Black Bay Aging - Experience? Thoughts?
No, I'm not asking about the patina on Bronze models. I want to know what I should expect 5, 10, 20 years down the road from your typical steel models. I have no experience with aluminum bezels - everything I've owned or looked into is ceramic (or precious metal).
How long have you owned your Black Bay, how's it holding up? Does the bezel fade and scratch? I'm hard on my watches. Relevant experience with other aluminum bezel sports watches?
I went watch shopping this weekend and when I started, the Black Bay wasn't really on my radar. I've viewed it several times before and loved it, it was just that some other options became higher priorities this time around. But after seriously considering Grand Seiko, Oris, Omega, Longines, and even Rolex I was surprised how the Black Bay once again stood out to me. It has always popped out of the case as a beautiful watch, one that speaks to me so much more in person than it does in photos and videos (which is saying something considering how much I still appreciate it in those mediums). That and the fact that it probably fits the "needs" in my current collection better than anything else has me really close to pulling the trigger on one.
Family connections to Fossil had me interested and involved in watches from a very young age, but my journey into Watch Enthusiasm as a hobby truly began in 2021.
Scratches on the case and bezel, maybe some light fading on the bezel if you wear it in the sun a lot. Other than that it will probably hold up pretty well, new lume shouldn't age like the older stuff did.
I've had my BB GMT since February 2022. It'll scratch -- my BB GMT has several scratches on it, and I don't wear it that hard. Aluminum can also scratch, but you'd have to hit it in a weird way given that the crystal is a box crystal. As for fading, you'd have to wear it in the sun quite a bit to see any fading -- and even if you do, chances are that when you send in the watch for service, they will replace a faded bezel with a new one.
I've had my BB GMT since December and wear it pretty regularly - about 50-75% of days. I live in Honolulu so the sun is obviously pretty strong, plus I wear it in our (salt) pool a couple of times per week and in the ocean about once or twice a week. So far, I've gotten one good scuff on the polished side of a lug but that was my fault - I hit it against a door latch. 😢 Otherwise, it has zero signs of "environmental" wear to the bezel or otherwise.
Should age nicely as others said. Some mild fading of aluminum but would have to be significant sun exposure.
I have a black bay 36 (kinda similar)
I‘ve owned it since 2019, I used to wear it alot but now it’s a dressy watch it’s pretty scratched up. In saying that it has went up a few mountains