# The Grovana conundrum, date issues



## deville (Dec 29, 2017)

Got this off ebay, Bulgarian seller. A manual wind Grovana 23 jewels with date. Replaced the strap (Di-Modell Jumbo), looks great (IMHO). Runs well too. Good time-keeper. So far.

Info on Grovana is pretty scarce, though. The company's own website has this: "1970 - Werner Bitterli [love that name] takes over Hans Gröflin AG and the name is changed to Grovana Uhrenfabrik AG [...] 1971 - The production of watch movements is gradually being reduced whilst the development of the company's own collection simultaneously starts under the name of 'Grovana'."

Does anyone know of any isolated Grovanas (under that name) pre-1970/71, one-offs, so to speak, prior to the company's re-christening? My watch looks distinctly 60s (but it could, of course, be early 70s too). It has no logo (later Grovanas do), just the name, so in any case it's early.

I've been searching the web for a couple of months now and have found only one Grovana similar to mine (see below). My unqualified guesses are that my case is a replacement (crown too, probably), but that movement and back are authentic (haven't opened the back, no tools (not sure I should anyway, no experience whatsoever), but the seller's not so great photos of the movement match the ones I found, the movements look identical, to my untrained eye). There's also a smudge of gold in the black on the dial, so I'm guessing repaint?

The only info I have concerning year of manufacture is what the seller told me, that a watchmaker had placed it in the 1960s. When the brand purportedly didn't exist. Or did it?

The case is SS, case width 34mm (crown excluded), lug width 18mm. No logo or anything on the crown. According to the site where I found the only other photos (so far) of a watch similar to mine (only with a white dial and a different case, probably original, that DOES look 70s by the way) the movement is EB-8021N. And as you can see there are no numbers on the backs of either of the watches, none on mine and none on the one below.

And yes, I'm a novice.

The other Grovana (not mine, and not my photos):


----------

