Making a Gold Bezel for a Vintage Omega.

Hello everyone.

Some time ago a customer brought in his old 18ct Omega automatic with a view to getting a new gold bezel for it. He assumed (fairly enough) that it would be a fairly simple matter of ordering the part from Omega. Unfortunately a little research on my part quickly revealed that this was a very unusual, probably hand made, probably Italian, gold case, and there was no way Omega were going to be able to supply any case parts at all. There wasn't even a factory glass listed for it. Some time in the past the original bezel had been lost, and a watchmaker had jury-rigged a repair by mashing an acrylic glass into the case and then clipping a piece of 18ct gold wire around the outside. This makeshift bezel could actually be quite easily removed with a finger nail, and not surprisingly the customer was hoping for something better.

I probably should have said "no I can't help" but sometimes my desire to do what others can't (or just won't) gets the better of me, so I told him I'd have a go. The difficulty was compounded immensely by the fact that the bracelet is hard soldered to the case, so that couldn't come off, and the bezel clips into a groove cut into the case, which being a bit, shall we say 'agricultural' in execution means the tolerances were all over the place. It was never going to be easily to make something fit.

The first thing I did was fire up the lathe and turn up a test bezel out of aluminium, just to test the principle. It wasn't perfect. I did it a bit in a rush (time is money after all) and it came out of the chuck and got a bit mangled at least once. But it did sort of clip in tight enough to convince me it was doable.

The next piece of the puzzle was to go and talk to a jeweller who was able to make a 3D drawing of what I wanted and then print a wax model for me.  (Isn't modern technology a hell of a thing?) Actually he gave me two which is why I still had one to take photos of. I started this project long before I started the blog, so I never took photos of the process. It just spent a long time languishing in what I call my "too hard basket". But I digress. Actually, come to think of it, when I outlined my plan the jeweller raised an eyebrow at me and said he didn't think it would work....   It did.

Anyway, I then took that small piece of wax to Regal Castings up in Mount Eden and they turned it into a VERY EXPENSIVE exact copy cast in 18ct yellow gold. It was at this point that I got my first shock. It cost considerably more than I had calculated, but since I had now just forked over several hundred dollars for it, I was past the point of no return. If I wanted to avoid taking a complete bath on this project then I was going to have to complete it.... Even then it was never going to be profitable... Just educational.... which is why I'm now sitting here typing and trying to make some mileage out of it.

Ok, so I had a lump of gold in the basic shape of the bezel, (which sadly I never thought to photograph) but casting isn't very exact, and I had given generous measurements to make sure I could turn it down to suit. The next part of the process was to put it back in the lathe and make it fit the watch case.... and look nice. This involved turning up various jigs and holders out of alloy so that I could work on it without it flying out of the lathe and getting mangled like my alloy test piece. I started with a chunk of alloy bar stock and once I had done one operation I then modified it for the next operation. As a result I only have the final jig left to photograph for your edification.

I was having a lot of trouble getting the bezel to fit nicely into the groove in the case, let alone clip in place, due to the lack of accuracy in said groove. Around by the crown it was fitting nicely, but the other side wouldn't fit. I tried filing it, and then using a graver around the groove itself to open it up a bit, and eventually just went back to the lathe and turned a bit too much off the piece of the bezel designed to fit inside the groove. Great. It now sat down on the case absolutely beautifully.... It just didn't clip. What to do, what to do?

Hmmm, time to use some lateral thinking. I fitted a piece of stainless steel bar stock in a tool holder in the lathe, brought it in on an angle to the bezel and very carefully turned the bezel by hand so that the stainless acted as a burnisher and very slowly formed the bezel 'clip' so that it splayed outwards. Pretty much the opposite process of making a rubbed over setting to hold a stone in a ring. Mercifully it worked perfectly and I finally had something I could glue a glass into and clip onto the watch.

From my point of view it isn't perfect. If I had to do it again I would make it a little taller to allow a deeper seating for the glass, but really that's just a minor quibble.

I'm happy.
I hope the owner will be too.

I Can Make Your Watch Look NEW!

A wee while ago a customer brought in her Omega watch. The glass was quite scratched, and it looked generally rather worse for wear, so we discussed fitting a new sapphire crystal. she liked that idea, and was even happier when I suggested I could re-groom the case to make it look like new again. I ordered a new factory glass and gasket, and she took her watch home to wear while we waited. The glass had to come from Switzerland, so there was a bit of a wait, but it arrived just the other morning, and she dropped the watch off later that same day.

I started stripping the case down before I got the idea to do a blog entry on it, so the photos pick up around the time I realized I needed to make a special tool to help disassemble the case. I could probably have cheated and mumbled something along the lines of "best I could do etc..." but this is a diamond set Omega with solid 18ct yellow gold bezel and tubes in the bracelet, so it had to be done right.

So the first photo I took is of making a tool to help me remove the bezel. Without doing this I would not be able to re-grain the case properly. Normally in the past I have found these bezels come out a little differently, but I think this was the first diamond-set version I've done, so it was a bit of a learning experience.... anyway, I used this little jig to reach the inside lip of the bezel and used a wooden mallet to lightly tap around the case, rotating it all the time. Bronte the apprentice was away sick, so not having three hands, I had to do the camera work myself... hence no action shots.

All that dirt is actually quite bad for your links. It causes significant wear in the stainless pins holding it all together and causes the bracelet to stretch. Regular ultrasonic cleaning (which we can do for you) is the best protection for your watch.

On the right here is the glass gasket. A nylon seal which the glass pushes into forming a very tight seal. Over time these crack under our strong UV conditions, and let in moisture. This one is going to be replaced.

So as you can see, the case is quite scratched, and quite dirty. This is entirely normal. We expect a lot from our watches. We wear them all the time in all sorts of conditions, and don't really notice how dirty they are getting until we see them post cleaning. The series of shots below show some of the cleaning process. I started with a new batch of cleaning solution in my ultrasonic tank so you can see the progression.

In the tank, but tank not turned on.

About 5 seconds after starting ultrasonic.

About 20 seconds after starting ultrasonic.

The ultrasonic tank is heated and when switched on, the transducers bonded to the bottom pulse at somewhere around 40-somthing kilohertz.  This causes cavitation in the liquid.... Microscopic air bubbles collapse and flash to high temperature. This removes deep down dirt and grease that we simply couldn't remove any other way.

Now that the watch is clean, it's time to do something about the scratches. This watch has a mix of 18ct gold which is relatively soft, and 316 stainless steel, which isn't. And the stainless pieces all have a satin grain on them, while the gold has a full gloss finish. This is one of the reasons I had to remove the bezel. I simply couldn't re-grain the stainless case properly with that soft gold in the way. The bracelet is somewhat different as you will see.

The first step is to polish everything to full gloss. On the stainless pieces, this usually takes two different grades of polish. One to remove the scratches, and one to restore a mirror finish. The gold is soft enough that I can skip straight to the mirror finish compound. So ironically, a solid gold case is cheaper and easier to do than a full stainless one.

One hand on the camera. I would never actually polish a piece one handed. There is quite a lot of technique in polishing things safely and accurately when your buff is spinning at 5,500 rpm.

The glossed case and my fingers all covered in polish.

It has been back into the ultrasonic, and now I'm brushing it to make sure it's totally clean. After this I use a high powered air gun to blow all the residual grit and moisture out of the links.

Then it goes on top of the espresso machine to dry. The top is heated to warm up the espresso cups, but it has been used to dry thousands of watch cases.... and make a lot of coffees.

Now for the really laborious bit. All the glossy bits have to be taped off with this special tape so I can restore the satin finish. This roll of tape is exactly the right width to cover one link and the gold tubes either side. After doing all these links, top bottom and sides, I pull off all the tape and do the alternate links. The taping has to be perfect. I don't want sloppy finishing.

I have various grades of satin finish buff.

Grooming completed. Time to unpack the factory sapphire glass. I think this might have been an upgrade to this watch, as the old glass was quite badly scratched, which sapphire shouldn't do. I actually demonstrate this in the shop by attacking the front of my watch with a file. The glass is harder than the file.

As a side not at this point, I can often offer an upgrade service to watches with scratched glasses. We can either fit a new mineral glass, or for a bit more cost is is often possible to fit a generic sapphire glass, which should retain it's appearance for years. It isn't always possible to do, but feel free to ask. In this case, because of the domed profile, and the particular thickness of the glass, and frankly, due to the value of the watch, we were always going to fit a factory original.

Anyway, at this point I realized none of the dies for my glass press were appropriate to re-fit the bezel, so it was back to the lathe and the milling machine with a piece of scrap aluminium to quickly whizz up a new die. You'll see why.

Bezel (and those darn lugs... not sure what else to call them) in place.....

......and fitted. I have a fair few specially made dies for various cases. It's one of the big advantages in having a workshop like mine. If I don't have the right tool for the job I just make one.

Change to the appropriate sized stock die to push in the glass......

....and done.

The movement is back in, and I've fitted a new battery just because...

And done!

No that isn't my wrist. At this point Bronte was back on deck and happy to model it for me.

So that's how we do it!

I think you will agree that all the work that went into this was well worth it. The customer was certainly chuffed with the result.

If your prized watch is looking a bit weathered, then bring it in, or snap a photo and email it to me for a free no obligation quote. There are few aspects of the job that bring me quite as much pleasure as giving you back a watch that not only works perfectly, but looks amazing too!

Blair.