Datejust lume question

[metsengland]

Hi, I purchased a 116200 with a black roman jubilee dial. The watch is a Z serial, dated 2007 I think. The dial has roman numerals with no lume, but the hands have lume on them. I didn't think this was an issue as I thought that lume and non lume hands were probably put randomly on any of the Datejust watches with any dial, but after reading forums and having a close look at the Rolex brochure it seems that dials with lume might be given hands with lume and dials with no lume, such as my black roman jubilee dial, might be given hands with no lume. So, am I right in thinking that some Datejusts leave the factory like mine, or is there a strict lume dial, lume hands rule. I know some AD's change dials, but mine recently had a service and everything seems fine, so what do you think?

[DJJon]

Not sure, I hope an expert will weigh in. I can say that I didn't see any Roman Dials with lume hands or I might have gone that way myself. I value the lume.

As an aside, if you want the lume to last all night, give it a 5 minute charge close to a new CFL light bulb. Wow does it put a charge on it.

[Chachabah]

Does CFL LIGHTBULB really work? How close do you have to hold it to the light? And 5 minutes will really make it last all night?

[rmfnla]

My experience is if the hands have lume the face should, too.

If the dial was replaced by the AD for a customer they probably would not replace the hands, too, unless the customer asked for that as well.

[zeuloa]

It sounds to me like the dial was replaced. RSC probably did not mind as this was common practice by ADs on Datejust models.

[metsengland]

Any more thoughts? Maybe Rolex put lume hands on any watch randomly. Do you think they would change the hands if I asked when it goes for its next service?

[godowning]

I have had a few dials changed by the RSC and they have always matched hands with dial. Stick with no lume hands, Roman with either no lume or black line depending upon style of Roman numerals, and Lume with lume.

[Lisa]

I asked this same question when my pre-owned Datejust Turn-0-Graph arrived. The hands were lumed and the dial was not. The consensus here at the time was that the hands and dial would either BOTH be lumed or BOTH be not lumed. Rolex did not mix the two.

The appropriate Roman numeral dial, in a non-jubilee dial at least, would have had little dots of lume at each numeral. The jeweler explained that the dial had been replaced by a previous owner, and the original hands were retained, and that the original dial was lumed. Since I bought the watch online from a supposedly reputable source, I was pretty ticked that the watch I received wasn't the exact watch in their photo, which did show a roman dial with dots of lume and lumed hands. I was offered a full refund but decided to keep it, since the lume on the hands didn't glow anymore anyway (it was tritium).

Our local AD watchmaker looked at the watch, and he said he could put on non-lumed hands if I wanted, since that's what Rolex standards dictate. I declined... not that big a deal to me at that point.

Anyhow, lesson learned - hands and dial are both lumed, or both non lume. I am almost sure that if the RSC did a dial swap on your watch, they would have also swapped non-lumed hands. I'm guessing your dial likely was swapped by a non-AD.