New to watches?
Don't worry, we'll get you started.
Strap / Bracelet
Straps are generally made of supple materials like leather or rubber, while bracelets are made of materials like steel or titanium. In the end, it just boils down to personal preference on which is better. Generally, there are 2 types of clasps available:Bezel
The bezel is the outer ring which holds the crystal of the watch. There are generally two types of bezels:Dial
The dial is simply the face of your watch. It contains a whole lot of stuff that makes your watch.... a watch. We cover them here:Case
The case is the foundation of your watch, everything is built upon the case. Cases come in a variety of materials, from 316L stainless steel to NTPT carbon. At Ghost Pirates, most of our watches are built with materials and finished with processes just as the originals are.A notable exception are Rolex watches, which are built with 904L stainless steel. Read more about them here.
Crown
The crown allows adjustment of the time and other features on a watch. There are generally two types of crowns:Pusher
These buttons activate the chronometer on watches that have them. The top pusher starts and stops the timer, while the bottom pusher resets the chronometer. Some watches like the Rolex Daytona have guards which need to be unscrewed before the pushers can be pressed.
The crystal is the glass face of the watch. It might just be a piece of glass, but to us it is one of the most important aspects of a good replica. Even the best replica will not look good with a cheap crystal. So what makes luxury watch crystals look so good?
Sapphire glass : Sapphire glass is the standard for all luxury watches crystals, and is the case for all our replicas as well. Sapphire glass is much stronger, scratch-resistant and optically-clear than traditional mineral glass. When placed on a watch, the difference is huge and immediately noticeable.
Anti-reflection (AR) coating : All our crystals are coated with an AR coating, which reduces reflections and makes the sapphire glass even appear even clearer than it already is.
This is the industry standard for luxury watches, and we will settle for nothing less on our replicas.
This is the industry standard for luxury watches, and we will settle for nothing less on our replicas.
Movement
The movement is the mechanism that gives your watch the trademark sweeping movement. Movements are immensely complex consisting of 60 - 100 intricate parts, making them incredibly expensive to replicate. Most are also impossible to buy because big brands build them in-house, and do not sell them to the public. Thankfully for us, there are large movement companies who produce quality movements for smaller brands like SevenFriday, and these are available for sale, and they are what we use in replicas.This means that the easiest way to differentiate a replica from an original is to dismantle the watch and look at the movement. This is fine for us hobbyists, as the movement is not something that can usually be seen. But anyone trying to sell a replica as an original to a shop will most definitely fail, because shops are know better than to accept a watch without looking at the movement.
This actually makes us happy, because unscrupulous people like these give replicas a bad name. Replicas are a way for people to enjoy owning a luxury watch without paying a hefty price tag, not a way to cheat innocent people of their money.
Rotor
The rotor is a balanced spinning metal piece found only in automatic watches. Moving our hands as we go about our lives causes the rotor to spin, which in turn winds the watch. This is why these watches are called 'automatics', as there is no manual winding required.When shaking an automatic watch in your hands, the spinning of the rotor can actually be felt. Low-quality replicas which do not have a real automatic movement can easily be detected this way.
Caseback
The caseback is essentially the back of the watch. Any maintainence or repairs done to the watch is done via opening the caseback. There are two kinds of casebacks:Lugs
The lugs are the points on which the strap or bracelet connects to the watch. On watches like the Rolex Submariner, they are part of the case, but in some like the Audemars Piguet Royal Oak, they are actually separate, moving pieces, which allow a little more degree of movement of the strap/bracelet.