Adventures in Band Repair (B4/After photos)

[goldfixer21]

I've had my laser welder for over 12 years now, I don't know how I could work without it. I admire your willingness to take on these band restorations. I've done many of them on my own watches, or ones that I have purchased for resale. I seldom do any for customers simply because the time it takes, as you obviously know, makes it generally unprofitable for me.I love that you are posting pics of the process, few people know how much tedious labor is involved in rebuilding these bands. Best of luck to you!

[avidflyer]

Originally Posted by ROLLiWORKS

Make it rain!






All work done in the good ol’ U.S. of A.

What do you do about the older rivets with the holes?

[R.G.Bramlett, CW21]

Great to see old riveted bracelets treated with the respect they deserve!

[ROLLiWORKS]

Fellow laser werder, you definitely speak the truth and feel our pain! It's not the type of work one does unless they genuinely enjoy what you do, and we do.

Originally Posted by goldfixer21

I've had my laser welder for over 12 years now, I don't know how I could work without it. I admire your willingness to take on these band restorations. I've done many of them on my own watches, or ones that I have purchased for resale. I seldom do any for customers simply because the time it takes, as you obviously know, makes it generally unprofitable for me.I love that you are posting pics of the process, few people know how much tedious labor is involved in rebuilding these bands. Best of luck to you!

[ROLLiWORKS]

Tube Rivets, sigh. Can't get the hang of making these yet. Could really use @037 and his engineering prowess to develop a tool or system to make these consistently. Convert to solid rivet is our only option at the moment. Does anyone know if MY can make these? If yes they have a edge over us for sure.

Originally Posted by avidflyer

What do you do about the older rivets with the holes?

[ROLLiWORKS]

Speaking of laser welding, let's do more of it!

We love seeing rare items come though the shop but sometimes they are in need of some help. This gorgeous Rivet Oyster received our stretch repair treatment but we needed to address this clasp.

There simply aren't enough of these left in the world to allow it to go to the wasteside.









Sorry poor donor clasp, we're gonna have to cannibalize a roll tube.

[ROLLiWORKS]

Def not a fan of clasp repair but yes we can do it. Some carefully grinding of the donor roll tube to match the contour of the Brevete clasp then some careful precision weld with 316L fill wire at low power.






Here is the opposite side of the clasp at this point. It will need welding as well for strength

[ROLLiWORKS]

We're getting close!

[ROLLiWORKS]

Another few rounds of ultra low power welds fill the area nicely and we can grind, surface, polish and blend.

It's not perfect blend but we're aren't able to recreate the pitting and corrosion spots for a perfect blend. Unsure if we would even if we could. It's more important that we have a nice strong reliable weld/repair.

[ROLLiWORKS]

Now ... that's the business!

[R.G.Bramlett, CW21]

fascinating. What would a customer expect to pay for that sort of clasp repair? you do have to chop up a "donor clasp" after all...

[ROLLiWORKS]

$75 if done with the bracelet service.

[Richard Carver]

Wow, nice save, that big logo is ready for another 60 years. :)

[ROLLiWORKS]

Heres a teaser of some of our ongoing projects.


New fixture being made to hold Submariner 1680.







All work done in the good ol’ U.S. of A.

[ROLLiWORKS]

After final touches on the fixture, next is TIG welding new 316L stainless steel fill material to restore the loss steel from years of polishing. Then the case goes into our cnc mill.

Still tweaking our model




All work done in the good ol’ U.S. of A.

[ROLLiWORKS]

Its crazy how often we see this. 6 links on both sides. 6/6 Who is the whacky person doing this to all the rivet bands and did manage to touch so many of them? Riveting isnt easy so not done at home by the hobbiest. Seriously a good 1 out of 3 come in as 6/6 or 5/5.


We changed them back to 5/7 but makes me wonder if someday whacky guy will just change them back to 6/6 again? Is he also wondering who the heck keeps changing them to 5/7?




All work done in the good ol’ U.S. of A.

[SweetJones55]

Amazing job..

[ROLLiWORKS]

This guy felt a bit heavier than normal. Now I know why.







All work done in the good ol’ U.S. of A.

[deltabravo786]

Originally Posted by ROLLiWORKS

This guy felt a bit heavier than normal. Now I know why.







All work done in the good ol’ U.S. of A.

Gross!!!

Sent from my SM-G960U using Tapatalk

[eugenetsang]

MikeRolliWorks,

Keep posting pics when you can! I love seeing your work! I'm sure majority of us loves see it as well! Rolex owners with beat up cases/bracelets, you seriously gives us HOPE!!

We need to give you a new nickname! The Bracelet Magician II?!

[jeffnnj]

Holy crap! Amazing!

[ROLLiWORKS]

Haha. Sounds a bit random, so let me follow up with a post to add some context!

Originally Posted by eugenetsang

MikeRolliWorks,

Keep posting pics when you can! I love seeing your work! I'm sure majority of us loves see it as well! Rolex owners with beat up cases/bracelets, you seriously gives us HOPE!!

We need to give you a new nickname! The Bracelet Magician II?!

[ROLLiWORKS]

This beauty arrived in our shop in need of a little TLC.






Off to the laser welder.

This photo didn't come out as cool as I would have liked.







We've used up nearly half our sample roll in the last 60 days. 5 meters of 904L fill wire. We've been busy. Time to order a real full size roll of 904L











These welds came out nice and neat! They're not always this pretty. A bit on the hot side, but it will polish up just fine.

[ROLLiWORKS]

Skipping ahead, the money shots











The proud owner is back stylin'

[ROLLiWORKS]

Even though we do this type of work daily, I'm still amazed by the transformation from these ugly fill wire spot welds to the polished end result.

[ROLLiWORKS]

We've shown before-after shots of Gold Oyster bands but never took the time to snap photos so time we took a few moments to snap shots. Some good ole goldsmith work.

This 16613 Submariner has seen better days. Surprisingly the movement was fine, just needed a routine service. The bracelet ... it needed some major work.

[ROLLiWORKS]

Look at how mishaped the gold and steel are. Large chunk missing entirely. Not a good look.

[ROLLiWORKS]

Once broken down the damage was much worse than we expected. There are huge chunks of missing gold. Laser welding won't help us here.

[ROLLiWORKS]

New gold sheets are gold soldered into place adding thickness to the friction points and replacing the missing chunks that will hinder us from repair the gaps and sloppiness.

[ROLLiWORKS]

Kinda reminds me of the fighter planes the empire had in Star Wars. @fskywalker is probably thinking