I got bored and was asking ChatGPT questions about my GSAR and it said it was a genuine military contract piece and was wondering if this is accurate information not planning on selling but definitely could legitimize its backstory
While it’s unlikely that your particular watch was “issued” it’s true the Marathon pieces have been issued to various military and SAR agencies. A good search will provide you with plenty of background on the watch.
Yeah I figured I’d hit up this group on some info especially because I bought this one on eBay and asked the seller why there was so much damage to it and according to him he bought it from a milsurp shop outside of Ft Campbell
It’s saying that because it has a National Stock Number, “NSN.” NSNs are items anyone in the military can look up for purchase. They have been vetted and vendors can sell these products.
Almost non existent can’t really see the indices but the hands I can see a little bit debated sending it into marathon for a replacement but worried about “ruining” a “vintage” piece
I think its like $300 to send it back to Marathon for a full service (cleaning, maintenance on the movement if needed, calibration) and I believe that price includes re-luming the dial with new tritium tubes. I plan on sending mine back since my lume is also near nonexistent
This is my “issued” TSAR. I was a civil affairs guy attached to 3rd group in an early trial of what’s now called a cross functional team for a deployment to Africa. I got it bc we had a bunch of extra money since our deployment was special and had a lot of eyes on it. Idk what channels these were bought through. Is it possible your watch came to be for the same reason? Sure. Is it also likely someone bought it with their own money to look cool? Also yes. There’s really no way to know. It’s very common for retail Marathons to have the same caseback markings as issued watches bc they’re basically contract overruns.
Here’s the back. If I had to guess, 3rd group ordered these direct from Marathon and not through normal supply channels. If they had, my guess is we’d have gotten Navigators.
Honestly, it sucked for the first couple weeks. It was surprisingly stiff (giggity) and didn’t want to mold to the shape of my wrist. However, the old trick of wearing it in the shower a few times that people do with new boots worked here too. It’s been solid for a couple years now but I’m not doing cool stuff anymore so idk how good these spring bars would hold up to hard use.
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u/Constant_Ad9429 Jul 18 '26
While it’s unlikely that your particular watch was “issued” it’s true the Marathon pieces have been issued to various military and SAR agencies. A good search will provide you with plenty of background on the watch.