You might be forgiven for assuming that in the case of mechanical watches, making the actions is the troublesome half, and all the things else simply slots into place. Typically which may properly be true—and Swiss manufacturers definitely place an infinite quantity of emphasis on the whirring ensemble of wheels and comes that tells the time.
However while you want the remainder of the watch to match as much as the identical degree of high quality, even essentially the most superficially unassuming elements could be surprisingly difficult to get proper, as Blancpain discovered when it set about creating a ceramic bracelet for its Fifty Fathoms Bathyscaphe.
{Photograph}: Blancpain
Years within the making, the bracelet makes its first look right this moment on a model new assortment of Bathyscaphe dive watches, the Fifty Fathoms Bathyscaphe Quantieme Complet Section de Lune—a whole calendar with moon part, which means a watch that shows the day, date, month and lunar cycle, however nonetheless requires guide adjustment on the finish of every month.
It’s an achieved watch in its personal proper, with a silicon escapement, three-day energy reserve, and that attribute dive bezel with a “liquidmetal” inlay for the textual content.
However what Blancpain is actually enthusiastic about is that, for the primary time, the Bathyscaphe—which has been accessible with a ceramic case since 2015—can now come on a bracelet to match.
It might have occurred years in the past; Blancpain’s mum or dad firm Swatch Group owns a specialist firm, Comadur SA, which produces ceramic bracelets for sister manufacturers Omega and Rado. However Blancpain’s guidelines, as one of many group’s most prestigious names, was very explicit, and led to the event of a totally bespoke bracelet, together with two new patents.
High of the checklist was a bracelet that will be as sturdy and resilient as a high-end dive watch would demand. The zirconium oxide used is understood for its floor hardness (scoring 7.5 on the Mohs scale, beneath diamond, at 10, and above titanium, a 6), and its superior strength-to-weight ratio—however it may be brittle.
Multi-link bracelet designs, the Blancpain staff defined, are liable to failure if the spacing between hyperlinks is just too slim and elements are allowed to rub towards one another. However make them too free, and never solely will the bracelet really feel cheaper and fewer safe, its hyperlinks will collide in different methods.
The reply was a fancy system of hyperlinks held collectively by titanium bars, each hand-screwed into place. Throughout the bracelet, every bar has a patented cam-shaped part that sits inside a flared recess within the aspect of the middle hyperlink. Because the bracelet flexes, the titanium cam is ready to transfer inside its recess, however no additional, which means the bracelet is supple inside a managed vary.
