IWC KL.2 Navigation pocketwatch

[ENGLISH BOB]

Hi Ed,
thanks for your post much appreciated,shame you didn't come in earlier on the thread could have done with the support, still i know a bad chicken when i see one and this one was no chicken in fact as soon as my Aunt placed the watch in my hand i knew i was looking at a piece of Kreigsmarine history
Yes Konrad is the man,he sets the bench mark and once he gave it the thumbs up i knew i wasn't talk'in out my backside
Regards
Bob

[Ed Sunday]

Hey Bob I do remember when you first listed the piece because I brought it to my friends attention who has many Kriegs. timepieces and he was interested but money is tight right now as many of us know. I didn't realize the watch was being discussed as to originality as I would have stepped in sooner with an opinion. Good to see you made a sale and alls well !

[ENGLISH BOB]

Hey Ed always amazes me were people find the money for their trinklets as you say considering the economy anyway.... yes Great i made a sale i can now afford to buy a few trinklets of my own and not worry about the bank balance. Happy Hunting
Bob

[John R.]

Bob, this was an excellent and instructive thread. This forum is generally concerned with wehrmacht awards of course plus uniforms, helmets, etc.

This particular subforum, called Kriegsmarine Uniforms and Equipment Forum, has been up and running for only a few months. The awards of the KM has its own subforum here of course.

When it comes to timepieces for example (of the KM) there is just not a big database here and collectors who do post are going by what they have seen before and as you mentioned, there were many timepieces and stopwatches made during the war. The fake timepieces on ebay has scared a lot of collectors and we have seen more than once that that fear has resulted in opinions that in the end were not correct.

I am glad you went to an authority on these plus there are more than one watch forum out there that are worth checking before a final call is made by the collector.

These timepiece areas are highly specialized and I think collectors are well served to check with these other specialized forums--I have in the past since that is where those collectors who are most interested in them are to be found naturally.

I have also checked with master watch repair experts since they have references that I do not have in my personal library. Taking the back off a watch will tell the tale in many cases also. However, I leave that to the craftsman.

Of course, collectors here might be members there and might actually have the detailed knowledge necessary for a final call, but not always, and the posts reflect opinions that might not be correct. Or they may be correct.

This is not a slam on anybody since even with badges for example, over the history of this forum many mistakes have been made on calls even by the most advanced collectors in the hobby at the time--hopefully most rectified as the years went by.

My point in the end is that your pursuit of an answer regarding your timepiece is what has to be done, sometimes in other forums, if the artifact is not one that is truly a focus of this one.

Again, very good thread and instructive and informative to all. Your watch is now in this database for example and if in the future somebody has one by the same maker, it will come up in a search of the forum.

As I said, I am not a watch expert by any means, I only moderate threads basically, and I go to watch forums when I personally have a question about a German watch for other opinions.

To be clear, we have seen outright fake watches over and over on ebay so collectors here can spot those with some accuracy. It is when you come to this forum for opinions on the entire spectrum of German watches that I think issues can come up.

John

[ENGLISH BOB]

Hello John,many thanks for your reply,I'm so glad that you appreciate my efforts for identification and i hope it helps others in the future. I would recommend anybody to sign up to the specialist timepiece sites that are on the net,in fact just by putting the name of the watch maker and German Kreigsmarine next to it usually throws up some basic info.There are some big German military watch collectors out there that do not come on WAF but they have all the answers,so you need to do the detective work to track them down.
I've been very surprised that this particular forum has taken so long to become a reality on WAF,thankfully that is now rectified.
Thanks again for the kind comments
Bob