I’ve been very busy with family commitments lately – good ones 🙂 – so I have not posted too much. Things are settling down at home now, so it’s time for a new post. And it’s time for something a little bit exciting – nothing less than the discovery of a previously unseen diver!

One of the joys of collecting and, more importantly, researching vintage Citizens in the absence of reliable reference material, is that ‘new’ models can be unearthed. It’s important of course to somehow authenticate a ‘new’ model, since it could be a ‘franken’ or an outright fake….

Some time ago I spotted a diver style watch for sale in Japan – I wasn’t convinced at that time that it was correct, so I archived the pics and ‘sat on it’. And then, just recently. I saw another example, also with clearer images. My conclusion is that this is an authentic, original piece, so I am posting about it now 🙂

And it’s unusual! This is a hand winding diver, rated at 120 meters, with an external bezel. What is rather cool is that it is no ordinary hand winder, but a white/silver dialled 25 jewel ‘Super Deluxe’:

Notably this watch features no lume, not even a pip on the bezel, so its practicality as a diver is somewhat limited! It seems to me that the case is a one-piece type – doesn’t look to me to be a snap on type looking at the shape:

The ‘monocoque’ case suggests it was made to a diving specification. The case/model number – D1307051 – is a genuine number, and ‘D’ probably means ‘Diver’. In my case parts manual the data for this model is marked ‘x’, i.e. a one piece case that can’t be opened from the back.

Here is a pic of the first of these I spotted, well two actually:

The case backs both seem to show production in 1965:

So there we have it – the Super Deluxe 120m diver 🙂  Before I add it to the diver page I’d like to hear what people think, so please post your comments.