An unfortunate aspect of life is that for every success, there's someone else waiting to capitalize on it; either by copying the business model, mimicking the brand name or logo, or even worse, making cheap fakes and selling them as the real thing. One of the most common "fake" scams involves the Rolex watch brand so this article discusses in brief some things to avoid when buying Rolex watches, especially in relation to making sure you don't fall victim to the many counterfeit timepieces on the market.



I'm fairly confident most people are familiar with the myth pertaining to the infallible method of checking the second hand on Rolex watches to see if it sweeps or ticks. If it ticks you're being tricked, if it sweeps then no need to weep. Alright so I made the rhyme up and I don't imagine I'll be picking up any literary awards this year (or ever for that matter), but still, it explains the common thinking on the subject. In truth there are several indicators that will expose Rolex watches as being a fake.

The aforementioned second-hand "sweeping or ticking" is not without it's merits and is grounded in some truth as many of the cheaper counterfeits contain a crystal quartz mechanism which produces a start/stop tick per second. In contrast Rolex watches have a second hand with a much more fluid motion, although it is not entirely "tickless", rather it consists of eight movements per second. To the naked eye this will seem as one smooth motion, but is in actual fact not perfectly smooth.

Other Rolex watch fakes have been presented with transparent casing on the back, something very rarely produced by Rolex themselves. Another aspect to look out for is whether there is an engraving of a logo on the back of the watch. Rolex have never engraved their name or logo on the case back, with one exception being the Sea-Dweller.

In order to try and reduce the instance of counterfeit Rolex watches being mistakenly purchased Rolex have recently been releasing watches with holographic stickers on the back. Depicted in the hologram image are the Rolex crown logo above the reference number of the piece in question. In general a fake Rolex watch with a hologram will be given away by the fact that the hologram itself is a solid green colour, or it will even be non-holographic and simply contain the word "Rolex" over and over again. Even more recently a full circle has been reached and Rolex themselves have stopped releasing new watches with holograms on the back in order to make the counterfeits out of date.

Finally genuine Rolex watches have a date magnification bubble which will fit the date perfectly, whereas fakes will not be able replicate this effect accurately. It would be a good idea, if you are thinking of investing in a Rolex watch to go to a reputable dealer such as ourselves at Second Time Round to look at a few different ones, which should then give you a basis of comparison if you should wish to buy privately. Good luck in your search!