The Breitling Watch Source Forums

In December 2007, I purchased from a AD my first Breitling - a Colt GMT. I LOVE the watch. I have always been a fan of Breitlings, and thought that this watch would be the first in a small collection for me. Right up until 6 months after purchasing the watch, when it stopped running.

In early June 2008, the minute hand started "sticking" at the 10 minute mark every so often. The second hand would continue to run, but there would be no movement of any other hands nor of the date dial. I promptly took the watch back to the AD, and from there the watch was sent off to Breitling for service.

Ten weeks later, the dealer called me and informed me that my watch had finally arrived, fixed and ready to go. It certainly felt good having it back on my wrist! Right up until five hours later when I noticed that my time was off by about 30 minutes. Sure enough, the second hand was running smoothly, but the minute and hour hands had stopped (this time the minute hand was at the 35 minute mark). I reset the watch, and it ran smoothly for about 40 minutes, before the hands stopped moving again (this time at the 20 minute mark). As always, the second hand continued running smoothly.

The next morning I promptly returned to the AD. They were shocked, offered numerous apologies, promised to call their Breitling rep, etc etc etc. That was less than a week ago. My watch is apparently back at Breitling for further "service."

I have always heard about the reliability of Breitling watches, the "toughness" of the Colt, and craftmanship that goes into building these watches. When I had the watch, I wore it every day - but as an accountant, I wouldn't consider the watch having been put through rough wear and tear. Am I missing something? Are Breitlings not the fine crafted watches that I thought they were? Have you heard of quality control issues with Breitling?

Any thoughts or insights (or sympathies) that you have would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks!

Well sympathies are easy - I do feel for you.

I do consider Breitlings to be exceptional quality timepieces, but they are made by hand and your Colt has a lot of moving parts manufactured in a very small size to tolerances that have to be extremely tight - sub micron level in some cases. As such there are mistakes made - there is a pievce that gets through that causes problems, and I suspect that is what is happening here - a piece of the movement is slightly outside of the tolerances and it has taken a while for that fault to show up. As you said there were no indications of problems for the first 6 months, so not really fair to expect QC to pick it up.

Where I do see a problem is in the apparently increasing trend by Breitling to give warranty issues a 'basic' service first time around and only givethe fully comprehensive 'complete' service if the problem persists. Their argument is obviously that a complete service costs them more and is often unnecessary - I suspect that you have a different view!

I suspect that this time your issue will be resolved, but if not I would talk to the AD about a replacement watch - they should be interested in ensuring that you remain a happy Breitling customer, and it does sound like they are helping.

I can understand the frustration, and to know that you are just the unlucky one out of however many isn't much consolation, but this isn't an exact science.

Not much more I can add to Roff's excellent reply, other than I feel for your frustration, and I guess it's human nature to be irritated at the entire brand and question their QC processes in general, but I simply think you've just been very VERY unlucky. I know that's not going to make you rest any easier, but once Breitling pull their finger out and sort this issue out for you, you'll be able to start enjoying your great timepiece again.

Hope it all works out for you.

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Driver8

Site Moderator

Thank you for the insights.

No matter how good of a QC process any manufacturer has is place, it is certainly naive to expect that every product will be perfect, especially considering the complexity of a product like a Breitling. I guess I was more interested in whether folks had become aware of any trends either at Breitling or with the Colt.

I find it interesting that you brought up the "basic" service point. I never mentioned in my post the type of service that was performed, but you were dead on. When I opened my warranty booklet and saw the "basic" service notation, I didn't think much of it, until I poked around some of the other threads and found the video of what goes into a "full" service. What then "basic" service actually entail?

I'm not sure what a basic service is, my guess would be that it's a disassembly, visual inspection and reassembly with fresh lubricants.

When it comes to warranty work I would expect that a complete service would also include replacement of the parts that might be responsible for the problem, even if there is no visible problem.

Others may be able to provide a more comprehensive answer.

I've certainly not come across any specific issue trends with Breitling or the Colt. As you rightly say, no matter how good QC is, when you are dealing with very small mechanical components in the reasonably high numbers that Breitling produces, inevitably some problems will slip through the net. Fortunately if this forum is anything to go by, the percentage is thankfully small. Unfortunately for you, you were one of them.

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Driver8

Site Moderator

Sorry to hear of your problems. As Driver and Roffensian, I believe you've had more than your fair share of bad luck for a long while. I really hope it gets sorted very quickly.

And as you say - no matter what QC process you have, there's always a risk (but it might decrease a lot with the right system/tools) something slips.

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