The Breitling Watch Blog

I probably should have posted this before, but it just occured to me. Ever wonder how to pronouce some of those Watch company names? Like Jaeger-LeCoultre? or Audemars Piguet? Well, here is a list of Watch brands and related watch terms and an AUDIO TRACK(!) for each one. No need to read phonetics, this ones read out for you!

Here’s the list:

Audemars Piguet
Bertolucci
Baume & Mercier
Blancpain
Breguet
Breitling
Bucherer
Cartier
Chopard
DJ Richard
Doppelchronograph
Dubey & Schaldenbrand
Dubois & Depraz
Philippe Dufour
Jacques Etoile
Fliegerchronograph
Franck Muller
Forget
Gerald Genta
Glasshutte Original
Girard Perregaux
Hublot
IWC (in German)
Jaquet Droz
Jaeger LeCoultre
Lange & Sohne
Longines
Maurice Lacroix
Montblanc
Muhle Glasshutte
Parmigiani
Officine Panerai
Paul Picot
Patek Philippe
Rado
Rattrapante
Roberge
Roger Dubuis
Revue Thommen
Schwarz-Etienne
Tissot
Universal Geneve
Ulysse Nardin
Vacheron Constantin
Van der Bauwede
Van der Klaauw
Valjoux
Sinn EZM
Zenith (in German)
Tourbillon
Finissage
Perlage
Equation du Temps
ETA
F.P. Journe
Glycine
Guilloche
Helvetia
Lemania
Limes
Ollech & Wajs
Piaget
Pythagore
Reserve de Marche
Rolex
Schaffhausen
Sjoo Sandstrom
Sonnerie
Traversetolo
Tutima
Le Vallee de Joux

And here’s the link:
http://www.chronometrie.com/watchsounds/watchsoundspage.htm

One of the most frequent questions that potential watch buyers have is whether they should buy a watch online or from an authorized brick and mortar dealer (AD). Well, each has their pros and cons, and it depends on what kind of buyer you are for the most part.

I recall an article written in the Watches and Jewellery section of the Financial Times on November 10, 2007 entitled “Time for the Exchange of your Life”. It was a very well written article explaining the merits of buying from an authorized dealer, and how the relationship between the watch dealer and the buyer differs from most commercial transactions. More specifically, the article states that “to be sold a watch is to enter a drama that is part seduction and part entertainment”.

I have purchased watches from online sources as well as brick and mortar ADs, and I think I am a little more objective than most as I do see the merits of buying from both. Quite often I end up buying used from friends or acquaintances when they are hard up for cash or need to make room for other watches in their collections.

Buying Online

Generally speaking, people buy online because they feel that they can get better pricing, and with collectors that buy watches as often as once a week, it becomes a lot of cost effective as well as convenient to purchase online, with virtually every brand available at your fingertips.

Another additional benefit of buying online is the availability of previously owned pieces. There is an ever-growing community of online watch buyers and sellers who are constantly updating and upgrading their collection of watches, and are more than happy to buy your used watches from you only to sell them again in 6 months (or less!).

There are obvious cons to purchasing online, the most prevailing of which is the chance of purchasing a fake. There are many steps that you can take to make sure that your online purchase is authentic, the most effective of which is “Buy the Seller, not the watch”. When buying online, especially at auction, it can be easy to get caught up in the excitement of the purchase and the beautiful pictures. The single most important thing to keep in mind when purchasing online is to make sure the seller is legit and trustworthy. Buying from forums where sellers will often have a long history of buying and selling is useful to check their track record. Ebay is great because of the feedback system, but remember not to take it at face value as ebay accounts can be purchased as well as hijacked and use for malicious behaviour.

If buying a watch online from one of the many grey market dealers, you need to keep in mind that many of them sell watches with incomplete papers and filed-off serial numbers in order to protect their sources. This devalues a watch and also means that Breitling will not service the watch directly. You will not be able to send the watch in to Breitling, and instead will have to rely on your local AD repairing the watch in-house. Take note of this in the watch description and call if it is not mentioned. There are many grey market dealers that also sell fully serialized watches with complete papers as well. They will, however, not come with a Breitling factory warranty. They are usually warranted by the dealer for the same amount of time as a factory warranty would be. Not quite as good as the real deal, but quite acceptable in many cases.

There are times when you may want to purchase some accessories online, even though you have purchased your watch from an authorized dealer. This is also a good way to save money, but remember that many accessories sold online are often fakes as well and are quite often more difficult to spot than the watch itself.

In summary, buying online is best reserved for those with experience making online purchases and know the markets well enough that they can prevent themselves from being ripped off. There are a lot of good reasons for buying online, with price and selection being the two biggest. I’ve listed of the general pros and cons below.

Pros:

1. Typically more Cost Effective
2. Greater Brand Selection
3. Secondary Market for even more savings
4. Great for people who buy and sell frequently

Cons:

1. Chances of buying a fake are greater
2. Less of a dealer-buyer experience
3. No freebies like Hats, Pens, Etc.
4. Warranty Is not Factory

Buying from a Dealer

For your first watch, I would always recommend buying from a dealer. It takes away that tiny bit of doubt that many people will always have when buying online as to whether or not the timepiece is authentic. All grey market dealers sell authentic watches as they typically obtain them from authorized dealers themselves.

When you purchase your watch from your a local authorized dealer, you create an opportunity to develop a relationship that can last a long time. Every time you come in, they will tell you about any new stuff that is come in, and will likely start to give you some free stuff to entice you into considering another purchase. Usually watch staff are not pushy, unless you are in a tourist location since you will not be coming back again.

A lot of buyers like to buy the watches overseas to save on taxes, and then just wear the watches back on their wrists. This can save you some money, but in the long run it is not always the wisest choice as it makes reselling the watch difficult if you do not keep the boxes (you can, however, ship them back to yourself), and when you are buying from the same dealer locally more than once, he will give you benefits such as reduced prices and other perks. The better long term decision, especially if you are choosing to purchase more than one watch, is to buy locally.

The two biggest benefits of buying from any dealer are the guarantee of the origin and authenticity of the watch, and the warranty that comes with it. The biggest unseen benefit is the relationship that is created between dealer and buyer, and this can only be realized if you purchase the watch locally, or if you purchase it from a remote location that you visit regularly. Of course any benefit you would get from being a repeat customer would be moot if the watches you want are from different dealers. Also worth mentioning is the somewhat more limited selection available when shopping locally. No matter what city you are in, there will be at least one brand you cannot buy, including brands that only sell online. You will however have the opportunity to order any color configuration of the watch you are interested in from an authorized dealer, which you may not be able to do online.

There is something special about coming into your local dealer and having the people you usually deal with come to you with wonderful new toys to grace your wrist with.

Pros:

1. Authenticity Guarantee
2. Factory Warranty
3. Buying Experience

Cons:

1. More Expensive
2. Brand Selection is More Limited

Overall, buying a watch is a very personal experience and whether you buy online or from a local AD is your choice. I`ve tried to provide a decent amount of information here so that you can make an informed decision as to which one is right for you. More and more people are starting to buy luxury timepieces for the first time, and many are buying online for the first time, so some pointers can be useful. I hope you enjoyed the article!

With a watch that you wear daily, especially with a metal bracelet, you will inevitably get scratches. Whether it is Stainless Steel, Gold, or Platinum, they eventually show up, first starting as small swirlies then getting more and more perceptible until your watch no longer looks new.

I’m going to go over a few of the methods that I have used to maintain the and restore that fabulous lustre and shine that almost rivals a brand new watch! Well.. not really, but I will show you what I do to keep them looking as good as I can. There are several different types of finishes out there on the market, including PVD and Bead Blasted finishes that cannot be restored this way. I am going to go over restoring Brushed finishes only in this article. Stay tuned for polished finishes later!

Brushed Finishes
Here is an example of a typical brushed finish:

There are four methods of restoring brushed finishes that I have used: Micron Polishing Cloths, Nail Buffers, Fiberglass Pens, and Scotch Brite Pads.

Micron Polishing Cloths

These are in my opinion the best tool for restoring a brushed finish. These are availalble in two different grits for brushed finishes: 15 and 30 Micron. Usually you can start with 30 micron and work down to the 15, or just use the 30 if the brushed finish is a rougher one. They are sold by Watch Band Renew, and come with finer micron polishing cloths for restoring a polished finish as well fairly detailed instructions on how to use them.

Nail Buffer

These come in a variety of shapes and sizes but the ones that I feel work well are like sandpaper impregnanted sponge blocks. They are a bit more flexible than sandpaper and tend to come in fairly fine grits, and while you can use sandpaper to restore a brushed finish as well, the nail polishing blocks come in slightly more convenient packages, and often with multiple grits in one block as seen above. You can just brush your watch or bracelet in the direction of the existing lines, starting with the roughest grit first and working your way finer.

Nail Buffers can usually be picked up in the cosmetics section of any drugstore or wal-mart location near you.

Fiberglass Pen

Fiberglass pens are very good for spot-fixes of bracelets and cases, and often getting those hard to reach areas, however they are of limited use when you are trying cover a large area, or renewing an entire watch as it is difficult to get long straight lines with them. Think of the Fiberglass Pen as the “Tide Pen” of brushed watch finishes.

These are readily available on eBay or from various watch assessory sites online.

Scotch Brite Pads

Scotch Brite pads may seem like a crude way of restoring that finish to your watch, but they do a great job. While they are not offered in a variety of grits, which reduces their versatility somewhat, they are easy to obtain. The Scotch Brite pad is a mildly abrasive pad, which creates brush lines when it is used on metal. If you’ve ever used a scotch brite pad on your knives, you will probably be aware of that!

Simply brush in the direction of the existing brushmarks on your watch, and they should help cover up any scratches!

Hope you enjoyed the article, I’ll be writing up a similar one on Polished finishes as well, but they are more work to restore, so the article will be significantly longer.

Hi Guys, just want to remind you guys about watchtrader.ca. I started it almost a year ago as a place for Canadians to list local watches for sale and trade, so we don’t have to deal with customs. We all know how great it is to send expensive watches over the border and receive them, and have customs hold them for long periods of time. No more!

Buy and sell your watches with watchtrader.ca. I even have forums set up.. though they are pretty dead. But the registration is running out, and if no one is using it, its not really worth it for me to maintain it. So hopefully there are some Canadians out there that want to buy/sell and trade watches!

Check it: http://watchtrader.ca/

First a disclaimer: I do not recommend that you do this, but because I’ve received several emails regarding how this is done, and also several emails about where to buy the case back opener I used in the Panerai video, I decided to write a post on it. Opening a watch and servicing and regulation should be done by an experienced professional. However if you are so inclined, you can give it a shot.

Opening a Breitling Caseback

Breitling Casebacks have 15 sides, which make them a bit odd and seemingly at first difficult to open. However, they can be opened with a simple high quality Jaxa opener. This MAY slightly damage or put small dents in the case back sides as the Jaxa openers do not fit perfectly. Remember if you open the case, a proper case holder should be used as well to secure the case.

A Jaxa tool looks like this:

The more proper way to open a Breitling caseback is to use a Breitling 15-sided caseback die designed for use in Horotec or Bergeon openers. These are large devices with big wheels on the top that look something like this:

The Breitling Die (and Panerai Dies too for that matter) look like this:

They fit into the Opener and open the caseback without damaging it. The case openers are expensive, at around $600, and the caseback dies are about $80 each. You will need a different size depending on the size of your Breitling.

Opening a Panerai Caseback

Opening a Panerai Caseback is a bit easier (cheaper!) to do without damaging your watch. There are caseback dies just like the Breitling ones, but with 12 sides as Panerai casebacks have 12 sides. Panerai Casebacks also come in 3 different sizes, for which you can use any of the above mentioned methods of opening just as the Breitling cases can be opened, but there are aluminum hand held openers for panera casebacks that work very well.

These caseback openers are made from Aluminum, which is softer than the Steel used in your case so it is less likely to scratch it. Also they offer very good grip and cost from about $50-100, depending on where you purchase them from. Strap-works sell thems for $85 IIRC:

This is the opener I used in the fake Panerai video. I cranked that guy open since my friend did give me permissions and its a fake watch. I have also opened my PAM250 without problems, so it works with the real deal as well!

Anyway.. don’t blame me if you break something. I don’t recommend you do this unless you feel comfortable with it, and even then, I recommend finding a quality watchmaker to fix your watch is something is awry.