PFAS (“forever chemical”) free watches?
A couple of you were confused earlier when I alluded to picking watches without “forever chemicals”. So I thought I should explain. It’s about epilame.
Watch epilame, I think, is kind of a dirty secret in modern watchmaking. I would almost call it the modern “radium paint”, because 1. its byproducts have real health hazards, which we are only now starting to understand the scope of, 2. there is a lot of inertia to just keep using it, and 3. Just like the “radium girls” of old, it probably hurts the watchmaker more than the wearer.
Both PFAS/fluorinated chemistries, and epilame, are kind of complex topics, so I’ll try to hit the highlights:
Epilame in watches
Epilame is just a generic word for a surface treatment, but in our watch context, it's a fluorinated plastic coating, very similar to the teflon coating of a nonstick pan. If you put oil drops into a nonstick pan, they stay beaded and in place, and don't spread and flow out. Same idea in a watch, oil stays put and don’t migrate into big greasy layers.
It’s a technique applied in many movements parts, especially in premium movements and especially if they're automatics with bidirectional winding. If used, it’s usually on automatic winding reverser gears (where it’s often a must-have), pallet stones and cap jewels (nice to have), clicks and clutches (nice to have), and winding stems (nice to have).
These might be pre-applied in the factory using various processes (famously the vibrant magenta Rolex reverser gears, which are said to be a teflon coating),
but also, watchmakers have to apply it during servicing, where parts are dunked into a suspension like Moebius Fix-O-Drop or similar. Usually this is liquid is made of microscopic bits fluorinated plastics (fluorinated polyesters or teflon) floating in fluorinated solvent, usually perfluorohexane (the FK line) or only more recently, hydrofluoroolefins (the more updated ES line).
PFAS
What does this have to do with PFAS and forever chemicals? Well, just like in watchmaking, fluorinated chemistries adds a lot of convenience and have gotten really popular - cooking pans, rain jackets, electronics, chemical-resistant bottles, firefighting foam -- and we've really just started to notice how insidious a lot of it is.
First, the same properties that make it water- and oil- repellant also means they don't break down easily. These products, including epilame, (and the chemistry needed to form each part) end up in chemical forms that are extremely long lasting and indestructible, and spread everywhere into the environment. Basically, they have been detected in drinking water nearly everywhere and in all the watersheds around the world.
Only recently, did the US start setting thresholds for how much PFAS should be in our drinking water (15 parts per billion, so no more than 0.0000015%), and the EU has started to look at restricting this pollution as a class.
The PFAS pollution has been linked to a lot of health effects, including decreased fertility, developmental effects in children, cancer risks, high cholesterol levels, obesity, and immune damage.
What does this mean for watches?
Obviously, this is not to be blamed on watches, very little of this comes from watches; a lot of this is firefighting foam, manufacturing of parts for cars or planes, and of course household goods everywhere from rain jackets to teflon pans to electronics.
But the watch industry has not responded well to these new health protection measures. For example, the American Watch Association of Maine instead sent a letter saying that
"Effective epilame solutions contain PFAS and there are no technically or economically feasible alternatives... The completed movements are sealed in a watch case where the watch is assembled in Switzerland, Japan, and other countries... Consumers are discouraged from opening the watch case... Therefore, there is virtually no risk of PFAS exposure to consumer from a watch."
I really find this type of response unsatisfactory because: what about at the factory? what about watchmakers?
We are still just at the earliest stages of understanding the risks. Watchmakers are the most exposed to this, having to actually work on and touch epilame solutions on their bench, which also spreads over everything else they're working on. Like radium paint, we really shouldn't be exposing watchmakers to a high concentration of an unknown level of risk just for a luxury hobby. I have already started telling watchmakers to avoid using epilame whenever possible, and definitely not while working on my watches.
But also, we are all exposed to this eventually, because it goes everywhere, just from the factories of the materials alone. Unlike household goods or planes, this is ultimately a luxury hobby and not an essential product. It's one thing to say "we need to use these chemistries or we can't make any electronics"; it's another to say "we need to use this chemistries for our luxury jewelry".
Low (or no) epilame watches
I've recently started looking for low-epilame watches. Given that their most pressing use is in reverser gears, unidirectional winding movements like the Miyota, and Seiko Magic Lever, should use much less (or no?) epilame in its production.
This is backed up by checking oil charts (when available), where ETA movements generally describe parts as "epilaminated", and calls for Fix-O-Drop or similar during servicing, whereas Seiko and Miyota servicing generally gets away with avoiding those.
Similarly, this bolsters my case to have long service interval quartz watches where the movements generally avoid the use of epilame, and do not have to be overhauled as much as mechanical movements.
What do you think?
(title image from https://www.mdpi.com/2305-6304/10/2/44)
enthusiast of wearable high precision timekeeping - mechanical, quartz, TCXO, OCXO, RF and network time sync, atomic clocks. I like them all.
I guess like CFCs that were so popular as refrigerants and aerosols, we’ll have to find a technically competent alternative. The watch industry is obviously too small to take the lead on this, the demand for a solution will come from bigger consumers. In the meantime, I’m pleased to hear my seikos aren’t offenders! 😁
I honestly think you are overreacting. It's definitely not as nearly as bad as Radium and only a small percentage of people will actually ever open their watch. Watchmakers are more exposed to it but it's a hazard that many other jobs have and a small one compared to the others.
Welders are exposed to toxic fumes, not to mention miners or metalworkers but it's the risk they knowingly take.
Mechanics work with a boat of synthetic oils, hands drenched in them and probably many of them carry the same chemicals so a few drops in a watch movement are definitely not a reason to ban all mechanical movements and switch over to quartz.
Pointless.
I honestly think you are overreacting. It's definitely not as nearly as bad as Radium and only a small percentage of people will actually ever open their watch. Watchmakers are more exposed to it but it's a hazard that many other jobs have and a small one compared to the others.
Welders are exposed to toxic fumes, not to mention miners or metalworkers but it's the risk they knowingly take.
Mechanics work with a boat of synthetic oils, hands drenched in them and probably many of them carry the same chemicals so a few drops in a watch movement are definitely not a reason to ban all mechanical movements and switch over to quartz.
Pointless.
Two things:
knowingly is the one keyword here. I don’t think I would have written this if this is 100% common knowledge, and watchmakers know exactly the risks they are taking. But if you poll 100 watchmakers right now, how many would know working with epilame is working with perfluorinated chemistries? 10? 5? 1?
I agree it’s all about the risk to benefit. Without welders, miners, or metalworkers, or mechanics, the world doesn’t run. I doubt you can say the same about reverser gears…
I guess like CFCs that were so popular as refrigerants and aerosols, we’ll have to find a technically competent alternative. The watch industry is obviously too small to take the lead on this, the demand for a solution will come from bigger consumers. In the meantime, I’m pleased to hear my seikos aren’t offenders! 😁
You’re right, it’s probably more comparable to CFCs than radium, but a lot of the problems is how little we know about the health effects and how little transparency there is - people just want to avoid talking about it!
For example, tropic FKM straps have come back into fashion, and Oysterflex has made FKM popular too. We love FKM because they are flexible and nothing sticks to them, like pet hair. Nothing sticks to them because… you guessed it, fluorine chemistry again 😁
The good thing there is that there are new fluoroelastomers processes that can make them without the heavy use of PFAS solvents that pollute like they used to, but we don’t know who sources what from where and without pressure, there isn’t the motivation to move to cleaner processes…
Two things:
knowingly is the one keyword here. I don’t think I would have written this if this is 100% common knowledge, and watchmakers know exactly the risks they are taking. But if you poll 100 watchmakers right now, how many would know working with epilame is working with perfluorinated chemistries? 10? 5? 1?
I agree it’s all about the risk to benefit. Without welders, miners, or metalworkers, or mechanics, the world doesn’t run. I doubt you can say the same about reverser gears…
Well knowingly or not I am confident that many would not mind since it's not making their jaw fall of or makes them grow a third arm or shortens their lifespan to a year.
Of course the world would run. You can walk to work, live in a wooded hut, farm your own food, use a wooden spoon, and have an outhouse toilet but you won't. So it's everybody's fault that there are those chemicals around but let's focus on one tiny aspect of it so we feel like we achieved something.
And having a bunch of plastic watch movements will lover the amount of micro plastics releases just how? Since I am sure everyone will recycle their quartz movements accordingly and there will be no micro plastics releases in the nature due to them.
Tell me, are you planning on glueing yourself in the middle of the street later today?
If you do, be sure to use an environmental friendly glue 😉
Didn't know any of that, than you for taking the time to explain.
Pleased to hear Seiko are "clean" , but disappointed that the Swiss, who often are caught up in the whole "green washing/virtue signalling" their credentials aren't.
Dude you are like the Erin Brockovich of the watch industry! This is a fascinating read. Great research.
I guess my ratio of 2 quartz for every mechanical is going to remain the pattern moving forward.
This is a thoroughly well put together post. I thank you very much for taking the time to put it together for us, and for citing your sources so neatly!
I'll have to do more research before I form my opinion on the matter, but thanks you to I have a good foundation to build from.
These are the kinds of posts I was hoping to see more of when coming to watchcrunch, kudos to you.
Well knowingly or not I am confident that many would not mind since it's not making their jaw fall of or makes them grow a third arm or shortens their lifespan to a year.
Of course the world would run. You can walk to work, live in a wooded hut, farm your own food, use a wooden spoon, and have an outhouse toilet but you won't. So it's everybody's fault that there are those chemicals around but let's focus on one tiny aspect of it so we feel like we achieved something.
And having a bunch of plastic watch movements will lover the amount of micro plastics releases just how? Since I am sure everyone will recycle their quartz movements accordingly and there will be no micro plastics releases in the nature due to them.
Tell me, are you planning on glueing yourself in the middle of the street later today?
If you do, be sure to use an environmental friendly glue 😉
The OP has provided a well written, thorough examination of an aspect of the watch world that I suspect not many, if any, others here could have provided. I can't help but feel you're being a bit reductive in your argument.
Just because the negative effects aren't on par with radiation sickness, doesn't mean there aren't negative effects. And just because there are other trades working with toxic materials or subject to hazardous chemicals, doesn't necessarily mean that those workers wouldn't choose NOT to be subjected to them if given a choice.
If welders could work without exposure to toxic fumes, I'm sure they would. If miners or metalworkers could work without risk of cave-ins or molten metal burns, I'm sure they would. I don't see the point in arguing things are bad other places and we do nothing about it, so this less bad thing is "pointless".
It makes more sense to me to ask the question WHY do watchmakers need to use epilame? What did they use before epilame? What are the alternatives that are so cost prohibitive or technically inferior that the American Watch Association of Maine thinks they are unusable in epilame's place?
If all of the as yet unknown downsides of epilame on watchmkaers can be avoided by replacing it in our niche, but multi billion dollar industry, I don't see how that could possibly be a bad thing.
Interesting post - and we are only really scratching the surface of the implications of PFAS distribution into the “foodchain”, so this is one of those topics that will develop in terms of context as time progresses (ironically).
To be honest - “green” watches are a potential growth area. We see a large number adopting recycled plastics as a case material, there are cases for the reuse and recycling of steel and sapphire crystals in terms of the carbon footprint of these component parts, and therefore the surface treatment and lubricating oils will also be something that will need to be reviewed done the line as this issue develops.
At the risk of sounding flippant, or defeatist, I suspect that any change in the use of such materials will be generated from wider-reaching policy, i.e. outright ban or minimum % makeup of product. Whether a manufacturer wishes to go above and beyond now, unfortunately, is on a case by case basis and probably driven by economic factors rather than any moral argument… until they are forced to change, little will change.
Didn't know any of that, than you for taking the time to explain.
Pleased to hear Seiko are "clean" , but disappointed that the Swiss, who often are caught up in the whole "green washing/virtue signalling" their credentials aren't.
Thanks — and just to be clear, I don’t know that for a fact! Because there little info on this, I can only guess that generic Miyota and Seiko movements have less (or no) epilame because
It’s relatively expensive and
Watchmakers reporting not needing to use it during servicing because the e.g the magic lever worked just fine without (I believe the Seiko manual calls for a graphite grease instead on the pawl/rachet)
In contrast, watchmakers know by experience that if you don’t epilame the reverser gears in a Rolex or 2824 or (any movement with reverser gears really), then the gears run a risk of getting oil-stuck and the rotor would helicopter and not wind later.
Grand Seiko automatics by contrast stop using the magic lever system, and I wouldn’t be surprised if it has more epilame again.
As long as you aren't eating watch parts you'll probably be a ok. Honestly, you're getting hit with more PFAS chemicals via plastic food packaging than a watch anyway.
Fwiw, petroleum based lubricant oils are also rather nasty if ingested. I guess we could go back to nice whale oil.....
Fwiw, petroleum based lubricant oils are also rather nasty if ingested. I guess we could go back to nice whale oil.....
PFAS really is a unique class of pollution, it’s not just like microplastics or petroleum products or vague concern about “chemicals”.
The US EPA and the EU aren’t spending billions of dollars to test a fraction of a fraction of 0.001% of PFAS in our drinking water for fun - it’s because it’s a unique pollutant, long lasting, goes into our water supply, and we have no real-world way to remove or filter it out. 3M does not just announce that they will stop producing all PFAS by 2025 (a big part of their business!) for fun. It’s because that division is being sued into oblivion for real harms.
And this is all brand new chemistry. Unlike petroleum, none of this was in the water table on a large scale before 1950, and most of it didn’t really make it into our water until very recently. (Other than people working or living near factories)
Yes, there are other things that are bad too, but I don’t think the response to bad thing A should be “well I can also name bad thing B and C and D, so let’s ignore all of them together! 🤣”
PFAS really is a unique class of pollution, it’s not just like microplastics or petroleum products or vague concern about “chemicals”.
The US EPA and the EU aren’t spending billions of dollars to test a fraction of a fraction of 0.001% of PFAS in our drinking water for fun - it’s because it’s a unique pollutant, long lasting, goes into our water supply, and we have no real-world way to remove or filter it out. 3M does not just announce that they will stop producing all PFAS by 2025 (a big part of their business!) for fun. It’s because that division is being sued into oblivion for real harms.
And this is all brand new chemistry. Unlike petroleum, none of this was in the water table on a large scale before 1950, and most of it didn’t really make it into our water until very recently. (Other than people working or living near factories)
Yes, there are other things that are bad too, but I don’t think the response to bad thing A should be “well I can also name bad thing B and C and D, so let’s ignore all of them together! 🤣”
Yes, however the PFAS you're referencing are sitting in a sealed metal capsule. Meanwhile people eat food cooked on pots and pans covered in PFAS and from containers made from the same.
I'm of the opinion that if you don't eat watch parts or the lubricants you'll be a ok.
Yes, however the PFAS you're referencing are sitting in a sealed metal capsule. Meanwhile people eat food cooked on pots and pans covered in PFAS and from containers made from the same.
I'm of the opinion that if you don't eat watch parts or the lubricants you'll be a ok.
I think OP has already factored in the impact of watches vs Teflon and other PFAS. However, these chemicals are prevalent and have made their way into the food chain. It’s not technically an horological issue, but it is interesting to see and read around. If you wanted to look at a green / sustainable watch, it’s a lot harder to find. The more you know…
I am glad you highlighted that we shouldn’t eat watch parts, I guess some of us need to be told.