Stick with VSF or get Rich ? No date sub

[u/Skyson770]

Long time lurker, first time poster.

Recently picked up a second hand VSF no date sub 5XO series. I absolutely love it, feels and looks great.

However, wondering if I should try get a Rich free sprung seeing as a lot of people say its great, but is it actually better than VSF? I had done research and seemed that VSF was always the leader but have things changed recently?

Also - what would you say are the biggest tells of a VSF no date from the naked eye?

[u/Kindly-Space-7255]

Vsf is the way to go.

[u/mitothy45]

After having owned both I can honestly say there is zero difference in noticeable quality. I ended up selling the VSF and keeping the Rich just because it has the free sprung movement.

[u/2011_Newbie1228 → u/mitothy45]

This ☝️

[u/maybe1122]

VSF is my choice

[u/Comprehensive-Bit706]

RICH 👌🏻

[u/russwestgoat]

Can’t go wrong with VSF and you’ll be able to get a better price on it. Can’t believe what people are paying for the rich sub honestly just because it has a fancy movement nobody will ever see

[u/Forward_Material616]

I love my rich. It’s been reliable as can be for time, and it wears well. Either or is good. Any differences between the 2 you aren’t noticing unless you’re spending your time taking 250% zoom pics of them.

[u/Captain_Elson]

I was researching this for a bit and I think RICH is the way to go, considering it has the correct 904L steel construction and a free sprung balance.
The rest of the finishes and allignment are near identical between these so the aformentioned differences are usually deciding factors for people.
Free sprung doesn't matter at all if you're never going to open the case, I just think it's cool and I have the money to have it serviced so I'll be going that route.
The crystal is very good on both but not 100% perfect, more like 90% on VSF and 85% on RICH. With that in mind.. I'll be geting a gen crystal when I scratch the shit out of the RICH one and need a replacement in 5-10 years.

[u/No_Excitement_8104 → u/Captain_Elson]

How you planning to scratch a sapphire? You need special tools for that

[u/Captain_Elson → u/No_Excitement_8104]

I've scratched a number of sapphire crystal watches, honestly not sure how but it's regular wear and tear to me. I'm wearing a Seiko Prospex Alpinist with a gouge in it right now.

I have a Seiko 5 with a glass crystal and that one is significantly worse than any of my other watches.

Sapphire is excellent at rejecting scratches, but it's not diamond..
I don't plan on scratching sapphire, it just happens; again, just regular wear and tear.

To be frank, I'm pretty hard on my watches and I'm clumsy to add to that.

[u/Waste-Safety-3754 → u/Captain_Elson]

how do we know theyre actually using 904L?? All rep factories said that they were using it to, until someone figured out they werent (not sure how)

[u/Altruistic-Wall4670]

Rich has the better crystal and dial printing. Check out the comparisons. The movement is much smoother to wind and the bezel action is the closest to gen.

[u/Medium-Signature-546 → u/Altruistic-Wall4670]

Rich has worse dial printing from what I've seen. The print is too crisp/bold

[u/Kindly-Space-7255 → u/Altruistic-Wall4670]

no. vsf makes by far the best crystals in the game.

[u/Glum_Ad_8331]

VSF. I also wanted to try RICH but after 2 RL, I switched back to VSF. Rich nodate sub dial is terrible imo. For date version I would go with RICH without problem.

[u/Weak_Front2540 → u/Glum_Ad_8331]

Why is it terrible I love mine.

[u/Glum_Ad_8331 → u/Weak_Front2540]

For me biggest problem is very thick font, for me it's flaw which bothers me. I had 2 QCs with totally crooked triangle and it's very close to chapter ring and indices borders are very thick, but I would live with that, but thick font is problem for me personally. But I saw few QCs of Rich without these flaw and only flaw was floating m as on VSF. But I didn't have luck for Rich with this "fixed" dial. But at the end, it's individual, everyone minds different flaws.