The Rolex Cosmograph Daytona has been a collector’s favourite since its initial launch in the 1960s. While its early models featured a four-digit reference and were powered by manual-wound movements, Rolex introduced the ref. 16500 series in 1988 featuring for the first time a self-winding movement developed from the famous Zenith El Primero, cal. 400 and was modified by Rolex. The cal. 4030 was born with the adjustment of its oscillation from 36,000 vph to 28,800 vph reducing wear on its components, the date function was removed and the implication of a Glucydur balance wheel and a balance spring with Breguet overcoil. The new model featured a metallic bezel with tachymeter scale, a newly developed Oyster case with crown guards and screwed-down pushers evolving from the ref. 6265.

Released in stainless steel and yellow gold, the ref. 16528 belongs to the yellow gold version of the series with its earliest examples featuring a dial composed of porcelain and features a “Floating Cosmograph” dial layout where the “Cosmograph” sits slightly below the four lines of text below the coronet. Extremely rare, it is believed that the porcelain dials were only produced for a short period of time starting from R serial to early L serial from 1988 to early 1990. To avoid any confusion, the reason why the white lacquer dial named as “porcelain” is because it shares the features of enamel and porcelain, in that it is hard with polished finishing, while having a much lower production cost (firing is not required) but retaining a perfectly even surface. With two marks for porcelain dial examples, they were both made by Singer, the same maker for the exotic “Paul Newman” dials featured in rare examples of its ancestral models.

The present Rolex Cosmograph Daytona ref. 16528 with an “R83” serial from circa 1989 is an extremely rare sight. Featuring a MK1 200-unit bezel evolving from the ref. 6265, it is fitted with a concept porcelain dial featuring an unusual four lines of texts “OYSTER COSMOGRAPH SUPERLATIVE CHRONOMETER OFFICIALLY CERTIFIED” below the coronet, that is again very similar to the lines of texts seen in yellow gold examples of the ref. 6265. Furthermore, another interesting feature is its black “DAYTONA” inscription above the 6 o’clock register instead of its usual cherry coloured signature, hence earning its nickname the “Ying Yang” as seen in Pucci Papaleo’s Ultimate Rolex Daytona book. Though all these elements already separate the present example from regular examples of the reference, another interesting detail to take note of is its stick-style indexes that are once again reminiscent of the ref. 6265 with luminous plots dotted on the tip of the indexes instead of filled, yet another trait deriving from its manually wound counterparts. Finally, it also does not feature the “T Swiss Made T” designation at the bottom of the dial. With all these elements combined, the “Ying Yang” is a class of its own, in fact this is the very example featured in the Ultimate Rolex Daytona Book on pg. 573.

Featuring a concept or transitional dial that was developed as a prototype to early examples of the reference with porcelain dials. Highly important and only few examples are known in the market, the present example is well-preserved and is also highlighted by important Rolex scholars. Fresh-to-the-market, PHILLIPS is extremely humbled to be entrusted by the owner of the present timepiece to offer this extraordinary piece.