The Breitling Watch Source Forums

My father always wore Rolex, and as I was young that's all I knew, and I did not understand the expense. My mother worked for Seiko, so my brother and I got great watches while growing up but I still did not have a grasp on it. Even in my twenties I did not understand and I stopped wearing watches for a while. A couple years ago I bought what I considered at the time an expensive watch for work, and it was only a few hundred dollars, if I only knew what was to come. Probably 18 months ago a few friends bought TAG's, at that time I started examining. After learning about mechanical watches, the craftsmenship, and how impressive a nice watch looked, in my thirties I finally got it. I started searching to find one I liked. After coming up empty last year a friend mentioned Breitling and that was it. I admired from a far for awhile, still rationalizing the expense. The mistake I made was stopping in the Breitling Boutique last November. It was the first time I ever wore a Breitling, or even held one. It was hard to put it back in the box and walk away. It took under a month of looking online until my girlfriend couldn't take it anymore and knowing I wanted that exact watch. Same one I tried on was there, and since December there has not been a day it hasn't been on my wrist.

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2012 Chronomat Blackbird LE

Some cool stories guys, great reading.
Keep them coming

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"It is just a matter of time!"

I've always been into watches, even when I was a little kid and I was one of the few kids at my infant school who had a watch! (A little Timex, followed by a blue Casio digital if I remember rightly).

Over the years I progressed through a load of watches, that all got more and more expensive, until around 1996 or 1997 when I started to look at "proper" expensive watches when I remember seeing a couple of adverts for Breitling watches in magazines like FHM. I then picked up a Chronolog from an AD and was absolutely smitten by the two-tone, blue dial, Crosswind they had in there. I remember drooling over that picture for ages, before finally coming to terms with the fact that I couldn't afford it! As a result I picked up a secondhand Chronomat before trading it against for a brand new Superocean around 1999. Never looked back.

The odd thing is, even to this day I've never owned that Crosswind that was actually responsible for getting me into Breitlings in the first place.

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Driver8

Site Moderator

What's it this one D8?
I nearly got this one six months ago in Taipei for a great price but someone beat me to it by a few hours.
I'm still kicking myself to this day that I've been stewing on it for several days.
Beautiful watch and I have not seen one since anywhere near the same price level

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"It is just a matter of time!"

Back in the early 90's my Aunt visited my family wearing a Lady J on bullet bracelt. At the time I was in my late teens and enamored with Rolex. I still am to this day. I remember getting a hold of a Breitling catalog and seeing the chronomats with the pilot bracelets and thinking wow! Rolex was still first place, but Breitling became second. It was several years before I finally got to hold one. I went through 4 or 5 Rolex watches before getting my first Breitling, a pre-loved, discontinued B-1 in 2009. To this day it is the only Breitling that I have, but I have my eye on serveral including the Steelfish, Navitimer World, Transocean Chronograph, and a B01 Chronomat! lol My eyes are much bigger than my budget! To curb my appetite, I have added a black ocean racer rubber strap, a dark brown calf strap on deployant, and a Pilot bracelet to swap out on my Black dial B-1 on the fighter bracelet. It is like having 4 watches in 1 with all the bracelet and strap opitions, which is one of the reasons I like Breitling.

I think I was like 6 or 7 looking at a tonneu (sp?) catalog and I remeber the ralley, but up until a few weeks ago until I saw one again I wouldn't have remebered that connection. http://www.breitlingsource.com/watch_de ... d_147.html

I can't pinpoint the exact moment in time but I think it may have been when I first visited (or even passed) Watches of Switzerland. Saw the Navi and immediately wanted it. That feeling hasn't faded despite owning one now for several years.

I've always been into watches and always wanted a Breitling; just one of those things.

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Happines is Good Health and a Bad Memory.
"Ingrid Bergman"

The breitling that hooked me is very similar
Hopefully one of these days ill have this watch !

I saw my first Breitling when I went to a jewelry store to purchase my first Omega. I was convinced the Seamaster was the watch for me, and I did buy it. But when I saw the Breitlings in the case, I knew I'd be back. Only took 2 months for me to buy a SO44, which I wear daily!

October of 1998 was when I first got the bug. I was 14 years old and was flipping though that month’s copy of Flight Journal and this ad for a black dialed Breitling Crosswind with a black leather band with white stitching caught my attention. I bought that magazine and kept it all these years looking at it every now and again. Last year I had had enough of just looking and tried on a piece at my local AD for the first time. Well now I really had to have one, I spent the next few weeks trying on different Breitling’s and drooling over the website trying to find the one. Six months went by before I settled on a Super Avenger and it took another 3 months for the dealer to get a black dialed baton marker one in for me, but that day almost 14 years later when I got the call that it was in was pretty exciting one.

About a year ago I was watching the Man Vs. Wild TV show with Bear Grylls and I thought his yellow watch was really interesting. I looked it up and found that it was a Breitling Emergency. A few months later when I wanted to buy some sort of dive watch, I decided to check Breitling's site. Upon seeing the Superocean 42, I knew that I had to have one and in December I bought an abyss red Superocean.

I must've been around 14-15 when I decided for myself that every watch next to the Navitimer was boring. The Navi thus began to make a regular appearance in my Christmas wishlists... But of course... To no avail.

Fast forward ten years. When I graduated from university and with some money I'd been able to earn along the way, I finally took the plunge and got to purchase one of the very last 01LEs available in Switzerland. I've had it for pretty much exactly one year now, and I couldn't be happier with it.

As one can see from my screen name, it's the watch that brought me here and the watch that got me into collecting.

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Cheers from Switzerland,

Fred

Yep, that's the one. It's still a very handsome looking watch today, but back then (and in Breitling's superb full-page Chronolog pictures) it was nothing short of stunning.

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Driver8

Site Moderator

I came to Breitling via vintage. I'd read about a Breitling watch in a novel quite a few years ago but then forgotten it. Then I was looking on eBay maybe 8 years ago and just scanning the brands. One suggested search was for Breitling. I saw the vintage 818 pictured below and fell in love. Saved for months then bought the sucker.

It must have been in 1994 or 1995 that I was reading Car and Driver magazine. I saw an advertisement for what I think was a Navitimer. I loved it from the moment I saw it. One day I made a trip to an AD and was stunned at the price. It was beyond my means as a college student. It took about 14 years of lusting, wishing, finally saying I can't spend "that kind of money" on a watch before my wife finally pulled the trigger for me and bought me a Motors T for Christmas in 2008. It's been down hill ever since.

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Regards,

Peter

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