zOwie Omega Discussion Forum

Sorry to hear of your problem. While I can't say what circumstances led to your current predicament, I can say that in my year or so of participating in this and other Omega forums, this is the first time I've heard of such a problem.

I have three watches with saphire crystals, one of them a Bond SMP. I am very rough on my watches and unfortunately have banged the crystals of all three on a variety of surfaces many more times than I would like to admit. I have not a scratch or nick on any of them.

As a side point, you mentioned a dent on the bezel. If that dent occurred during the incident that broke the crystal, you may have hit the watch a lot harder than you think. After a year I don't have a single dent or scratch on my bezel, and as I said, I'm rough on my watches.

Saphire crystals are scratch resistant and strong, but as you found out, they can be broken. I suspect a similar blow to your other cheaper watches would have done them in as well.

: I bought my Omega partly because of the good
: stuff I read about it on this forum, so I
: thought it only fair that I should feed my
: bad experience back for the benefit of
: anyone else who's thinking of buying one.

: I bought a Bond-style SMP chronometer back in
: May. A week or two after purchase, I noticed
: that it was running slow and I contacted
: Omega who told me to measure the deviation
: over 15 days and then return the watch to
: the place of purchase, so they could
: calibrate it. After 15 days, it turned out
: the watch was running almost seven seconds
: slow, per day - i.e. outside the chronometer
: specifications.

: The day before I was planning to drop it back
: into the shop, I was walking through my
: front door, and knocked the watch against
: the door handle, which chipped the edge of
: the sapphire crystal and shattered part of
: it inside, so that the space between the
: inside of the crystal and the face ended up
: with lots of crystal chips in it.

: Needless to say, I was not impressed. I brought
: the watch back to the shop and they sent it
: away to Omega. After hearing nothing for
: three weeks, I went in today and the shop
: assistant phoned up Omega, to be told that,
: as far as they were concerned, the damage
: was "accidental damage", rather
: than a manufacturing defect with the watch
: itself, and that I would have to pay to have
: the watch fixed. They hadn't yet finished
: assessing the watch and couldn't yet tell me
: how much it was going to cost.

: They claimed that their assessment of the watch
: indicated that I had scraped the watch
: against something prior to banging it, and
: that this had chipped the crystal, weakening
: it, and that the subsequent bang against the
: door shattered the part of the crystal which
: had been weakened. They claimed that a dent
: on the bezel was consistent with this story.

: This, as far as I'm concerned, is bull. I would
: have noticed if the sapphire was chipped.
: And, in any case, if the sapphire crystal is
: so weak that it can be chipped by scraping
: the watch against something, then they
: shouldn't have designed the watch in such a
: way that the crystal stands proud above the
: bezel.

: I went for an Omega because I wanted a
: well-built watch that could stand up to the
: sort of punishment that a watch gets
: subjected to when, for example, being used
: whilst diving. Turns out that the fabled
: Omega Seamaster Professional can't even
: withstand normal daily wear. The cheap £30
: quartz Sekonda that I was wearing previously
: (and am wearing again now) is more resilient
: than a £1050 Omega.

: It looks like buying Omega will turn out to be
: a very expensive mistake for me.

: Jack