My first vintage / fourth watch, Orient TriStar 1989 (my birth year) with a cleaned 46943 movement, and it was a troublesome one! This is one of the two watch that bought for my birthday in April, arrived a week before my actual birthdate. This one came all the way from the Ukraine and what a surprise when I opened the box…came with some treats, Ukrainian candies.

This watch probably date back even older due to the shrouded lug. I like that, it gave a unique look to it and that the steel have a darker tone to it as well. The watch have a button to change the day easily. This is a 36mm case, 37mm with the crown recessed. A lug to lug of 42mm and lug width 18mm. The watch was polished and serviced. I don’t mind it being polish. I can make my own scratch on it, hopefully not :)

Here is why it was a troublesome watch…I was super excited wearing it that day when it arrived and somehow the second hand got loose and was swinging around when holding it at an angle…probably due to the delivery service throwing the package around. I did not want to return the watch since I like the watch and I thought I could fixed it myself, which I did. I worked out a deal with the eBay seller and got a partial refund about 35% back.

This was my first time ever opening a mechanical watch and taking out the dial out of the case at that, and it was easy. Fun experience, and made me love the watch even more after fixing the second hand being loose. It actually fell off when I took out the dial out of the case and so it made a bit tricky to put the hand back on. Really made me appreciate watch more in general because you need a delicate touch to put something on that so small.

Another troublesome part was adjusting the bracelet since it was a folded link and it has been a long time since anyone adjusted the link. All the build up made it tough to pull out the pin that was holding the links together. I’m glad that happen,and I figured out a technique to easily to pull those pins out without a need for a plier.

The watch got some interesting story behind it.

“The watch was bought in Soviet times, in 1989 Mr. Bubliy bought a watch in a thrift store, and for a long time the watch was in his collection, because of the war the watch was sold and transferred to my collection.

I assume that the watch was imported into the territory of the USSR in a not entirely honest way, since the watch has a German/English, Italian/English, Spanish/English, Japanese/English layout.”