5510 seems to be hot.....

Seems like the Rolex 5510 just is getting his attention. A sleeping beauty. Undervalued maybe. Tha last of the real cool Bond watches.

Well i guess we all have seen the 5510 from e-bay. Star of last month in a lot of media.Even friends totally not in the watch-world spoke about it yesterday. But the story and price itself does not matter to me so much. Of course it's fantastic to see those images of the guy wearing the watch. Lool even having breakfast with Superman. But the interesting part is that the watch came from a original owner. Grown on his wrist. Honest watch. Some guy's on VRF started some negative comments about the sale when it was running on ebay. And to be honest... 99% of the time it stninks... but this time... woaaaaw the new owner got himself a beauty at a cheap price. We could all see the images on VRF when the watch was openend and the dial set free..... killer dial!!!

Story of the e-bay 5510

Amazing condition! Thanks Yeti for sharing!!!
See the sparkle/surprise in the eye of the owner. That is what it is all about. Finding watches from people that just had a watch. Loved it... have been wearing it. Provenance, History.... without beeing played with by dealers, altered, put together... made to look different then they where. As we see so much the last years. Finding quality, honest watches. That is the big challenge for the future. And a real value boost.

The 5510 is a strange reference. Very rare. Experts say the number produced is about 300-600 pieces. Less the Milsubs or even 5514.
Only 1 year in production (1958) as intermediate between the 6538 and 5512.
Same case then the 6538. But different movement. Using caliber 1530 instead of 1030.
The 5510 is seen in a couple of dialversions. All gilt and silver/gilt, 2 and 4-lines and 3-6-9 dial (ultra rare).

Sometimes we see them fitted with early 5512 dials. You can spot that by the gap between case and dial. The 5510 dials are bigger then the 5512 dials. On the 5510 dials we often see a copper kind of colour of the gilt printing. Only model i have seen that so often.
They where also fitted with small bubble second hand, golden big bubble and white big bubble second hands.
Often you see they have the 6 o'clock index in different colour then the other indexes. More yellow. Also more radioactive. Still shining like a x-mas tree. Most of the 5510's are fitted with the red-triangle

As said, it's a very rare reference and i have not seen to many nice ones around in the years.

In the range of BigCrowns there are quite some variations. More and less rare. Mostly we see the 2-lines 6538. Already rare to find a real nice version. But still a watch produced over years. The 4-liner as one of rare versions and high value. I see the 5510 between the 6538 2-lines and 4-lines 6538. The 6200 is the coolest....And then of course we have the real rare stuff. Like 3-6-9 versions with and without depth in red. Ultra rare... ultra prices these days.

Seems like the BigCrowns get a new attention. And for me, they are a keystone in each collection. I still remember the chaise Philipp and i had on our first one about 3 years ago. They where like the holy grails. The DNA of vintage Rolex diving watches. Professional, often used by military and imagine 200 mtr's depth at that time. End of the 50th. When diving was still to be developed. Most exciting time of Rolex. 1955-1964. So much development, versions, ... so much to learn.

And again... for me the BigCrown is one of the coolest watches ever made!!!
Not only beacuse of this images ;-)

Here is a real great one from the dial archive of VRF. Old one from KevinO. Well he always owned the best watches ;-)




And the one sold at Christies NewYork in december. 98.000 USD.

And some other ones...

 Here you see the more copper kind of gilt-tone

And here some other great bigcrowns. Not 5510....

My old one...

Fab 6200 next to rare 6543 tropical

6200 and 2 red depth 6538's.

6200

5510 next to 6538 4-lines

And the best i have ever seen....