Yesterday I got the Christmas gift I ordered to myself. An Omega

"America Cup" rubber strap with deployant to fit onto my Omega SMP, and me being the geek I am I want to share my joy with all of you. So here is the impression after 24 hours with the strap.

It looks good. I never really belived that curved ends did make such a difference, but they do. I never belived that a smooth surface was such a big difference compared against the Hirsch Carbon strap, but it is. The strap feels good and tapers down from 20 mm at the watch to 18 mm at the deployant end. The thickness of straps goes from 4.8 mm at the case to 1.8 mm at the deployant. It is stiff, so stiff that I have problems laying down the watch dial side up, I can't bend the strap enough. But regardless this stiffness, it is comfortable and I wear the strap tighter than I usually wear them.

The curved ends are not without problems. This is doubtless the strap that I have had most problems to fasten, regardless that I used my Bergeon strap tool.. I was on edge of breakdown when I finally got it there. Simply stated, it was a tight fit.

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The deployant

Another issue that almost made me go havoc. It took me half a day to understand the proper way to close it. I tried a lot of ways but I always had problems to get the "click" until I understood the way to do it...
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Simply press where I got my thumb. It is simple but I tried to high up on the deployant for the first hours, and almost given up beliving that the deployant was broken when I got the idea...

There isn't much to say, after all it is only a strap, even if it is nice.

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The Omega hole distance

The deployant is made to fit into the 8 mm hole distance of Omega straps. Normal straps (as measured on my Hirsch straps) have a 9 mm distance. In this

picture you can also see the one concern I have with these kinds of deployants, they make marks on the strap like a normal clasp. But these mark are not visible when the clasp is closed.

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Price?

I got mine from Jürgen as s-parts.de and the price was really good compared to the price qouted by the local Omega dealer. The price they qouted to me was: €150 for the strap and €300 for the deployant! Jürgen gave me a price way below that! There is no way I would have payed that insane amount of money, not even for this combination.

--jalle</p>

you and Lee really seem to get the last out of the strap possibilities

And your creativity Jalle, already helped Dan to fix his Seiko Chronograph bracelet problem. I guess that is the real benefit of forums, to share knowledge and pics and at the same time having fun.

Best regards

Reto

>>> Yesterday I had the opportunity to try the Omega AT 41 mm size (silver dial) with alligator strap and the Omega deployant (identical to yours). I had your same problem to close it and in reality I didn't ask to the Omega dealer how to do it; I understand from your picture that if you put your thumb just below the deployant itself, it will close. The question is: once it is closed the deployant will remain close and safe or can it suddendly open ?

Any comment is welcome, because the AT 41 mm (with silver dial and PINK indexes and hands) will be my next purchase (beginning of 2003) and I would like to understand how this clasp works !

Waiting for your replay.
Bye
Engi

Once I got the hang of it and closed it correctly, it stayed locked. To open it, I just place the thumb nail under the front of the clasp and push upwards.

Happy hunting:-)

--jalle

nt.

buckle on that strap.very impressive. dan

nt