Marine Life professional - 406.90.85 Old enough to be on here?

[PhilipJamesDaleBall]

Dear all,

A very well respected jeweler's of Midtown Manhattan is closing its doors after many years in business so I bought a couple of watches from them as they cleared out. Because for good reasons we are supposed to limit ourselves to posts about older watches, I'd like to know if the Marine Life I bought is a 1990s watch or a later model.

I took some pictures and attach them for your enjoyment.

Philip, formerly of Huitzilac, Morelos, Mexico, now of Ridgewood, Queens, New York City.

[Butch]

Yes, that model appears in the 10990's catalogs.

[PhilipJamesDaleBall]

Thanks. I paid $250 for it, with a double box but with no instructions or anything. Do you think I paid a fair price? It was a spur of the moment thing for me but I've spent a while reading about Zodiac and think I'll wear this, after having the strap adjusted. I also got a Swiss Formula, with a leather strap, which I think might be better than the later ones.

[Butch]

I think so, if you like it and wear it. The jeweler paid more than that when he bought it in the 90's. As for instructions, they were pretty generic for all the models by that time.

[incountry]

Nice watch "PhilipJDB"! I would be happy to walk away with that for $250!

[PhilipJamesDaleBall]

I went back to where I bought it to have the strap adjusted further (not quite tight enough after having it seen by a jeweler in Glendale who said he thought I would have paid $300) and ended up buying an automatic.

I have a feeling from looking at pictures on a Swiss site that this new one might be a variant of the Cold Point, from the 90s. The shape of the hands doesn't quite match what I saw on those pages. It could be 14k plated tubes in the strap and around the face, I'm not sure. It seems to run fast, maybe 5 seconds every six hours or so, and I'll look into that closely.

It has the plastic protection on the back, and I notice some bluing in what seems like a protective film (tiny really). Should I just leave that there and, if not, how should I remove it?

Here are pictures of the new one and the budding collection.

[Butch]

I always remove the blue, others leave it there. <shrug>

If you are interested, you can look up the model numbers in the catalogs.
http://www.zodiaccatalogs.com

[jon p]

     you did great on the marine life chrono, there is one on ebay BIN for $499. i have the same one plus the regular dial model that matches. i know they are quartz but they are really nicely made time pieces. the automatic professional is one model i have not seen before. you see a lot of quartz versions. also a beautiful watch, i just sold a blue dot automatic SEA WOLF that looks just like it. the black bezel professional is a common model with different color plastic bezels, i have 3, one blue bezel, one stainless silver bezel and one that is all gold plated. they were nearly exact copies of the TAGS from the 1990s. you did well my friend! on important thing, do NOT LOOSE your extra bracelet links! they are VERY valuable to have with the watch.