In the past, I was not really attracted to the Rolex GMT root beer brown dial until I saw the gold 16758. following my acquisition of the Rolex GMT Root beer ref 16758 in 18k gold, I have decided to form a small collection of the Rolex GMT Root beer series. This is the half gold (Gold & Steel) version with the early brown nipple dial. While most GMT-Master watches feature bezels in black, blue, and red tones, ref. 16753 opts for shades of brown and cream.
The Rolex GMT-Master 16753 is a special two-toned variant of the Rolex GMT-Master 16750. Ref 16753 offers a mix of stainless steel and yellow gold. However, the watch’s brown dial and two tone bezel are what really draw the eye.
Hollywood’s icon and luxury watch aficionado Clint Eastwood was known to wear the Root Beer Rolex GMT-Master ref. 16753 both on and off the big screen, also earning it the nickname “Clint Eastwood Rolex.”
His two-tone GMT-Master appeared on Eastwood’s wrist in 1982’s Firefox, 1984’s Tightrope, and 1993’s In The Line Of Fire. While Clint Eastwood has been in roughly 60 films, his Rolex is almost as famous as him in many watch-collecting circles, making the watch even more collectible. The Rolex GMT-Master 16753 was produced from 1979 to 1988. It is generally considered a desirable and collectible model, especially with the "Root Beer" color scheme and the early nipple dial.
The Rolex GMT-Master 16753 "Root Beer" started with the brown dial featuring “nipple hour markers” in the early 1980s. Around the mid to late 1980s, Rolex shifted the dial style to the *non-nipple (flat luminous markers) design before discontinuing the 16753 in the late 1980s to make way for the 16713. So, the nipple dial changed to the non-nipple dial roughly between 1985 and 1987.
Before & After
From the techinical point of view, the 16753, 5-digit series was the first generation of Rolex GMT watches to use a 3000 series movement – the caliber 3075. It replaced the caliber 1575 used in the 4-digit series featuring a higher frequency of 28,800 bph, up from 19,800 bph and it also includes a Quickset date, which allows the wearer to set the calendar complication while the crown is in the second position instead of winding the crown a full 24 hours plus a sapphire crystal.
The Rolex 16753 is available with either a black dial or brown dial, the watch could be chosen with either a Jubilee or Oyster bracelet. Today, it’s the brown dial model that holds our interest. The dial contains a printed crown logo versus the earlier version’s applied logo. and the brown dial is metallic and it tended to change colours. Many early Root Beers bezel were all brown, but the Rolex 16753 has a nice contrasting tan and brown bezel that’s bisected.
After much consideration, I have decided to restore the watch to its glory by servicing the watch plus replacing the dial with an original spare dial and get a new old stock bezel as well.
Luckily, I was able to find a nice original dial for replacement if necessary
