The Breitling Watch Source Forums

I am looking to add a black coated bracelt to complement my Breitling Black Steel, Skyland.

I know about Argor that does the coating on the original peice and i'm waiting to hear back from them to see if they will coat a bracelet for me, but i'm also looking for alternative bracelets that would equally complement the watch

Kind regards

Dan

Pretty sure that blacksteel coating on the bracelets wears off with time. Ends up looking bad in the long run. Might be best to stick with black rubber/leather.

This, in my opinion, is one of the few Breitlings that can benefit from a custom strap with matching red stitching. Can look really sporty.

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“The only reason for time is so that everything doesn't happen at once.” - Albert Einstein

One of the characteristics of DLC is that it rubs itself so wear will be caused wherever links meet.

Cheers guys, points noted

Dan

Wait...what?!? So PVD/DLC coating will wear off? I thought the whole point of the coating was that it didn't wear off. I am looking for a sport watch that I can beat around a bit and not worry about, while still having a great looking watch. I had almost settled on getting a PVD/DLC watch but this may make me jump back to getting a brushed case instead.

PVD and DLC are very different beasts. PVD wears off very easily, it can even peel off in fairly large flakes. DLC is much more resilient, but can certainly wear in high rub areas - edges of the tang buckle for example. Additionally if the watch gets dinged then the bare metal can show through, although that's not the same thing.

However, one of the characteristics of DLC is that if two DLC coated parts are rubbing against one another - as would be the case in a bracelet, they will wear the coating from one another.

I thought that PVD was the process and DLC was the coating that is applied using the PVD process. Is that incorrect?

Yes you are correct - DLC is applied via a PVD process. However, in the watch world, PVD has come to mean a generic term for any surface coating other than DLC......, even though DLC is still a PVD process. As a term it also (quite incorrectly as it happens) includes the powder coating and black oxide anodization processes used in the 70's, 80's and 90's that wore incredibly badly.

DLC on the other hand has much greater wear resistance as it's a latest generation PVD coating (known as a "superlattice" due to it's structure), but as Roff said, it will still wear over time (and most of all if in contact with another DLC coated part) and can definitely be damaged if the substrate is soft enough to be dented.

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Driver8

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