The Grey NATO – 207 – Challenge // Omega

Published on Thu, 15 Sep 2022 06:00:00 -0400

Synopsis

The hosts discuss some technical issues with their podcast hosting service SoundCloud and Apple Podcasts, which caused the latest episode to not appear on Apple Podcasts. One host describes migrating to a new podcast hosting platform to resolve the issue.

They talk about the new Apple Watch Ultra and their interest in reviewing it for its adventuring and dive capabilities. Jason shares his experience buying and installing a new Android-based touchscreen head unit in his Jeep to add features like CarPlay.

The main topic is an "Omega Challenge" where each host drafts an Omega watch collection on a $15,000 budget, with Jason getting 3 watches (Speedmaster Mark II, Diver 300M Nekton, and Aqua Terra Quartz) while the other host gets 2 (Seamaster 007 Titanium and Seamaster 1948 remake). They discuss other Omega models they considered.

For the final notes, Jason recommends a video about restoring an old NASA lunar module guidance computer, while the other host suggests a YouTube series called "So Expensive" that explores why certain niche products are costly.

Transcript

Speaker
Unknown Hello, and welcome to another episode of the Graynado.
James It's a loose discussion of travel, adventure, diving, driving gear, and most certainly watches. This is episode 207. And it's proudly brought to you by the ever growing TGN supporter crew. We thank you all so much for your continued support. And if you'd like to support the show, please visit thegraynado.com for more details. Hey, Jason, how are we doing?
Jason Heaton I'm doing really well. I You know, I was thinking today, it seemed like such a long time since we talked and it kind of was because I was camping last week. And, and so we recorded a couple of episodes the week before. So, you know, oftentimes we're, we're just a few days apart between episodes and we don't have a lot of news, but yeah, it's been a while.
James Yeah. And then I'm away next week. So we'll record two episodes this week and then you add in the stress of what's going on with SoundCloud and Apple podcast. Yeah, it's been, it's been a long week. I think we'll have a solution by the time this episode comes out. I don't really know because no one's really being clear on what the problem is or how long it's going to be fixed. But basically, the easiest way to describe this is when you when you make a podcast, you use a service that holds the file and publishes the file's information into a feed. It's called RSS or reader subscribed syndication. Basically, the feed is your home for the podcast and the feed that URL. It's a website. is given to all the other various podcast aggregators. That could be a client like Pocket Cast, or it could be an entire platform like Spotify, Google Podcasts, or Apple Podcasts. Basically, at some point on September 8th, there was a disconnect between SoundCloud's feeds and how they hit Apple Podcasts, which meant no new episodes were going to the Apple Podcasts platform. My dashboard on Apple shows the new episode, says it's published, but it's not there. And then if you took the raw feed, which doesn't have the Apple podcast layer of information, like our reviews, our star rating, all that kind of stuff. But if you took just the raw feed and added that to podcast, everything was there. The correct album artwork, episode 206 was there, et cetera. So it's this hugely annoying thing where I thought it was a problem with Apple podcasts. I put that on Instagram and it may well be, but at this point it seems to only be affecting everybody who uses RSS provided by SoundCloud. So I looked into a few different options. SoundCloud is basically saying like, oh, we're working on it and we'll fix it when we can fix it. Which, if I'm honest, is just not acceptable for a service that I pay for. So basically I've migrated the entire show to a new platform. This should not affect anyone who's already subscribed, including those folks who are subscribed through Apple. And in fact, if you're listening to this, it means you got the show somehow. but we'll be progressively over the next few months moving away from SoundCloud and onto a new platform that is both more expensive and hopefully more better. That said, if you want a more direct control over your podcast feed experience, I'm going to put the feed in the show notes for this episode. So if you don't want to use Apple Podcasts or you don't want to use Apple Podcasts like normal library, which is a layer kind of on top of the RSS, you can actually just take this actual feed and put it into pretty much any podcast platform or app that you would like. And it'll just pull from the feed directly from our new host. It'll be the fastest experience. This is basically how PocketCast works. But it's been a pretty stressful week trying to sort this out, and I think we have a solution. The nice thing is, Jason, like I was saying to you, the golden lining in all of this is because our subscriber feed carries every episode, there's nothing lost. If so, if you, if you are a subscriber, so you pay for the show, that's a separate feed. It's managed through Substack and every episode still shows up there. It's been publishing without issue. So thankfully we don't have to, you know, apologize to people who were, you know, directly supporting the show. But I do, I do feel bad for about, you know, something like 70% of the audience that wasn't able to find the last episode as easily as they might've.
Jason Heaton Yeah, it's been it's been quite a week. I mean, I'm you're kind of our tech guy. So I've been sort of watching from a distance, but it's been it's, you know, these sorts of behind the scenes like technical issues create such an issue. And I know you were chasing it down for a while. And then when you found out it was on SoundCloud side, it was at least a hint of at least there was an answer. At least there was an answer. Right. So, yeah, hopefully this this sorts it all out.
James Yeah, I hope so. Speaking of Apple, the other thing that kind of wasn't on the radar when we recorded 206 was the Apple Watch Ultra.
Unknown Yeah.
James Which is the first Apple Watch that I'm interested in. It's probably the easiest way to put it. I talked about it a bit on Hodinkee Radio, but it's 49 lug to lug. It's, it's like Pelagos thick, like 14 and a half millimeters, but you get a great big screen. It, you know, it's, it's their first attempt at taking on something like the really full featured Garmin's, but it's a different blend at trying to hit that multi-sport thing. I am super curious. it's what Apple can do that kind of does their own flavor in the space. Yeah. And whether or not this will end up being a pretty solid competitor, because the price point is pretty hard to argue with, um, on paper at least.
Jason Heaton Yeah. I'm glad you mentioned the fact that, uh, you know, it's got all the, the Apple watch features on top of, or, or layered beneath, um, all this new stuff, this new kind of sports specific and adventury stuff, because it's the new features that I'm exclusively, uh, interested in. I just have never, had much interest in the form factor or the functionality of the Apple watch itself. It's just, I don't care for the looks. I don't, um, I'll be getting one of these ultras here to review at some point soon. And I think I'll, I'll certainly sync it with my phone because you have to in order to use it. But, uh, I can't see myself, you know, really digging deep into a lot of the kind of existing Apple watch functionality. But then again, I shouldn't, I should not say that because the chances are I'll enjoy that stuff as well. But, um, I remain kind of a diehard, Garmin guy, especially when it comes to the dive functionality. I still, you know, love the full features and kind of the interface and the battery life, et cetera, with that. So it'll be an interesting comparison.
James Yeah. I'm, I'm, I'm actually interested in trying all of it just cause I've, because of the Garmin stuff, it was kind of the smartwatch that tricked me into liking a smartwatch where I got it for a specific thing and then all the other stuff it does suddenly becomes kind of engaging.
Unknown Yeah.
James And I'm always, you know, pumped to try the Apple experience for that. So looking forward to that, I should have one in a few days. I have no idea when I'll write the story because I would like to try like five sports with it. Obviously this one can be used as a dive watch. It does all the normal, like the normal Apple watch is a pretty great multi-sport watch to begin with. I'm really pumped for it. I love to see movement in our space. I think this is the most TGN, you know, sort of Apple watch that could exist.
Unknown Yeah.
James Um, but I am, I'm not only interested in seeing how it stacks up with everything else on the market. I can't wait for like a DC rain maker posts about this. That's 8,200 words and full of charts and stuff. Right. Um, I'm going to pour over that. That'll be super fun to read. But, uh, I'm, I'm also excited to, you know, take it running, take it cycling, take it diving, maybe take it skiing, maybe take it hiking, maybe, you know, test out some of these, these kind of more advanced features right now. They definitely look like they made a thoughtful, uh, competitor for the space and at $800. It is that sort of Phoenix price point until you get into stuff that can also do the dive watches and the rest of it. I'm pumped to see it and it's nice to be excited about any of this stuff.
Jason Heaton I don't know, several months ago, I guess it was early in the year, I was approached by the Apple design team to present to the design team about kind of my experiences with dive watches. And I think they were, you know, I said, look, I'm happy to do it, but my background is more in mechanical dive watches. kind of the, the, the appeal of them among, uh, you know, I guess what we'd call ourselves, you know, Luddites or collectors or watch enthusiasts, as opposed to kind of hardcore divers and the functionality of a dive computer. Although I'm happy to talk about that. And so, you know, I did present to them. I got some good feedback and some good questions from the group. And my perspective was the most important function of a dive watch. as a dive watch is to kind of inspire you to go out and do cool stuff and to kind of collect those memories. And I think they sort of understood that. Um, but of course they're, they're out to design a product that is cutting edge and, um, all the things that this new one appears to be. So I'll be curious once I get my hands on it to see kind of what, what that watch feels like in terms of kind of my own perspective of it.
James So, yeah. Yeah. I think it's also an interesting challenge because the dive computer thing is usually where you draw the line with a watch being one you would wear all the time. Yeah. Yeah. You know, Sunto with the D6 line, something like that, they made a watch that was kind of small enough to actually wear while also being a pretty full featured dive watch. And then of course Garmin has jumped pretty deep into that space, especially with the Descent Mark 2S, 43 millimeters, nice and light, great dive computer. So I'm really interested to see how they add all of the kind of hardcore stuff on top of something that they, I there's definitely, they're unequivocal. I don't think they're expecting someone to wear that when they do a certain sport and then go home and put on their series six Apple watch or whatever. Right. Right. Like I think this is, this is a certain group of people will not upgrade their current Apple watch and we'll get this one.
Unknown Yeah.
James Or, and then I think the other thing is I've heard this in some, you know, sort of presentations about the watch. Like it seems like they also expect a big group of people who weren't necessarily Apple watch users before to suddenly give it a chance. And I think that might be where I land.
Unknown Yeah.
James You know, I, I find smartwatches so sticky. Um, but also a little bit intimidating because I just worry that it'll change my interface with watches. And so I, I'm, I'm always kind of reticent to wear them for a really long time. But I think my plan for the, the altar will be like a month straight and then, and then maybe make that the story. And over the course of the month, like see what it inspires me to do. Like you said, yeah, yeah. Uh, definitely got a ton of messages about it. Um, from Instagram, everybody asking like, Hey, look, this seems TGN, like, where are you guys going to do something? I said, Hey, it's, It's an $800, like fairly high-end modern sports watch. Of course, we'll check it out at some point. Yeah. I'm happy to hear it'll be sooner rather than later. The strap choices look cool. The straps look super cool. I'm kind of hoping I get, I get to try all of them.
Jason Heaton Yeah. It should be awesome. Well, speaking of dive watches, and this is a decidedly more retro version of it. I had mentioned on our last episode that I was auctioning off this Doxa diving star. Man, did you ever? Yeah. And, um, boy, did that take off and, and I got such a good result and, and I'm so pleased. And I just want to thank everybody who bid everybody who helped spread the word. There were people who, you know, a lot of people actually that wrote me and said, Hey, I can't bid on the watch, but I'd like to donate money on my own. And, uh, people did that. People have sent me money separately to kind of pitch into the, to the final amount that was one on the high bid. So it's just tremendous. And to make a long story short, uh, this watch. has raised just over $10,000 for feeding school kids lunches in Sri Lanka, which I, I just, I, I still, you know, get goosebumps when I, when I think of that amount, I'm, you know, we've, we've done a few auctions over the years and you know, I want to be careful not to just sort of overdo it. You know, you could, you could do an auction every week. This was one that was obviously close to my heart being that it was regarding Sri Lanka and a place that's close to me and a friend who's running this program. And, uh, I have to put out a special thanks to two different people. One is, uh, Don Harris, who goes by Dundee 63 on Instagram. Um, Don was the winning high bid at 5,500 just tremendous. You know, Don wrote me and he said, you know, I, I, I'd love a doxa, but I really liked to bid on auctions to kind of get the price higher. I really want to see as much money as possible going to these good causes. Um, so he won the watch and then in communicating with him, he said that, you know, he was in touch with, craft and tailored, um, which is, uh, some of you might know is a website that sells, um, vintage and pre-owned watches. Um, you know, good, good guys there. Um, and they had the second highest bid, um, at 5,000. And so Don got in touch with cam at craft and tailored and said, Hey, if you'd like the watch, you can submit your bid or, or, you know, pay your bid and I will give you the watch and you can do with it what you like. So. together the 5,500 and the 5,000, as I mentioned, we've raised over $10,000 and, and, you know, hats off to both those guys. That's so impressive. It's so generous. It's so generous. It's, it's, it's just tremendous. And I'm going to obviously do my due diligence and just follow through on, on every penny of that, that money and make sure that it's going to the right place. I know it is because we're good friends with the person who's running the program. And when we go to Sri Lanka next, we can actually go and visit, maybe get some photos of these schools where the lunches are being served. I think it'll be, um, I think it'll just be tremendous. So, uh, yeah, thanks to everybody who, you know, shared, um, and, and commented and, uh, and bid and donated, um, just a, an amazing, amazing result. So thanks so much.
James Yeah, that's awesome. Well done. Well done on that for sure. Oh, before I forget, and we ended up getting, you know, too far into the episode. Uh, I did want to say a huge happy birthday to Andreas who is turning 30. Andreas, if, uh, hopefully you're listening to this episode, your wife wrote us a very nice email. And though this isn't something we've ever done before, we figured, Hey, why not? So happy birthday, happy 30th from Jason and I, and congrats on starting a new decade. We're sure it'll be a good one. Yeah. Uh, did you get up to anything else this week? Anything fun?
Jason Heaton Well, you know, because I was gone last week, we recorded the week before. And so last week, uh, Ghoshani and I got up north for some camping. It had been, I don't think we camped at all. Well, we didn't camp at all earlier this year. And so we really needed to get out and we love going up North, up to the North shore of Lake Superior. And so we, you know, we planned for this for, for quite a while. I had to book at least one of the campsites some months in advance. So we loaded up the defender. We, we put the, the plywood camping boards on the bottom and a mattress in the back and packed a cooler along and an awning and, and drove up and we camped in two, two state parks up there and did a lot of hiking. The weather was, it was like, Perfect. I mean, it was absolutely that kind of dry, sunny, cool, perfect hiking weather, perfect camping weather. You can build a campfire. I was wearing, you know, a down jacket in the morning with my coffee. And then by afternoon I was in a t-shirt hiking and, uh, I never sleep very well when I camped, but you know, Hey, we had, we had, you know, bright starry nights and, um, you know, drank some good whiskey, ate some good food, did some good hikes. It was, uh, it was just tremendous. So. If you haven't gotten out yet this fall, at least in the Northern Hemisphere, uh, you know, you got to do that. It's, it's just such a rite of passage and such a, for sure. I know you were out, you know, just what the week before that, when you guys went out, uh, out east.
James Yeah. Went out east, did some hiking, talked about that on a past episode. I was up at the cottage recently and, and, you know, really, really starting to enjoy the change in the weather. Yeah. You know, fall comes quick sometimes, and sometimes it's a little bit of like a false change and you get another run of heat. Uh, but I, I'm not minding it that much. I've been doing some walks down in high park. uh, just to get some fresh air during a busy work day. And with it being a little bit cooler down there, I definitely feel like, uh, you know, it's, it's time to ramp up the pace a little bit too for running or something similar. Yeah, definitely. Oh. And then speaking of the trip out to Newfoundland, when we were out there, I like to, when I travel around, especially when I'm parking in parking lots for parks and, and all that kind of stuff, like, you know, outdoor recreation, I, when I'm traveling, I try and do so using Turo. Oh yeah. the car sharing app because it means you typically get a local's car that has a license plate from that province or state. And it helps insulate you a little bit from theft and that sort of thing. And so we ended up with a RAV4 out there, which you know, RAV4 is fine. It's a microwave basically with wheels, but a very pleasant one at that and being a Toyota nicely made and the rest of it. And what it had was CarPlay. And so, you know, in the Jeep, you know, being a 2011, it, I just have a, an old head unit. It's the higher end one at the time. It's really very dated, but it has an Oxford on the front. So I would use a little Bluetooth adapter that plugs into the Oxford and then just Bluetooth through my phone. And if I needed navigation, I had like a holder for my phone up on the dash and I would run ways or something from that. Right. Yeah. Well, I'll tell you, man, five, six days with a car play really kind of spoils you. I really, really liked it. And so, you know, my wife and I both kind of agreed like we should see, what it would cost to put it in the Jeep. And so I started down the road of a pretty extensive bit of research and dug around for a while. And I looked at, you know, buying and essentially wiring my own harness to put in, you know, like a modern Sony or Pioneer unit. And then I kind of randomly in my searches through YouTube came across this company called Xtreme based in Florida. And they basically make like whole complete kits for various popular vehicles. And it turns out they had a kit for a JKU Wrangler. that was essentially pre-wired and mostly plug and play. And it gives you this kind of nice kind of floating 10 inch touchscreen with CarPlay wired and wireless. And it was like a fraction of the cost of making my own harness and doing all that kind of stuff. And the CAN bus adapter that goes with it and then buying the head unit. So this, I think, ended up being $400. Oh, that's not bad.
Unknown Yeah.
James For a great big touchscreen. And it doesn't look so out of place in the Jeep. I can throw a picture in if people care. But I didn't know what to expect because the one I bought had apparently only been on the market for a month or something. So I wasn't finding like a ton of reviews from other, like you'll get used to it with Jeeps, with Land Rovers, with kind of enthusiast vehicles that have been around long enough to depreciate. If you need to do something, someone else has done it on YouTube or 20 people have done it on YouTube. And I couldn't find any of it in here. I got it. I was pretty impressed by it. Nicely made. I maybe had it installed in 45 minutes. You know, took the you have to take most of the dash apart. The only thing I had to do is because my Jeep has the factory amplifier for the infinity audio system, which sounds good in theory, but less so to your ears. So I just had to literally splice one wire and cap it and tuck it back in there and otherwise just plug stuff in. It has two USB ports that both charge and run Android Auto or Apple CarPlay. And so far, everything's good. I mean, like the UI works, it's all Android based. I was surprised. I kind of thought this must be a scam or it's going to get here and like not look that good or it'll be impossible to install. And so far, everything worked out. So I'll include that in the show notes. I was pretty impressed by it. And I have to assume there's a handful of folks listening that, you know, might have a vehicle that came out before, I guess maybe 2018 or 2019 is when you started to see CarPlay and more stuff.
Jason Heaton Wow. That's cool. I mean, that's the nice thing about also having a vehicle that that is popular enough that someone's decided to actually make an aftermarket. Everything becomes modular. Yeah. Which is nice. The existing head unit was kind of flush built into the dash. This one floats out a bit. What happens when you pulled out the old one? What's left behind the screen now? Nothing? Or is there a
James Blank plate? It goes in the exact same spot. Oh, okay. So it fills in that space. Yeah. So you bolt on a bracket and then the, the back of the screen is kind of contoured to fit into the bracket. So it all looks very OEM. It's too, it looks too big for how old the Jeep is.
Unknown Yeah.
James Like if they had made a seven inch one, which I think is more common to mid or older era car touchscreens, like six and a half inches gives you roughly a doubled in. Yeah. This is, this totally covers that whole space. Okay. But it doesn't tuck in too poorly. And beggars can't be choosers at a certain point, right? You want to add 10 year newer technology to a 10 year old vehicle. I think that this adds a ton of functionality. And because it does CAN bus, if you open a door, it shows you on the screen which door is open or not closed enough, which is nice when you've got two little kids who don't always close the stupid Jeep doors hard enough. And then it also maintains all of the steering wheel controls.
Unknown Wow.
James So I still have volume and mute and none of that changed. Like I lost nothing. Well, if I, if I rotate the interior lights, the backlight for the buttons comes on, it's clever. Yeah. Geez. I'm always so doubtful. And I know that, I know that you can put in head units in these vehicles for like a hundred dollars, something simple and Android thing. And then, you know, maybe you need a special adapter or a piece of kit to do car play and the rest of it. So I thought I'd just give this a try. And yeah, yeah. Pretty cool. Extreme 10 inch QLED. know, HD screen. Very cool. Nice. Uh, you want to talk a little bit about watches maybe? Yeah. Right. Um, what are you wearing today? I am wearing the new Raven vintage gold. Oh, that looks so good. So this is a watch that, uh, yeah, Raven shared a while back and I immediately wrote Steve, uh, who's been running Raven. And before that, uh, Banaras, he's probably one of my, like my oldest quote unquote, like manufacturer press contacts in the industry. I had a Banaras very early on in my collecting. and sent it back to him to get the orange minute hand swapped out for a white metal one, back with a Benares 44, a Moray 44. But this is kind of the latest generation of their vintage styled sort of Submariner adjacent, MOD adjacent sort of design. So it's a 39 millimeter steel dive watch. And in this case, it's entirely, I assume PVD coated in gold and it's a yellow gold. It has matching accents on the dial. And it's just really, really sweet in a person. 740 bucks. As I'm reading this, they have 15 available. The crown matches up nicely. The aesthetics are great. It has that sort of vintage dive watch feel. It's kind of a blend of a few different things. A 20 millimeter bracelet, also gold, tapers down to 16. It's got X1 blue superluminova. It's 300 meters water resist. It's got drilled lugs. The case height, case and bezel profiles, 11 millimeters. with the dome crystal, it's 13. It's 47.5 millimeters lug to lug. It has a very similar wrist presence in terms of weight and size to like a Black Bay 58. Sure.
Jason Heaton And what's it like to wear gold all the time? I mean, have you worn it like for days on end and kind of had that experience?
James I haven't worn it for days on end, but I have been wearing it, you know, off and on trying to get a feel for it. And I really like it. I mean, like, you know, there's a handful of watches that I think work really well as an inexpensive kind of introduction to gold, whether it's that Seiko Dolce, the SACM 150 that I've talked about before, and I'm finally going to put a piece together about that watch, or something more like this, where you're not spending a ton of money, but you are getting an entirely different experience. It's fun, and I think it's fairly priced. Yeah, cool. Yeah, that's kind of what I'm up to now, just kind of an inexpensive, fun gold diver.
Jason Heaton How about you? Yeah, I've got something similarly priced also with the Miyota movement. This is the new Citizen ProMaster Dive Automatic. So the nickname is the Challenge Diver. This is a watch that kind of was released very recently to a fair bit of hype. I think people have been waiting for this. It's sort of Citizen's answer, so to speak, to what Seiko has been releasing the past few years with these kind of vintage inspired, you know, looking back at their archive of historic pieces and So this is a, it's a 40 millimeter watch. It has a Miyota 9051 movement in it, titanium case. This one, I got the black one with the rubber strap. They also make a blue version with a full bracelet. So this, this came last week and I've been wearing it off and on quite a bit since then. And it's funny, I'd waited for this watch for quite a while. I'll actually be, actually, sorry, it's a 41 millimeter case with 20 millimeter lugs. When I first put the watch on, you know, and I've been wearing it for the past couple of weeks, I have to admit to a certain sense of disappointment. I almost feel like this is a watch that would work better in steel. I think the fact that it's titanium, it's so lightweight that it almost feels too light to kind of my wrist. And especially like when you start manipulating the bezel and the crown, everything just feels really lightweight. It almost feels like you're wearing a moonswatch or something, you know, it's kind of scarily light. That's when the watch is in the hand. You know, you're playing with it, you're holding it, you're unscrewing the crown and setting the time and kind of playing with the bezel when you first get it. Once it's on the wrist, titanium does feel good. It feels like you're not wearing anything at all. It's like I've put on a Garmin or a G-Shock or something like that. Yeah, obviously build quality is good. I think the beveled crystal is kind of one of its neat features. The rubber strap is, it's a little stiff and kind of Not my favorite. I prefer the the kind of the softer rubber that comes on some of the newer bigger chunkier eco drive stuff They're putting out these days. But yeah, other than that, I mean the aesthetics are really cool it has the you know spitting image of kind of its historical forebear from the 70s and Yeah, so that's that's what I've got on I'm taking a diving in a couple of weeks along with the Apple watch ultra So it'll be kind of an interesting to wrist. Ooh, that's a titanium wrist one to punch there. So we'll see how it goes
James Yeah, I have the exact same watch in citizen was kind enough to send me the same one the black on the rubber. I swapped it. I've only played with it for a little bit because I've been busy with other hands on and I want to make sure this one gets a fair shake. Because I think it's at the right price point. It's the right size. I like the aesthetic. I have to agree in hand. It feels too light. I kind of wish that it sent me the bracelet. It sits really low to the wrist, which is nice. So yeah, and it's also obviously 200 meter dive watch, but it's also they're super titanium. So you get a hardened titanium. In my mind, this is one of the ones where you would go for the bracelet and then swap to whatever straps you like. I put it on a NATO and I think that's my best experience yet. So I think maybe a NATO or a rubber NATO might be the way to go for this one. But I'm going to spend a bunch more time with it. And I'm excited to hear what you think of it after some diving. Like you said, I think people will look at this and they'll go like, well, it's this or an SPB. And if you had one in one hand and one in the other, two totally different watches. SPB still feels like a skin diver. This feels like a more modern watch because it just weighs nothing. Yeah. Yeah. I'm excited to spend more time with that and see how you found it diving.
Jason Heaton Yeah. All right. Well, we should move up market with our main topic here.
James Yeah, I suppose we should. So we haven't done a challenge episode in a while and we're looking for an episode to put together. We've got a fun one for 208 for those of you who are, you know, keeping up week to week. Another one of our kind of classic modes. But we wanted something extra watchy, and we kind of landed on Omega. And if you haven't listened to a Challenge episode in the past, it's kind of like a dream draft, sort of what would you buy, where we define a price for a certain brand. Usually, it's something that puts you somewhere between two and three watches. So the challenge is to make a whole collection or buy something that's representative of your tastes from the brand, and you have to get at least two watches. we made this one kind of tough with Omega because it's $15,000 of hypothetical budget. And that's more than Jason and I are going out and spending on watches, but it's more of a hypothetical that does give you a bit of a constraint. So this is our Omega challenge, a minimum of two watches per person. You have $15,000 TGN to spend, and we can't pick the same watches, and I can't see Jason's picks, and he can't see mine. So it's just going to be kind of blind.
Jason Heaton Um, and this is a good one. I, you know, what I like about this one is I think in the past, I, the last one we did was episode one 72 was Breitling. And for whatever reason, you know, you look at this episode and you think this is an absurd kind of model because who would go out and spend X amount of money on one brand. But then again, with Omega personally, I feel like they've got these very strong families that I could conceivably see myself doing that. I mean, I own a couple of Omegas, I have a Speedmaster, I have a Seamaster and, and, and I kind of like their, the way that they divide up their families and kind of what they represent. And so I could kind of see doing this. So this was a fun one for me.
James Yeah. I don't disagree. Uh, it's also a brand where, you know, they have a lot of watches in a certain bracket of price, right? Like they have a lot to offer between five and $10,000. Yeah. So 15 does kind of give you some options. You know, there is a possibility here where you could come out with three watches depending on what you chose. And I think that's kind of, um, kind of fun.
Jason Heaton All right. I'm going to suggest that you go first here. I'm confident in my choices. I've got some contingencies and backups and yeah, I'm ready.
James All right. So if I'm going first, let me just run some very quick math because I didn't expect to get to go first, but I think this means I might be able to make a move. All right. So here we go. My first pick, some of you will probably be able to predict this, but I had to make a strange kind of adjustment to the pick because of the $15,000 price point I'm going to actually not go over in this draft, I think. Okay. We'll find, we'll find out. Yeah. I normally go over by a small percentage, but I'm going with the titanium Seamaster 007. Okay. All right. But on the strap, as much as I love that bracelet, I can't afford it. So it's $9,200. If you get the bracelet, this is the bond with the mat, everything in the Brown accents. It's probably my favorite Omega I've played with in the last little while. It felt really special. the titanium really helps the 42 millimeter sizing. And the only reason why I could sit here and say that I could be okay without the bracelet is one, if I were able to get this watch, I would definitely find some way of getting the bracelet, even if I had to order it later. And two, these watches are simply so good on the rubber strap. So at $8,100, I feel like I could probably I'm not going to use that NATO. I don't like a striped NATO. Yeah, I'm almost vehemently against striped NATO's actually. And then on top of that, I don't love Omega's NATO's. They're very expensive. They're very shiny and slippery. The hardware is incredible. The quality of them is great, of course. But I would just wear this immediately on a on a TGN Grenado or a black rubber strap. Oh yeah. At which point I think it would just be incredible. Yeah. Puts me at $8,100. And I think that we'd be able to factor a few hundred dollars, probably a couple hundred bucks for the rubber strap, maybe a little more. And I think I'll still, I would still land under 15K if I managed to get my second pick. Yeah. We'll see. Yeah.
Unknown All right.
James But that's my first one in a watch that I've really enjoyed for a long time. Yeah. That's a good one. That's a really good one. Um, was that on your list or not so much?
Jason Heaton You know, it was on there for awhile. Then I took it off. In fact, it didn't even make my backups or my final cut. I love that watch. Um, but given the price, it was just above kind of the, the mark I wanted per watch.
James So I thought, Hmm. All right. And the other thing to keep in mind is you are paying an incredible premium for the titanium. Yes. Yeah. Right. Cause it's what, like 51, $5,200 for an SMP 300, like your white one. Yeah. Yeah. And, and one, The white one is just as lovely in almost every metric. There's just something about the blind one. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, I love that watch. With this kind of budget, I'll lean in and go for something spendy. All right.
Jason Heaton So what do you got for your first? So my first pick is, and I'm going to take this off the table because I thought for sure you were going to pick a watch from this family. This is the Omega Speedmaster Mark II coaxial chronometer chronograph.
James It's definitely on my list.
Jason Heaton You know, I've got a vintage Moonwatch. I love the Moonwatch, but I don't know, there's something about these Mark II's that it's just different enough. I love that kind of 70s style, the tonneau case, very wearable size. We're talking 42 and a half diameter by 40, a little over 46 lug to lug and really doesn't have lugs. It's that kind of hooded lug design. It's got a classic three link bracelet. This has that kind of checkerboard style minute track. I don't know if that's considered a racing dial or not. I know that the original had kind of orange accents, but you know, I, it's just, it's just a sportier looking watch. I think it has less of a kind of a vintage look or less of a, you know, iconic moon watch. He kind of looked to it that that would make it just kind of fun to wear on a number of different straps or on the bracelet. And, um, know, super high quality. I mean, this is a, this is, you know, Omega, there's no doubting their, their movement making prowess and that sort of thing. So this one comes in at $62.50. So that, that kind of plants me, you know, well over a third of the way to our, our price ceiling.
James I'm interested to see what you go for next.
Jason Heaton That's fun. Yeah. And I think it also gets a chronograph, you know, I think an Omega chronograph is the, there's something iconic about Omega chronographs and it's just kind of nice to have one kind of in this, in this pick.
James For sure, yeah. The Mark II was definitely on my list. The only reason I didn't do it, because it would fit with what's left in my budget, is they don't make the one I love anymore. Or at least it's not on their website. The original, the one I reviewed years ago for a blog to watch was that racing, gray, orange, maroon dial layout. And that's the one that's just so 70s and awesome. It's also referential to my favorite modern speedy, the Japan LE. which had a very similar dial. Yeah, I think these are killer, but I would definitely miss that specific color way. And yeah, good first pick for sure. I love the way the loom is done on their bezel. Oh yeah, so cool. All loomed up. It looks awesome being on the glass like that. Yeah. All right, what's your number two? So you're up 6,200 and I'm up 8,100. So spending as much as I spent did really limit my secondary picks. But the nice thing is, you know, Omega goes in a bunch of different directions in terms of style, aesthetic, size, the rest of it. And the kind of fun thing about it is I'm just going to go with another Seamaster, but it couldn't be more different from the 007 and titanium. And this would be the Seamaster 1948, which sells for $6,400, which leaves me 500 bucks. Not too bad for me. Yeah. So yeah, it's part of their heritage models. It's a steel watch with a kind of gray silver dial, white metal hands based on the 1948 sort of original Seamaster design, sort of a beautiful take on a dress watch that I think would absolutely suit the way I wear watches. I think you could even pull it off on a NATO if you wanted to. I like the one with the center hand, the full size seconds hand rather than the sub dial. But I think these are really, really beautiful watches. They come in a few different versions. They're 38 millimeters wide and steel, and they fit my budget with, like I said, about 500 bucks left over. And this is a watch I've always been curious about, but I've never seen one in person, like maybe in a display case at a boutique or whatever. But I've never walked up to somebody at a hangout or whatever, and they popped it off their wrist and I got to try it on. If it wears like a vintage one, all the better. but it's the right size. I think it's gorgeous. It's like both casual and dressy. And it would be such a compliment in terms of like being distinctive against the titanium Seamaster from my first pick.
Jason Heaton Yeah, no, I think that's a great pick. I mean, it's, it's, it's a good one, two punch to have kind of the ultimate, you know, sports watch with the, the tide of the bond films and something you could take diving, et cetera, and then have something you'd probably wear arguably less often, but you know, super high quality and just, uh, Yeah, that's such a classic. It's such a cool watch.
James That's my pick. And that brings me within 500 bucks. So I'll spend the rest on straps for these two watches. Happily, I think I could do that pretty easily. But yeah, I'm pumped to hear where you went with the second one. I've got a guess, but we'll see. We'll see.
Jason Heaton All right. So my second choice, you know, I've got Speedmaster. I've got to have a Seamaster. Yeah. And I am going with the Diver 300 Master Chronometer 42 millimeter Nekton edition.
James Oh yeah that was on my list too with the relief bezel.
Jason Heaton Yeah yeah very cool. So now if they made this in titanium it'd be ultra cool they don't it's steel but that kind of relief sort of almost looks like a hammered finish or I don't know what you call that finish on the bezel but it's um it's just so cool and then it's got that touch of red with the the Seamaster writing and the sweep hand on a rubber strap this just watch just looks so sporty I have the white dial as you mentioned, which I love. I think, you know, assuming different universe, I didn't have this watch. I think this Nekton would be a real contender for my wrist. If I were to kind of start over and look at Seamasters to get, I think it just has a little different vibe than all the rest of that family. And I love the kind of the connection to the deep sea exploration stuff that they're doing with Nekton and the mini submarine on the back and that sort of thing. And the titanium bezel. Titanium bezel with the, yeah, with that kind of relief pattern. Yeah, so this is a 6200. So I have enough for a third watch. Oh boy. Yeah. Oh man, late entry. Yeah, so maybe I should have gone first because I got three.
James Yeah, you definitely should have. All right, I'm getting blown out of the water in this draft, I think. I'm happy with my 007 and my 1948, of course, but I think it's clear there's a winner here.
Jason Heaton What's the third one? I got greedy because I wanted three watches and I really tried my best to make it work. Um, and the only way I could happens to be with a watch that I think is still pretty darn cool. I'm going over by $100. I hope you'll forgive me or lend me that. I'm always going over.
James So it's, I'll allow it. All right.
Jason Heaton So this is the Aqua Terra 150 meter quartz in 38 and a half millimeters.
Unknown Okay.
Jason Heaton The Aqua Terra is kind of Omega's answer to, you know, a little bit of an Explorer type watch or, you know, it's, it's a steel sports watch, a little dressier than my other two picks. We don't have the big chunky, very seventies chronograph. We don't have the kind of over the top wave dial bonkers, you know, diver like the Nekton. This is, this is going to be my everyday kind of dress watch. This is going to be kind of the, the grab and go. It has a date, you know, I'm not clear. I guess they don't really say what the, well, they call it the Omega 4564 movement courts, precision movement. Um, so, you know, not sure what they're using. I'm sure it's some kind of an Etta or, you know, courts, I think a Swiss courts movement. super high quality, you know, if it's Omega, it's going to be great. Um, and then of course the rest of the build quality is going to be excellent at 150 meters water resistance. And this is a 38 and a half millimeter case. So I think, um, I think this trio really would work well. Like, you know, if I had 15 grand and someone just dropped me in front of the Omega boutique and said, go in and get three watches, this would be, this would be the trio.
James It's true. Yeah. No, I think you did really well. I, uh, I did not come across this Aqua Terra in my, uh, in my searching.
Jason Heaton I think I kind of started there. Cause I went, I wanted to like, look for the absolute least expensive watch they sell. And I didn't even know if they made quartz watches anymore, because back in the day, I mean, they made the Bond, you know, Seamasters and quartz, all sorts of watches and quartz. And they were, they've always been high quality. I think, you know, you look at that Omega quartz or Tag Heuer quartz. I mean, these are, these are high quality watches. I mean, you're getting all the fit and finish of, their higher end mechanical stuff. And then you get a high quality kind of no nonsense grab and go courts. And I think you can't, you can't lose.
James Yeah, that's a, that's a good one. All right. So that is, uh, the Omega challenge. We had $15,000 to spend. We had to get at least two watches. I've just only dual only barely hit that requirement with a 300 SMP with in titanium, the, which is the no time to die watch. I got it on the strap because I did not have enough money to get the titanium bracelet. We'll have to, you know, save that for a bracelets challenge down the road. And for my second pick, I went with the Seamaster 1948 coaxial master chronometer in 38 millimeters. This is with the center seconds hand. It's a nice classic kind of recreation of the original Seamaster design that gives me two Seamasters. I think they are a nice pair. I'm not, uh, you know, I'm not sad about the, uh, the picks that I got and I'm pretty happy with how closely I came to the budget without doing the usual and, uh, going over by 10% or whatever.
Jason Heaton Yeah, I started with the Mark II coaxial chronograph. This is $6,250. It's kind of the classic 70s style revival of Omega's Mark II Speedmaster. My second pick is the Diver 300M coaxial dive watch. This is the Nekton edition. So steel case, titanium engraved or embossed bezel, red sweep hand, rubber strap, just kind of a killer special edition sports watch. And then rounding things out, I chose a 38 and a half millimeter Aqua Terra quartz, um, which, you know, there's no, no slouch. I mean, I'm not, this isn't just like the, this isn't like the, you know, the, the, the forgotten pick here. I think this is a watch that can stand on its own and, uh, also gets me within a hundred dollars of the budget. I'm over by a little bit. I'm hoping, uh, you know, I'll find one that's kind of, the last item in the, in the case at the Omega boutique and they'll give it to me for a hundred bucks off or something.
James So I mean, you have a couple of, have a couple of cappuccinos with your salesperson. Yeah. Let them, let them know you're interested in such and such down the road. And then maybe more than a few hundred bucks falls off the final bill, but that's a killer trio.
Jason Heaton Funny thing is I, it was either going to be this three watch approach or I had another sort of alternative version where I was going to go all in and get a pro profit.
James Oh, I did. I did the same.
Jason Heaton And the Aqua Terra Quartz. That was, I was going to do a duo.
James I think if I had seen the Aqua Terra Quartz, I think if I had seen it, that's what I would have done. Or the Ultra Deep. The Ultra Deep as well. Yeah. Let's see what else I had on my list. So my list, I had the Ploprof, which is 12,600. Yeah. So it would have worked. Yeah. The other one I really liked if you had taken the 007 Seamaster is the 1957 Trilogy 300. Oh yeah. Recreation dive watch. Also gorgeous. Seven grand. Um, a rail master was my safety at $4,900. Not my favorite of those on my list, but it was there in case, in case you really cleaned me out on, on the same picks. Yeah. And then the other one I had on the list, which I actually really like, it's probably my favorite Speedmaster that isn't solid gold. Yeah. Uh, is the Speedmaster 57 in 38.6. So the broad arrow, the tan beautiful colorway and the steel bezel. Yeah. It's their older model, because they redid the 57 this past March with a 40.5 millimeter version. But they're still offering the other one. Comes on sort of a cool flat length bracelet. It has kind of a 2915 vibe. I love that watch. Actually, if I was buying an Omega, and especially if I wanted to finally try my hand at a Speedy, I think that's the one that would speak to me. Nice size, cool watch, great look, and really just a solid sort of vintage recreation. uh, in there that does kind of follow the same methodology as the, um, the 300, uh, trilogy. And then, yeah, the other two were the Seamaster in titanium, which I picked and the Diver 300 Nekton, because I definitely wasn't going to put the white one. I didn't want to actually own it. I didn't know if that's going to be one of your picks, but that, that Nekton I just think looks so cool. It does.
Jason Heaton It looks really good. I think it'd look cool on a NATO. I mean, it's, that's a cool watch.
James Did you have any other random stuff on your list?
Jason Heaton I did. So instead of the Speedy Mark II, like if you had gone first and picked that, I was actually going to go with a real kind of black sheep here. And I was going to go with the X-33 Regatta Chronograph. This is the analog digital thing.
James Yeah. It was one of my first stories for Hodinkee. Oh really? Yeah. A hands-on with it.
Jason Heaton Super fun. Titanium case. It's got the sailcloth strap. really sporty looking, you know, we, we love our analog digital stuff and at 5,900, it would have brought me an under budget if I hadn't picked the Speedy Mark II. So I'm still happy with my choices, but those were, those were some of the alternatives.
James The funny thing about those X33s, it still is the only one in my history where I absolutely had to go and download the manual. Because you know, like most, most digital watches or watches with a digital feature have a mode button and then you just kind of figure out your way loosely. Nope. It's a whole different interface, especially when you wanted to like play around with the regatta stuff. You press a couple buttons in the wrong way and the hands are moving around and you can't tell like, what is the screen trying to say to me? I really think those watches are cool. The only ding I could put against these, you know, they're 45 millimeters. The titanium helps, but that's not a small watch. Look what it was made for. Yeah. Missions to Mars and, uh, and yachting.
Jason Heaton But man, I just noticed it's only 30 meters water resistance. Geez. Yeah. For an America's cup boat or a watch. That's a little flimsy, but.
James Yeah. I mean, it's probably not going to get that deep on Mars, right? It's probably they're thinking when they, when they originally made that, made that model. And then of course the precursor to that remains a deeply cool watch. Yeah. Yeah. Great picks. Some, I mean, they make like a, such a wide variety of like interesting watches and like none of these watches are cheap. Right. Even down to the Quartz Aqua Terra. Yeah. You can get a whole lot of automatic watch for that money. But within the guys of Omega, like they have a really tidy lineup that offers a ton of variety, but all of it's based on pretty nice product.
Jason Heaton Right. And their families are very distinctive. You feel like you're in the right place when you're looking at Aqua Terras and when you're looking at, you know, the Seamaster Divers and things that's very delineated. Yeah.
James Especially when it comes to the Seamaster, they've got a little something for literally everyone. Right. Right. You know, several, several product lines within there that all do feel kind of distinct. Yeah. Good stuff. Always fun to do a challenge episode.
Jason Heaton Those are kind of a kick. If any of you have your own feedback on, on our picks or ones that we overlooked or, or, you know, tell us how you'd spend 15,000, uh, at an Omega boutique, uh, drop them in the comments on Substack. We always love to hear from everybody.
James Absolutely. Yeah. You want to get into some final notes?
Jason Heaton Sure. Yeah. Today I've got, I've got one sort of Omega adjacent, at least it's Apollo related, uh, moon, moon related. This is a YouTube video. from the Wall Street Journal. And the title of it is Restorers Try to Get Lunar Module Guidance Computer Up and Running. This is well outside my wheelhouse tinkering with old computers, but I thought it was fascinating and I love dipping into other people's arcane hobbies. And this was a group of people who had come across this collection of old, very old computers. And we were talking late sixties stuff that one of the guys had found and bought at like a Not quite a garage sale, but you know, a clearance event of some sort in Houston way back when, and it turns out what he had was, was a bunch of, uh, components from the guidance computer, the, that they used at NASA in Houston, a mission control to organize the kind of the landing sequence, uh, for the lunar module and the Apollo program. And so through, you know, various web groups and forums and whatnot, uh, he hooked up with. Some folks that were kind of did this for fun, for a hobby, uh, restored old, very old kind of obsolete computer equipment. And they, they, they wired it all up, set it all up and spent hours like days, you know, we're talking, you know, locked in a room for, for, I think they were in a hotel room for days on end, you know, probably, you know, big, big gulp sized, uh, cokes and bags of Doritos and stuff, just hammering away on this and rewiring stuff and soldering and troubleshooting and trial and error. And, uh, and they got, they got this thing powered up and they were actually able to run it through some of its sequences. Now, obviously it wasn't wired to any, you know, thrusters or rocket engines or anything like that, but they got it to function. They got it to light up and walk through a sequence, which, uh, I thought was kind of cool. I, it made me chuckle. Um, it's impressive that, that, you know, I love to see people it's like, I guess it's like a watchmaker reviving an old pocket watch or. Um, you know, bring an old car to life or a plane or something like that. Um, just really impressive, really a fun video to watch, not terribly long, easy viewing and, uh, and just a lot of fun to watch.
James Yeah, that's awesome. Yeah. Very, very cool. I can't, uh, I, I didn't, I did not come across this on my own, so I'll look forward to, uh, kind of watching this in a nice, not, not a super long video. Yeah. About seven minutes. Yeah. What do you have? Uh, mine is also a YouTube series, uh, one that my brother introduced me to. He was hanging out at my house for a couple of days while he was in Toronto. And it's, uh, I'm sure some people listening will know this, but it was brand new to me. And it's a, a series of videos. There's like 130 of them from business insider. That's just called so expensive. Huh? And they're essentially video essays on something that's expensive to explain why. Oh, Okay. I've got three in here that I'll suggest, but go through and find the thing that you're interested in. There's a couple in there about watches. There's a couple in there about cars, but the ones that really had me interested were Ernest Wright scissors, which are British handmade scissors. Wow. And you swear this factory was, it was, you would swear it was 1948 and they'd make scissors by hand. And you know, a pair of scissors from the grocery store or even from Amazon or whatever, decent pair of scissors is 20 bucks.
Unknown Yeah.
James Wow. These aren't that much more than, than that. You know, they can, they broke it into the three figures occasionally being at their handmade. I might need to buy a pair of these just so I can like, Oh, look at this. Like some dude made me like it was long before a machine could kind of stamp these out. And then, uh, another machine sharpened them perfectly. There's, you know, master putter togethers or guys that finally that assemble the final pieces and make sure that the cutting edge works the way it should for a premium pair of scissors. I watched a really interesting one about Dijon mustard. Oh, uh, I learned why Dijon mustard is expensive and some of its background. And then, uh, there's a great one in there about a Japanese denim. So of course, those of you who know your Japanese denim, they go speak with the folks at Momotaro, um, who Oris has actually done, um, a collaboration with and, uh, and look into the difference between like the, the kind of expensive Japanese denim or, or salvage denim that you're aware of. And then the stuff that costs like thousands of dollars and, and is, quite literally died, indigo died several times by hand. Like it's just a labor, very labor intensive process. I thought these were great. There's ones in there about different types of marble and lots of different like gemstones that you, you know, that aren't diamonds or something like that. And they're really, really digestible and typically pretty fast. Uh, so you're, most of these are less than 10 minutes. Uh, I, I really enjoyed the series. So I'll, I'll include those three I mentioned and also a link to the playlist. Yeah. where you can literally just like sit and let them run through. Um, but it's everything from food to marble to scissors. I mean, like anything that's kind of weirdly expensive for its category. Yeah. And, and for the most part, they really stay away from like, Oh, it's expensive because it's prestigious. Sure. Yeah. Fascinating series.
Jason Heaton I loved it. Ceylon cinnamon. There we go. Oh, this is awesome. I love this. I'm looking at, I'm looking at their list. This is a, this is a rabbit hole I could spend a long time on. I love it.
James Yeah. It kind of reminds me of when Cole Pennington introduced me to Donut Media and I started going through every episode of a show they used to do called Up to Speed. Oh, sure. Where they would just give you the in-depth details on like a specific model or whatever. Yeah. And they were always like super dense in terms of information. I always felt like I was learning a lot and like really expanding. And then with this, because there's, like I said, there's a couple of things in there that people listening will probably know something about watches, cars. Yeah. Stuff to that, right. But then there's a bunch in here that's like brand new to them. And, uh, I just really, really enjoy the chance to learn. Well-named, easy to understand, and a super enjoyable kind of lesson in, um, yeah, kind of economy, specialized economies. Love it.
Unknown Yeah.
James Absolutely love it.
Jason Heaton Yeah. That's really cool. All right. Wow. Great final notes.
James Yeah, no, that was a fun, fun episode. I always like doing a challenge. I'm, I'm, I'm really keeping my fingers, you know, they're, they're just so tightly crossed that the feed will be all sorted out and everybody will get this episode on Thursday. Um, If you don't, please know I at least did my very best to make it happen. And when you get the episode, I do hope you enjoy it nevertheless. But I'm excited about the next one. We'll record in a couple of days as I'm just putting together the notes for that as well. Yeah, definitely.
Jason Heaton And as always, thanks so much for listening. If you want to subscribe to The Show Notes, get into the comments for each episode, or consider supporting the show directly and grab one of our TGN signed NATOs, please visit TheGreyNATO.com. Music throughout is Siesta by JazzArr via the free music archive.
James And we leave you with this quote from George Orwell who said,