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DeBethune Factory Visit Part 2

After a wonderful lunch we headed over to the main factory. The master watchmaker on site Martial is a man with great passion. He has an unbelievable amount of knowledge and experience in the industry. You have to speak with him personally to feel the emotion. It was a pleasure to meet him and hope to meet with him again! This building was owned by his grandfather and it used to produce music boxes.

We were welcomed with open arms and had unlimited access to everything in the factory. For someone that loves watches, this was a treat and honor. I can't express how much we appreciated this.

Bottom Floor where all the machining gets performed.

CNC Machines.

Parts that show the process from solid blocks to movement holders, cases, case backs, movements, wheels, hands, etc.

White Gold pieces that had an interesting finish fresh from CNC. It has to go through the Rhodium plating process.

Drills for the CNC. Unbelievably small units.

Plating area

Second Floor for polishing, quality control, finishing, inventory control, etc.

Hand Polishing.

Are you kidding? Amazing.

The employees were explaining that there is a standard to every single piece that goes into a DeBethune they must hold. For example if the color on the hands is not a uniform blue and a little purple sheen is showing then that piece must go back to get refinished and go through the blueing process again. This will happen over and over until either the part is scrapped or the part is what they can use. There are no shortcuts, not compromises. It has to be dead on perfect every time.

An employee finishing a ratchet wheel. My camera is not great so I tried to get as close as I could without bothering her. She was using 15 micron sandpaper from what I remember.

These old machines are the only ones that can help aid the technicians in their work. I love it.

Spherical moon phase indicators.

Blueing process at DeBethune. They use brass to spread the heat. This process is tricky because the heat applied has to be even or else they will get that purple sheen and not an even blue. It has to be in a controlled area with no wind because if the flame goes in a direction on it's own the piece may have to be refinished or scrapped and the whole process restarted. You have to appreciate the time that goes into each piece. Amazing.

Polishing Area

Using this oven at almost 700 degrees Fahrenheit the technician is showing us another blueing process.

Sand blasting area

Dream watch components. The red layers are a film to cover the area so it doesn't get polished/brushed. This is how they get the different textures.

I wish my camera did a better job. This is the Quality Control area. To the naked eye the piece we were looking at was perfect. But under 300 times magnification (i think, going off memory again. ) you can see little areas that need to be refinished. Nothing leaves the 2nd floor without being thoroughly checked over and over.

Parts for 10 movements. Well over 300 parts just for the movements. Every piece in these bins have been painstakingly carved out from solid blocks, finished, treated, polished, gone under QC, then maybe repeated the process again, measured, fitted, etc. It's truly an art.

By the way there are more parts in that blue box, this isn't all of them.

Parts bin for all the movements

Box of Jewels

Third Floor. Assembly

This technician was installing an stem on a gear train wheel. This process is just all feel for him. He started with taking the gear train wheel and positioning it on a stem. He then hammered it down but then had to make it so it would be stable inside the movement. So from his experience he hits it just enough to create two bevels, one on each side. No machines for this process but the final check was using some sort of caliper.

This technician came from the jewelry industry. The talent at DeBethune is something to see.

DBDigitale Movement

DBDigitale moon phase. The little holes are drilled in then gold is pressed into the dials then polished again leaving a smooth surface.

Gold for the moon phase

These are the push pieces for adjustment on the DBS. It would be nice just to have a tool with DeBethune but these guys give you a solid gold pen with the blued sphere and tip. What a nice touch! It makes sense though, when you spend this much on a timepiece everything must be perfect.

Hands for the DB26. These are sapphire hands with a blued ring around it. Also the blued points have to be pressed into the sapphire using a special glue. Just imagine how many of these are scrapped. Cutting sapphire this thin, then making it perfect as there is no tolerance. Then adding the holes and placing the metal for the cannon pins. These are just the hands!

I think I am going to own this soon. Similar to my DB 22 yet soooooooooo different. OMG this thing is gorgeous!

Grade 5 titanium fully polished. This is extremely hard to achieve.

Blue treatment for the buckle as well.

DB 25 Rose Gold. Gorgeous

Alessandro's DB 25 and once just assembled.

This dial is something to be seen in person. Pictures do not do this any justice.

If I do not get the 24 then this is the watch that I will add. This is perhaps one of the nicest watches I have seen (next to my 22 of course). DBS with Ruthenium finish. I don't know if that's spelled correct but I don't care. It's not Rhodium, you can imagine the conversation we had going back and forth with Rhodium, Ruhenium, LOL it was pretty amusing.

DBDigitale

WOW

I have never seen a DB 26 in person. It's truly unique. The way the lugs and case are constructed are mind blowing. A lot of thought, time and energy were put into just that portion of the watch. You can imagine the tolerance on something like this. It's made so perfect that when the lugs go up and down it doesn't scratch the case at all but looks like it's right there. Over time you can imagine if it were to scratch the case how bad it would look.

DB 15 ready to get assembled.

DB 22 on the timing machine.

DB 26 with alligator lined straps!

My DB 22 handled by Martial. I was telling him that my winding stem seemed a bit tight. Okay then, no problem. They took apart my watch on the spot, and changed a gasket for me. Talk about service. Now my DB 22 is even better than before.

DBL in for service.

DB 15 in for service. This one had a fight with a tile floor. Guess who won?

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