A month living with PCL's

[rockmastermike]

Like you, I would read many, many threads by suckers who bought PCL's and quickly took to the watch community boards to complain that their watch is ruined by the scratches. And, like many of you, I would mutter to myself: "OP is an idiot. What did he think would happen?!? That is exactly why I don't buy PCL's."


Then, a month ago, I went from "I won't buy PCL's because I know they will scratch" to I'll try PCL's because I know they will scratch." If that makes sense. To put it another way, I'm not going to worry about an outcome that is pre-ordained so why not try one?


A little perspective: The Daytona has been worn in a three watch rotation over the last month. However, as the Daytona is the newest watch, it gets more wrist time. In this context, wrist time means desk diving at work, carrying equipment to soccer practices, doing dishes, running a copy machine, taking out garbage, putting away groceries, going to local baseball games...ya know....regular everyday stuff. I wear watches "normally", that is to say I don't mow the lawn with them but at the same time don't pamper them either.


Important takeaways:


1) "Before" photos taken in extreme/harsh light to show much worse than they actually are. Most of these are hairline and light marks that cannot be seen unless looking for them. The one exception is the clasp, pretty easy to see those.


2) Will I cape cod the bracelet every month - hell no - I just wanted to show a typical month with PCL's.


Here we go:


Desk diving





Wooden desk surface - pretty worn in places





Normal view of the bracelet - nothing stands out





"Before" Macros in harsh light of the clasp and bracelet. Again, these are photographed in worst case angles and lighting














Painters Tape and Cap Cod ready to go:








"After" shots....obviously not RSC caliber, but not bad and better than before:

[OhDark30]

PCLs?
Partly cloudy er..?
An esoteric Rolex bracelet insiders' term? Please elaborate
And yes, Cape Cod
Made a great job of a secondhand Smiths Explorer bracelet covered in similar desk rash I bought a few years ago

[Hayseed Brown]

PCLs?
Partly cloudy er..?
An esoteric Rolex bracelet insiders' term? Please elaborate

Polished Center Links

[Nutty28]

Thanks for the tip! Looks as good as new.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[OhDark30]

Aha! Thanks, Hayseed!

[Colin63]

Like OhDark30, my first thought was what are we talking about here?

Now I know and good results.

[geoffbot]

Good work. I haven't had much luck with cape cod - maybe I need to polish for longer.

[rockmastermike]

Thanks guys.... Remember the "before" shots look waaaay worse due to harsh lighting and don't look nearly as bad when wearing it on the wrist.

I won't do the cape cod again for quite some time - just wanted to share for those considering a watch with PCL's

[MHe225]

PCLs? .....

It's funny - at times I wonder whether I am a wee bit dyslectic. Every time I see PCL my brain registers PLC (Programmable Logic Controller) and I get confused. In the midst of that confusion, I make the link (pun intended) to the watch forum and all is clear again. I don't even know if PLC's are much used these days, but I've played extensively with those in my younger years.

On topic: I do not have (watches with) bracelets with polished center links, but I do have one with a highly polished bezel. Our Doxa SUB's appears horrible in pictures, yet in real life these watches looks almost brand new. Close-ups and harsh light will visualize and magnify all micro scratches. I don't think, though, that I would take a Cape Cod cloth to their bezels; we just live with these scratches, that, in every day use, aren't even visible to the naked eyes. And we're not planning on selling, so ....

[rockmastermike]

Perfect comparison MHe225 with the Doxa Bezels. I've had (and enjoyed) Doxa in the past and photos always distort how good the bezels look in real life.