Once in a Blue Moon Upgrade....

Today is the second Full moon in the month of August. The day before the second full moon (yesterday), I competed an upgrade for my VC Portofino. While in NYC I stopped in the Boutique and added a new strap and deployant replacing the original tang buckle. This is a great upgrade and one I should have done a long time ago and it compliments the recent upgrade to a larger crown.

While I was taking a quick picture of the strap and deployant (not a very good one), I also took advantage of the full moon display to check the backside of the minute hand as others did in a prior post. Hard to tell if this is any different than their discovery. It looks like the back side definitely is not polished like the first; it's a rougher finish and likely not rhodium coated like the face side.

Great upgrade Bill. Will be interested to learn if having the deployant encourages you to wear this Portofino more frequently.

I should keep in touch with you on NYC Boutique visits. I need to get down there soon to drop off a watch for service - as well as do some shopping.

Deployments are relatively expensive - but certainly worth it. Great photos too.

Nice change up and upgrade.

I emailed Jack Freedman to check the Forum on the "underside of the hands issue". Hopefully, he will have some insight into this controversy.

I am NYC about one per month. I'll let you know the next time. I dropped off my PPC yesterday for a trip to Schaffhausen. I hate to see it gone for an extended stay in it's birthplace. : (.

Bill -

Same situation here. I need to drop off my 5022-18 "Ardoise" (again). It had a calendar mishap last NOV and 3 weeks after it came back from service it enjoyed April 31st - same issue. Tells perfect time, but I feel the watch is 'tainted' with the calendar out of synch and I have not worn it since May...

Hopefully it can get worked out - and we can enjoy some time there and at a nice dinner!!!

Richard

Nice touch Bill - perfect with the new crown too!

I would very much doubt, that the underside of the hands are not rhodium plated. To the best of my knowledge the parts are completely submerged when being electroplated (which is I assume the process that Schaffhausen uses to do their plating).

I've seen the platting department there - it's huge and very modern with parts coming in on trays and going straight into cleaning baths and then the plating baths.

Then of course, it's possible too, that the manufacture of the hands are outsourced I even wonder the process of making these little marvels of mechanical engineering - are the hands individually die stamped out of sheet metal (which I assume would be brass)?

Mark,

I agree with you sir that the Rhodium should be on the back side, but take an even closer look at the back side. I am guessing in the finishing process for each hand, it is rubbed over a scratch / sandpaper like board to remove burrs and flatten the hand. This would remove the electroplating and produce the rougher surface on the back side. You see this same process with the tiny gears after emerging from the spark eroder.

You can see in this old photo, the small gears being rubbed over the rough, flat surface to remove burrs and polish the item to some extent.

Bill, a very nice upgrade. Sorry I missed you, I was there on Friday.
Met the new Boutique Manager for Costa Mesa, very nice chap.

Kevin

Bill - are you sure that the "sanding" takes place after rhodium plating? It would make more sense to me (I admit that I know nothing about manufacturing processes) if it happened the other way around since any touchups could damage the highly polished front face. Unless they are plating quite heavily, polishing the front face after plating could easily wear through the rhodium. Or I could be out in left field. Just curious...

To tell you the truth, I have no idea. I am just spouting conjecture. Alan has contacted an expert, Jack Freedman, who may shed some light on what we are seeing.