a fraction wider than on the gen, which makes the rep crown look a tad too thin.

--The biggest improvement is functional. The OEM lever functions both more smoothly and with more firmness than the floppy rep lever.

So, are OEM guards worth the money? It depends--if you can get one and your other option is wearing a severely damaged rep, I guess they are. As a cosmetic improvement they definitely are not. Putting that OEM guard on was most useful as proof of how good the 50 and 51 reps are.

[tonton2000]

Great review and info!