November 2007


That’s a good question. In my mind, if the crown falls off the watch, it should be fixed by Breitling under warranty… that’s assuming it unscrewed from the stem. However, if it snaps off the stem, then that’s a bit more difficult. Was it abused? Was it a fault stem? These are things that Breitling must consider when looking at the problem.

I received an email from someone and the email says this:

“Hello there! Thank you for your website, it was really helpful, I have fews questions that I hope will get an answers.
My father bought almost 10k for breitling watch. Last time, he lightly pull out a dial(knob) to change the time, and that little knob fall off. I sent it to Breitling to fix it, they charge me $984 to fix it. My father just bought a watch last year, warranty is 3 years. Should they fix this with no charge. Becuase it is such an expensive watch, and you lightly pull out a dial to turn the time, it fall out and they considered this not cover in the warranty. You know a lot about watch. What should I do? Can you please advice.
It is so unreasonable that I bought a watch, and something wrong with the dial installment, I have to pay to get it fix? So, they meant that Breitling is made out of cheap materials and cheap equipment? For example, if something wrong with the chain then it is our responsibility to fix it, but there should not be any wrong with the watch right? The dial is 18kt gold, and the watch is expensive, my father treat it very nice and genlte.
SO, what shoud I do now??
thank you for your time reading this, I really appreciated it.”

Now, warranty is usually 2 years, so I’m not sure where they got 3 years. I am waiting on a reply from her since $984 is an incredibly large amount of money to fix a broken crown stem. If its costing that much to fix whatever it is sounds like it should be under warranty, unless they smashed the watch against some pavement or something.

But it made me think. What if your crown does fall off? Is that covered? What if you take your watch swimming, is that covered? The Breitling warranty manual is somewhat ambiguous when it comes to what it covers. I personally have had no experience with Breitling Warranty as I have had no problems with my watches. I took them in for servicing and that was that. I had to pay.

I’m hoping some of you guys might be able to chip in or shoot me an email with some info!

The seventh annual Watchmaking Grand Prix celebrated earlier this month is the Oscars of the Watchmaking world. All the big players were there, and HublotTV provides us with Internet Video coverage!

Big Players at the awards included Harry Winston, A Lange & Sohne, Hublot, Patek Phillipe, Vacheron Constantin, Jaeger LeCoultre, Audemars Piguet, and many many more. This is truly a star-studded Horological event! Would have been awesome to be able to go there and see it in person.

Some of the winners (Laureates):

Golden Hand Grand Prix Prize
RM012
Richard Mille

Special Jury Prize
Reverso Grande Complication à Triptyque
Jaeger-LeCoultre

Best Watchmaker Prize
Jean-Marc Wiederrecht
Agenhor SA

Ladies’ Watch Prize
Ballon Bleu
Cartier

Men’s Watch Prize
Observatoire
Kari Voutilainen

Design Watch Prize
Millenary Watch with Deadbeat Seconds
Audemars Piguet

Jewellery Watch Prize
One Million Dollar Big Bang
Hublot

Complicated Watch Prize
Tourbillon Glissière
Harry Winston

Sports Watch Prize
Chronographe Royal Oak Offshore Alinghi Team
Audemars Piguet

Public Prize
Defy Xtreme Open Stealth
Zenith

Videos:

Part One:

Part Two:

For more info, visit World Tempus: http://www.worldtempus.com/wt/2/1182

Omega Speedmaster Schumacher Legend series watch, my first Omega Automatic Chronograph, and I’m quite impressed with it. Nice Column wheel chronograph movement based on the 33xx series of watch movements. Enjoy!

I’ve always wanted an Omega Seamaster… to be honest, I’ve always wanted the 3, 6, 9 subdial layout model, but that models also uses the 33xx series of movement from Omega, which I have heard has a lot of problems, which is unfortunate. So I have ended up with the Bond Seamaster, which uses a Valjoux 7750 movement, immediately identifiable by its subdial layout.

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This is a sweet watch, and I am really enjoying it. Interestingly so, it seems more busy to me than a Breitling does. Possibly because of the colors and the bracelet and the bezel. I really do like the divots in the bezel… they look really cool. Also its a very robust feeling watch, that doesn’t make me worry about scratching it so much as a Ling (not that I really worry too much about that anymore either).

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I’ve always loved the machined clasps that Omega uses on their watches. They are a bit hard to open sometimes and I have almost pinched myself pushing on the releases, but it looks very nice. No stamped steel here!

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As you can see, the 42mm diameter watch looks very appropriate on my smalle 6 3/4″ wrists. I think this one might be a keeper afterall!

seamaster_chrono_05.jpg

Previously, we talked about how Bear Grylls wears a Breitling Emergency. Well, turns out Bear is quite the watch enthusiast and now has another watch brand to promote, and that brand is Bremont. A new company out of the UK, Bremont focuses on Aviation watches built to highly exacting standards.

The cases are hardened to 2000 vickers, the hardest of any production watch on the market. Production is limited 1000 of each model, and the English brothers that head the company, Nick and Giles English (pun intended) are aviators themselves, each watch a COSC certified chronometre.

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Check ’em out:
http://www.bremont.com

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