Congrats,
I have got a couple of Seiko watches and I love them .
For watch modding I know two great guys :
www.mullerandson.com (he also sells on ebay )
www.luciusatelier.com
When you search for Seiko mods you will be seeing tons of modders as well .
I like Luminox watches but as far as I'm concerned Luminox don't offer automatic watches .I may be sounding like an automatic watch snob , believe not, I can't stand "limping" second hand for the chronograph when I want to track some events . Another reason why I love Seiko quartz chronographs because their movements track the time 1/5th to the second which is cool
If you want a rugged tool watch and automatic then you should be considering Sinn .
Longines , Tissot, Hamilton , Certina makes decent watches as well . None of them are independent but that doesn't matter