# Rado 'green Horse' Watches



## messiaenic (Jul 19, 2009)

Is anyone familiar with the history of Rado's 'Green Horse' Watches? I've seen them pop up occasionally on fleabay, with quite varying prices. I'm sorely tempted, and would be interested to learn which are the models to go for, as there seem to be quite a few.

Thanks.

Messiaenic


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## messiaenic (Jul 19, 2009)

Anybody??? Perhaps there's a good Rado history site that someone can recommend?

Thanks.


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## Guest (Aug 20, 2009)

I did a bit of research into this model a while back.They were a late 50's/60's model in differing styles [Green Horse,Black Horse Etc] i remember,although discontinued eventually.I might guess Rado is now Japanese owned,and this model was ressurected recently and made available [As a limited run]for the equivalent of around a grand ...But only to the Japanese market.

Good looking watches,Am on the lookout for the right one myself.


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## angeleye (Dec 25, 2007)

i have a rodo green horse, bought off of a forum member and can highly recomend then, personaly i think they are a stunning watch, dont pay some of the stupidly high prices they go for on e-bay though , ive seen them for sale at over Â£200, if i remember rightly mine cost nearer Â£40


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## purplepantman (Jan 4, 2009)

I'm into Rado's but they're not mentioned that much on here.

Don't know of any reference sites for Rado but there's quite a good forum I check out now and again - although I'm not a member. If you Google "Rado Forum", it's the first one that comes up.

It's quite a slow moving forum but has lots of info in the threads. Green Horse's were a topic not long ago.

*Mods - sorry for plugging another forum but I didn't post a link and was only trying to be helpful to a fellow Rado fan. *

*
Not really that many of us out there! *

:rltb:


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## Guest (Aug 21, 2009)

[Did i say ''Black'' horse in my earlier post.They DID also do a Purple horse,and Golden horse.But they are ALL pretty nice watches.What i would say to you messiaenic, is make sure you've checked out all the models and their year on year variations before deciding on a purchase.Maybe you could start by searching Google images for examples,There are some there.

Good Luck !.


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## johnbaz (Jan 30, 2005)

Here's my green horse (sellers pic on fleabay)

the bracelet was miles to small so i bought another from fleabay and haven't got around to fitting it yet :no:










they certainly are nice watches :notworthy:

i think from memory, i won this for around Â£26 and paid around Â£6 for the bracelet 

john


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## messiaenic (Jul 19, 2009)

Thanks to all those kind enough to reply to this thread, and apologies for being so dilatory in my response. I've actually found out a bit more about Rado's history from an excellent article by Bruce Shawkey at:My link



> I did a bit of research into this model a while back.They were a late 50's/60's model in differing styles [Green Horse,Black Horse Etc] i remember,although discontinued eventually.I might guess Rado is now Japanese owned,and this model was ressurected recently and made available [As a limited run]for the equivalent of around a grand ...But only to the Japanese market.
> 
> Good looking watches,Am on the lookout for the right one myself.


Quoting from the article itself, Shawkey notes that: 'The horse is a sign of good luck in many Asian countries. Thus, the legendary "Horse" series of Rado watches was born. The Green Horse was first in 1958, was eventually followed by the Golden, the Silver, the Purple, and possibly others that I am missing. These early Rado "Horse" series had a pressure rating of 12 atmospheres, or 120 meters in depth.'

Interesting additional detail from Shawkey that I wasn't aware of: 'They also did not feature a conventional screw back, but rather a pressure-fitted back where notches in the back line up with notches in the case. It requires a mere quarter-turn to "unlock" these cases. This is a feature that many collectors and watch technicians do not understand and, as a result, they damage these cases by trying to twist off the back as if it were threaded. The "Horse" series did very well in Asia. In fact, to this day, most of the vintage Rado "Horse" watches you see on eBay are coming out of Asia--notably Hong Kong, Japan and Singapore.'



> i have a rodo green horse, bought off of a forum member and can highly recomend then, personaly i think they are a stunning watch, dont pay some of the stupidly high prices they go for on e-bay though , ive seen them for sale at over Â£200, if i remember rightly mine cost nearer Â£40


You're quite right, I have seen some incredibly odd prices for this series of watches on ebay - I guess I'll just have to wait until one turns up on here or another forum. 



> I'm into Rado's but they're not mentioned that much on here.
> 
> Don't know of any reference sites for Rado but there's quite a good forum I check out now and again - although I'm not a member. If you Google "Rado Forum", it's the first one that comes up.
> 
> It's quite a slow moving forum but has lots of info in the threads. Green Horse's were a topic not long ago.


I haven't checked out this site yet, but I will do. Do you own any of the Rado 'horse' series watches?



> [Did i say ''Black'' horse in my earlier post.They DID also do a Purple horse,and Golden horse.But they are ALL pretty nice watches.What i would say to you messiaenic, is make sure you've checked out all the models and their year on year variations before deciding on a purchase.Maybe you could start by searching Google images for examples,There are some there.
> 
> Good Luck !.


Thanks for the tip! I think the complete 'horse' series colours were white, green, purple, silver and black - I've never seen a gold ' horse' watch though, and would love to see one 



johnbaz said:


> Here's my green horse (sellers pic on fleabay)
> 
> the bracelet was miles to small so i bought another from fleabay and haven't got around to fitting it yet :no:
> 
> ...


That's a lovely example of the series. Some of this series has the day/date at the bottom, with the horse logo moved over to the left. In fact, why don't people post photo's of their Rado 'horse' watches on this thread - it would be great to see all the variations. Oh, and should one of you be itching to sell your fine example, well, I know of a suitable home for it.


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## Barryboy (Mar 21, 2006)

I was quite keen on Rados for a while, and actually failed to find out much about the brand at all.

Here's the one that I had - the Rado Starliner. I preferred this one to the 'Horse' series simply because it's a bit bigger.










The 'horse' variants don't really differ a lot in appearance, and there is an 'Antelope' series as well, but they are very rare. Good luck in finding good examples - a tip I was given is that some of them had 23J movements and they are the ones to go for.

Rob


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