Dial damaged while shipping?! I am confused....any thoughts greatly appreciated

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It could be a tiny piece of loose debris that got lodged between the hour hand and dial during shipping?

I cannot imagine that a well packed (triple packed!) Certina DS could receive a jolt during shipping that would have any impact on hand or dial positioning unless there was a major mechanical issue to begin with.
 
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I can only speculate that some debris somehow made its way between the hour hand and dial, and was dragged around. What debris? I have no idea. Very unfortunate.
 
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I know…if it’s not lume what debris?
 
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It could be a tiny piece of loose debris that got lodged between the hour hand and dial during shipping?

I cannot imagine that a well packed (triple packed!) Certina DS could receive a jolt during shipping that would have any impact on hand or dial positioning unless there was a major mechanical issue to begin with.
Unless shipping took many weeks or the debris particle was large it seems less likely loose debris alone would explain this. Regardless have a watchmaker inspect it.
 
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Is there any chance someone inspected it and opened the boxes at customs or something? Any sign of anything being taped a second time? Maybe during inspection it took a hard fall dislodging something and it’s stuck under the hour hand?

Unless it was missing all its case clip or something I don’t know how the movement shifts enough to push’s down hard enough on all 3 hands to cause drag on the dial. You’d probably have a bent minute and second hand if it was something like that. I think you’d also feel it wobble in your hand if that were the case.
 
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I think when customs opens a package they reseal it with tape that is marked. I don’t think that happened here. There were delays in shipping as it was supposed to be received Friday. I’ve always tried to avoid weekend storage for just this reason.

And am thinking that maybe it was dropped hard and from a distance. But can’t imagine where the stuff that caused the damage came from..
 
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There’s a spot over by the 8 in the after photos, maybe whatever that is is what was caught under the hour hand?
 
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I guess (hope) that Secursus would cover this type of damage?

Sorry for both of you, very unfortunate event 😟
 
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There’s a spot over by the 8 in the after photos, maybe whatever that is is what was caught under the hour hand?

Good catch. You can also see a small cascade of particles falling towards the 8
 
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Unless it was missing all its case clip or something I don’t know how the movement shifts enough to push’s down hard enough on all 3 hands to cause drag on the dial. You’d probably have a bent minute and second hand if it was something like that. I think you’d also feel it wobble in your hand if that were the case.

A DS has its movement in a metal movement holder suspended in a rubber ring against the side of the case, fixing it in place. The crystal is taller than a regular crystal, giving more room between plexi and dial. Even if the movement got jolted out of place, the dial edges would hit the case (the dial does not touch the case and the aperture of the case is a smaller diameter than the dial) making it impossible for the hands to hit the crystal.
Edited:
 
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Is the logo made of anything that can break apart? Doesn’t appear to be lumed but looks like it has some material on it more than just a single piece of formed metal.
 
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To the best of my knowledge, no. But I will know more when I get it back and decase the watch.
 
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This is what the watch looks like opened up, no signs of any loose debris or anything that can cause this kind of damage.

The only thing that I can think of is the applied lume sticking out on the underside of the hour hand, since the position of the scratched circle and the lume on the hour hand seems to match up pretty good. Even though the hour hand looks to clear out a decent gap to the dial now maybe it did not do for a while if there was any type of pressure on it. Could it be possible? Can any type of lume mixture be that hard to scratch a dial surface? If not possible I'm out of explanation how this damage could happen.

 
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Yes, lume can scratch some dials, although this looks like lume debris from your photos as it does not seem to have damaged the a and c in the automatic text.

Is the dial secure to the movement? Are the dial screws engaged with the dial feet? Can you lift the dial up and down a little towards the hands?

It's worth getting it to a watchmaker.

Good luck, Chris
 
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This is far-fetched and not even sure if the watch travelled by air to the buyer, but any potential risk that pressure was applied on the watch (or lack thereof) when the plane was up in the air and caused something like this?
To have such circular patterns, you need a force for an extended period of time (vs. a shock that drops lume etc. ) 👎
 
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As @ChrisN suggested, I was wondering if the dial is really scratched or whether it might just be some debris deposited onto the dial surface.
 
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Yes, lume can scratch some dials, although this looks like lume debris from your photos as it does not seem to have damaged the a and c in the automatic text.

Is the dial secure to the movement? Are the dial screws engaged with the dial feet? Can you lift the dial up and down a little towards the hands?

It's worth getting it to a watchmaker.

Good luck, Chris
As @ChrisN suggested, I was wondering if the dial is really scratched or whether it might just be some debris deposited onto the dial surface.
Dont look like lume dust or loose debrise to me, also it did not move when blowing air carefully on it or using rodico. But if it is removable no one is more happy than me.

The dial did not feel loose and all screws seemed to be there holding it.
 
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also it did not move when blowing air carefully on it or using rodico.

That is good information to share. 👍
 
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The applied logo looks odd, like there’s something missing - could something have come from there and got caught under a hand? But then I guess there would be loose material around the dial or the extremities. What’s on the underside of the dial at that spot? Maybe something there has caused the circular effect on the dial’s face, though that would have to be fairly harsh to affect the other side. It’s bizarre.