WATCH POP

Congrats Edwin, and yet another great pictorial post! I always knew the Lange deployants are massive hunks of metal, but I still can't believe the it weighs nearly 40% of the watch head itself. Am I correct that the deployant is Pt too?
In all events, wear it in good health. It's a stunning piece.
Regards,
Tom
PS - Great little strap storage box you have there! Very compact and neat, and it looks to be full of some nice straps. Guess the ´Pandora´ name fits this theme very well.
:-)
Edwin
(who gave up smoking 3.5 years ago, iirc ... I started drinking instead and I cannot remember the date I stopped exactly, as is the case with todays date btw ... ) in case I didnt I´ll repeat it here.
Sometime ago, a year or perhaps two, I told my son that the straps on my Lange-1 was made from Croc hide. He looked at me the way he always does when I make a joke, bad or not.
I convinced him that the black strap was made of Croc leather and he looked at my wrist with deep respect.
In my enthousiasm to educate him, I showed him my Ebel watches. One of them is on a dark blue croc strap. From a distance it looks black too, as do the Lange croc straps so no problem there.
Then I showed him the medium brown shark strap on my LeModulor Ebel ...
Silence ....
"NO" he said, convinced that I was pulling his leg, "Bruce is grey and not brown"
:-) who is Bruce?
In any event, I look forward to telling stories like this to my son one day. For now, all he wants to do is claw at my croc strap with his drool soaked hands!
Regards,
Tom the shark whose mantra is, "Fish are friends, not food" in the animated movie - Finding Nemo... thanks for sharing the wonderful pictures. Thanks Peter. Think I need to head over to the video store this weekend and catch up on my animated movies. :)
Regards,
Tom is that, while a world away, not only do you and I have the same watch, we have the same carpet! thanks for posting Peter!
And Tom, catching up on the animated movies will soon be your share as well: young kids have a tendency to want and watch the same movie over and over again, I have watched Finding Nemo (and others) for almost 50 times, each, easily :-)
th-th-th-tha-tha-tha-thats all folks!
:-)
Edwin :-)
Edwin Considering the mass of the Pt deployant, the current price of Platinum, and exchange rates....USD/CHF/EUR......one pays a 6X premium for the buckle over the price of platinum.
At first, it may seem like a lot....but, considering it is a piece of luxury jewelry, it is not excessive.
In heavy industry, the mark up for engineered steel fabrications, for example, can be on the order of 5X. In fact for estimating purposes, it is quite common to simply calculate the weight of the item, then multiply the material cost by 4X or 5X to take labour, wastage, etc into account.
I had dismissed a deployant buckle for my Lange because I felt the cost was rather excessive.
However, Edwins demonstration has made me reconsider......
Thanks
especialy the PT ones (the WG deployants are expensive too compared to their YG and RG siblings btw).
But to me they are worth the money, certainly if you, as I did, dont buy the deployant afterwards but buy one INSTEAD of the standard tang buckle. The Tang buckle pays for about 30% of the deployant.
For a Lange-1 and Dato, both in PT, the deployant makes wearing them more (mass) balanced around the wrist, due to the heft of the buckle (approx 30 gram vs. approx 10 gram for a tang buckle) and you gain alot of comfort from the deployant buckle.
On the Anniversary I think you dont NEED a deployant to create a comfortably mass balanced combo. Still, adding the deployant makes the watch look very nice(r!), makes it more safe to put on or of your watch (less chance you drop the watch) and reduces the wear and tear on the strap by quite a margin. And the extra area that you can polish with the micro cloth at night is a big PRO as well of course!
The only two CON's re the deployant are :
- the strapsize needs to be picked/choosen very carefully since you need to center the deployant exactly under the wrist. If it isnt centered properly it will wear uncomfortably.
You can make a deployant+strap combo center properly by ordering a custom length strap or, if a standard (short, regular or long) length strap doesnt suit your wrist with the deployant, you can try and reverse both the strap parts. Lange puts the strap-part with the holes on the 6 o'clock side of the watch and I have it on the 12 o'clock side which does work for me.
- viewing the backside of the watch is easier with the regular tang buckle (you can put the watch up-side-down easily). With the deployant you have to put a little effort into fumbling the strap from the deployant.
I hope the above makes sense!
Edwin