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by bri3d
1518 days ago
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I think that amongst the "high end," counterfeits are probably not that common. Dealers tend to have a reputation to maintain and even the best clones are easily distinguishable once the case-back is opened up and the movement inspected. There are a few rare Rolex models with "1:1" clones which can have an authentic movement installed. There may be some "high profile" counterfeits of these pieces floating around, but it's hard to say. I think that in the mid-market, counterfeits are probably more common than we would hope. Modern Rolex and especially Panerai clones are quite good, far from the Canal Street "folex" type watches of old. I bet that a large number of Panerai watches seen worn are fake. Panerai have an especially major problem with this because for years, they used commodity movements from ETA, sometimes lightly decorated (although sometimes not - see the "Brooklyn Bridge" Panerai scandal), rather than proprietary movements like Rolex. So movements were widely cloned, and for an even more accurate copy, one could engrave an authentic ETA movement with the Panerai finish and have an extremely difficult fake. This hobby is surprisingly open and very interesting - you can find forums like Replica Watch Info or /r/RepTime and learn in great detail the specific, minute differences between each replica factory's attempt at a counterfeit vs. the original. |
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Can you provide some links to examples?