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– By Logan Baker
An error will occur in the sport of baseball when a player, whether offensive or defensive, fails to complete a play that – per the umpire’s judgement – would be considered routine for the typical player. Accidentally overthrow the first baseman? That’ll likely end up as an error in the box score. Muff a pop fly? Error.
Most baseball players, regardless of their skill level, will end up committing a few errors every year. Messing up is part of life, and it’s especially a part of the reality of the MLB's extensive 162-game season. You own up to the mistake, and then you move on with your life. It happens.
But what about errors in watchmaking? We like to think of watches – and, by extension, watchmakers – as infallible, focused entirely on precision above all else. There should be no room for errors in high-end watchmaking, right? Especially when it comes to the five-figure and above ballpark.
If only that was the truth.
The world of luxury watchmaking is, in fact, full of accidents and errors, no matter the expense, the quality of materials, or the skill of the watchmaker. Even if a watch is otherwise perfect, the mechanical movement inside will naturally deviate from its isochronous state due to countless external and internal factors, from fluctuations in torque being delivered from the mainspring to standard positional rate variations that occur constantly when a watch is worn on the wrist. A wristwatch is interesting in that it's both a precision instrument and a bustling hub of potentially erroneous energy.
Aesthetic errors in watchmaking are a different story. They’re much rarer than the beat errors and rate deviations inherent to a mechanical watch movement. But they do turn up every so often, and their outlier status tends to result in a bit of a paradox, where the few watches that do have noticeable errors in appearance and that make it out into the world become much more desirable and valuable to collectors than a potential sibling unit that has zero issues. An error in a baseball game? Not so great. Errors in the regulation of a mechanical movement? Not preferred, but it happens. But an error in the design, manufacturing, or external appearance of a watch? Well, there are many watch collectors out there that I think would welcome it happening more often.
The brand/watchmaker with the most known errors? It’s hard to say for a fact (there are no umpires in the watch biz, after all), but it’s likely that Rolex has the most documented instances of various aesthetic errors occurring in their delivered watches (at least in recent history).
Tropic dials in unconventional colors (fuchsia, blue, purple, etc.) tend to appear more often in certain vintage and neo-vintage Rolex watches than from anywhere else. They're cool and all, but they still count as a manufacturing defect. The same goes for vintage Rolex models with “spider” dials or “ghost” bezels. Oh, and don't forget the "no-Daytona" Rolex Daytona!
Imperfections happen everywhere, but they seem to attract the most attention from collectors when they come out of Switzerland’s largest watchmaking monolith.
Rolex's most pernicious imperfections in the modern era, it seems, tend to center around the different elements of the dial. There are plenty of Rolex models out there that are known to feature some sort of dial defect, typically isolated to a specific production range, as indicated by the specific serial number of each watch. The “Double 9” Air-King is one of the better-known representatives of this trend, but the examples that capture the imagination of the most collectors these days are much more subtle. Take, for instance, the obscure early 2010s examples of the Daytona ref. 116520 that were delivered with what collectors now call “APH” error dial.
The Rolex Daytona ref. 116520 was introduced in 2000 to replace the previous Daytona generation, the long-running ref. 16520 with the famous Zenith El Primero-based movement ticking inside. The six-digit, steel-bezel ref. 116520 quickly stood out not only as the first Daytona of the new millennium but also as the landmark home of Rolex’s first-ever in-house chronograph movement, the now-famous self-winding caliber 4130. The ref. 116520 would remain in regular production at Rolex until 2016, when the ref. 116500 would replace it, entering the catalog with an eye-catching new bezel design made of black ceramic.
The ref. 116520’s 16-year run as the top chronograph at Rolex is surprisingly filled with nuance – it turns out that a Daytona isn't always just a Daytona – and one of the most discussed variations of the ref. 116520's recognizable theme is the “APH” dial variation.
So, what is it that makes the “APH” ref. 116520 so different from the normal production examples? Well, it turns out, not too much.
The “APH” references the final three letters in the “Cosmograph” text on the afflicted example’s dials. Although it’s basically impossible to notice this without your undivided attention and a loupe in hand, the kerning of the Cosmograph text is slightly different on the error dials compared to all previous ref. 116520 examples. The letters "APH" are quite literally positioned slightly further away than they should be, introducing a visible space in the middle of the word, an error in the typographic kerning of the text.
This detail can be found on both black and white dial versions of the Daytona ref. 116520, but only on those produced later in the reference’s lifespan. Scholarship indicates the earliest Daytonas with “APH” error dials first came to market in 2009, exclusively on the white dial ref. 116520s; black “APH” dials will start to show up the following year, in 2010. The “APH” error is most commonly found on ref. 116520 dials that were produced during the first few years of the 2010s, but sporadic examples still made it to market all the way up until the reference was officially discontinued in 2016.
Interestingly, the kerning inside the Cosmograph wordmark is far from the only issue that eagle-eyed Rolex lovers have noticed in many of these later-period ref. 116520s. The letter O in Oyster on the dial was also changed slightly, adopting a shape that looks more like a zero than any letter. The horizontal spacing between the individual letters of “Oyster Perpetual” on the dial has also noticeably expanded on these error dials.
It’s unknown how many of the "APH" dials were produced for the Daytona ref. 116520. It could be a tiny percent of a percent, or potentially much more. The details and differences are so subtle that it wouldn’t be surprising if most non-enthusiast owners had zero awareness of if their personal example was any different than the norm.
It's easy to dismiss these admittedly faint variables within the ref. 116520's production, but it absolutely makes a difference for Rolex collectors at a certain level. The way many collectors are wired is to seek out the outliers and to appreciate the unusual, even when what they might cherish is something that won't be noticed by anyone else. The “APH” Daytona ref. 116520 is a great example of exactly how detail-oriented and knowledgeable some collectors can become, simply by making sure to value any differences in terms of degrees. If you want something no one else has, you have to go looking for it to begin with.
A 2013 Rolex Daytona ref. 116520 with an "APH" error dial recently arrived at Phillips PERPETUAL; it's available now for immediate purchase. It's priced at £24,950 and comes with its full suite of original accessories.
About Phillips PERPETUAL
Phillips PERPETUAL offers a boutique experience to clients for both the sale and purchase of fine and rare watches, in London’s Berkeley Square and the Gstaad Palace, in Switzerland.
About Logan Baker
Logan has spent the past decade reporting on every aspect of the watch business. He joined Phillips in Association with Bacs & Russo at the start of 2023 as the department's Senior Editorial Manager. He splits his time between New York and Geneva.
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