Under Pressure?
Pressure testing. We all demand it of our dive watches, and the sad news of the Titan sub reminds us all of the consequences of pressure testing gone wrong.
When you think of the physics involves in pressure testing a watch, does the instantaneous pressure change harm watches in any way? Pressure testing once at the factory for a brand new watch I imagine is okay, but what if you keep repeating the pressure tests on an older watch. Could it affect the crystal or gaskets, or even the delicate balance spring?
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Raj Jena
I have a 16.5cm wrist, and according to the Geneva Convention, that is all I need to tell you.
Cambridge
Member since
Last active: 1 month ago
Never thought of it inc that way. It would make sense though
I would recommend replacing all the rings on a older dive watch before pressure testing as the old rubber gets hard over the years but if want to have fun watch The hydraulic press channel as they test watches down to three miles down and some watches don’t make it
You say instantaneous, but I think there is a huge difference in truly immediate and over a second or two or three, which is how I assume it's done. Regardless, I'd think a shock overload would have an immediate destructive impact and not some lingering hidden one. This should be a nondestructive test, but if anything is going to go wrong, it will be during the test and it will be noticed, which is sort of the whole idea.
I'd assume the cumulative effects of a momentary test done once every several years to be very negligible. The gasket will age out first and is presumably being replaced every time anyhow.
A watch case and crystal aren’t going to be affected by a pressure test, unless it’s carbon fiber, and you’re exceeding its design tolerances. Most metals are malleable and have some “give” in them, where they can flex a bit and return to their original shape without any damage. That’s one of the reasons we use steel rebar in concrete, for example. As for the movement, it won’t be affected unless the watch case has a leak or otherwise fails…and that’s the whole point of a pressure test.
Titan failed precisely because it WASN’T made out of metal. Carbon fiber is incredibly strong, but it’s not made for repeated extreme pressurization. Every time that thing went down, more and more fibers failed from the pressure. They finally hit a point where too many fibers failed and that was it.
And how many of us will dive to 30m, let alone 50m or more. If you have a watch that is wr to 100m you are more than safe to swim with it.
pringglide
·7 min ago
YouTube video caused me to buy a watch. I enjoy the Hydraulics YouTube show when they took a CRONOS down to 3000 meters, it stopped working at 2900 meters. About 1.7 MIles but then when taking it out of the water it started working again. So many people have commented about the submersible imploding at 3,000 meters. This inexpensive watch might still be laying on the debris pile at the bottom of the ocean, amazing, And this new one has a hydrogen relief valve, but a bit heavy
Forgot to mention that now Cronos advertised the back of their watches it says 3,000 meters shown on the YouTube Hdraulics show. ha
Ha