Blancpain

jkingston
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Answers concerning DLC

Hi Forumners:

A few questions have been raised concerning DLC watch cases.  Blancpain uses DLC on the Super Trofeo and Fifty Fathoms Black models.  DLC stands for diamond like carbon.  As the name implies it is an extremely hard material.  Here are some numbers that make the point.  The metric for hardness is  "vickers".  Look at this comparison:

Steel 150-180 vickers; Ceramic 1000 vickers;
• DLC 1000-3000 vickers

The second question has been raised is the risk of scratching through DLC.  In fact DLC is melted into a substrate that bonds with the underlying case material (in most instances for a watch case the underlying material would be steel (which is what Blancpain uses), a couple of brands use titanium).  Blancpain's R&D department advises me that it would take an extremely severe scratch to penetrate down through the DLC and substrate to reach the underlying steel.

The sum of all of this is that DLC is not just "a pretty face"; that is to say, it is not something which is done just to get a cool dark case look.  Substantively it produces a far more robust case than stainless steel or titanium alone.

Hope this information helps understand the material.

Jeff