Help with identifying Vintage Air-King

[bdb0322]

Im wondering what I have here. I received this air-king from my father in law as a wedding gift but can't seem to find any info on it. It is an air-king only, not air-king date but it shows the date along with a magnifier. The only thing I can find is apparently Rolex made a few air-kings in the 70's with the date/magnifier included but are very scarce. I took the watch to a Rolex dealer and they didn't seem to know anything about it as well. Any help would be appreciated...

[Tools]

Sorry, your photos aren't really good enough to say much...

There are numbers etched on the sides of the case between the strap lugs that would be more helpful..

[joe100]

There are lots of issues here. First the hour hand is flat-out wrong for an AirKing 5500 or 5700. Also the text on the dial. An Air-King-Date or AKD should say that on the dial.

The 5700 looks like this:


It appears to me someone decided to replace the dial on an AKD or OPD and used a non-date AirKing dial and cut a hole in it. They then used some sort of gold strips to finish the new date window. Sorry to say that your watch is a mish-mash of parts from at least 3 different watches. The 4-digit code between the lugs will help, as will much better photos

[crowncollection]

i agree with the above, certainly not right in many ways, is that your airking above joey, nice one

[joe100]

No that's not mine, I stole the pic from the interwebs, this is mine

[violetman]

fake dial, should be writing air-king date on the top

[harry in montreal]

i love how this thread uses the term Scarce and Fake very quickly!

its not a very unusual watch. its model 5700 if its a true AK Date. they are plentiful in canada. you need to read your model number to know anything about the watch. seems likely that the dial that is on it does belong there.

[Jake B]

Originally Posted by violetman

fake dial, should be writing air-king date on the top

...and no frame around the date. I don't believe there is any Rolex AKD model that's had a frame around the date.

[bdb0322]

I tried reading model and serial #'s but both are a little knicked up. I can only see a few of the numbers on both.

[joe100]

None of the parts look fake to me, just modified. It's a franken watch, no question.

[harry in montreal]

its either model;

1500
5500
5700
5701n

[padi56]

Originally Posted by harry in montreal

i love how this thread uses the term Scarce and Fake very quickly!

its not a very unusual watch. its model 5700 if its a true AK Date. they are plentiful in canada. you need to read your model number to know anything about the watch. seems likely that the dial that is on it does belong there.

Have to agree there were many watches only available Canada Commonwealth and Europe and not available in the USA.

[joe100]

Originally Posted by harry in montreal

i love how this thread uses the term Scarce and Fake very quickly!

its not a very unusual watch. its model 5700 if its a true AK Date. they are plentiful in canada. you need to read your model number to know anything about the watch. seems likely that the dial that is on it does belong there.

This is NOT a 5700. No way, no how. Dial, hands, date window are all wrong. It's a franken. Case might say 5700 but that is a 5500 dial and hands off of a 1002 or something.