The cost of a new Hesalite Crystal

I saw your post over on FB and thought I was having a flashback when I saw it here. I know you’re committed to having it done, but did you mention over there that you’re a dentist? I’d think you’ve got the best polishing tools EVER at your disposal, if so. I dropped my Speedy a few months ago. Literally three minutes with some Polywatch made it look new again.

Oh, and also... have you looked at the Omega symbol on the crystal through a loupe yet? I was dismayed to see mine was cocked almost completely sideways. Apparently the factory just mounts them any old way. That bugs me more than any scratches I’ll add to it. I’m tempted to pay a watchmaker to R&R the crystal just to line the symbol up properly.

One note for possible future polishing, since you mentioned you're new to this:

Be very careful if you use any sort of power tool to polish the hesalite. Being that is an acrylic plastic crystal, the use of polywatch (or any abrasive polish) with a power tool will generate enough heat to melt the crystal and cause damage that might necessitate replacing the crystal. Doing it by hand with the tools that comes with the polywatch kit is virtually fool-proof and practically impossible to mess up. Like we've all echoed here, just try it out next time and you'll be pleasantly surprised.

Also, congrats on being a relatively new speedy owner. I remember the first scratch i put on my hesalite - I was trying to squeeze into my car that I had to park very close to a brick wall in a small parking lot, and while sliding through I dragged my hesalite across the brick wall, leaving a severe gouge in it. It took a little more effort than normal to polish out, and certainly took a little life off the crystal, but it polished out perfectly in the end.

From the 1st of November if I remember right. But this is not the retail price !!

I prefer the far more scratch resistant Sapphire glass in a modern watch if I have a choice, especially an expensive one.
Plexiglass or Hesalite (more or less the same thing) had its day in the past and was the best thing available at that time.

If you wear a watch as you should with a tool or sports watch and forget its on your wrist and go about your day as normal its a better option than the easily scratched Hesalite.
Sapphire is very hard to scratch as only another Sapphire or a Diamond can scratch it.
Lets face it none of us are going to the moon any time soon either so Sapphire has to be my choice, if I have one.

I think the brittleness may come from rather thinner Sapphire glass, I do not know the thickness of it on my Omega Seamaster Pro but I have barrowed cement dug out Concrete with Jack hammers and sledgehammers and done flagging jobs while wearing it played Golf wearing it and forgot it was on my wrist and there is not a mark on it.

I do not do that now though as I have a Beater in a casio G shock that I picked up on a flight to Canada. This watch is probably the toughest thing anyone can buy in a wrist watch, it needs no winding nor any battery that is correct all the time as it resets its self every night while I sleep. The Omega Seamaster is one tough Mechanical watch though.

Speedmaster should never have been made with sapphire crystal.

My avatar is the kool-aid guy for a reason 😀

I am not a dentist but I have done dental work on people.. haha. Yes I did order a tube of the Polywatch and no using of power tools. Hopefully my OCD will stave off any noticeable damage and already saw numerous vids on YouTube on using the product.

As others said multiple times, you have nothing to worry about. I polished some scratches out of my four-month-old Speedy for the first time the other day with Polywatch and a small microfiber cloth. A blind monkey could do it, honestly. I get your trepidation but listen to the people on this forum. When they say something is beyond easy, you can take it as fact, at least in this case.
Oh, and you will scratch it again. Two days after I removed those first blemishes, I made a very minor, barely visible new one when I ever so slightly banged my crystal off a metal handrail at a movie theater. I'm not bothering to polish it until I get two or three more. I don't even sweat it one bit because I know how painfully easy it is to remove them.

I have a bit of experience about this and can clearly understand where you are coming from. I previously had polished away the scratches off of my Swach quartz using nothing but Tooth paste. With that experience I used the tooth paste again on my Omega moonwatch when I scratched it somewhere and to my surprice, the scratches are mostly gone.
Dont worry too much about it, as it will keep on getting scratched no matter how hard you try to save it from them.

If you can't wait for the Polywatch, toothpaste and some water does the trick. I wouldn't replace the crystal unless you actually cracked it. The last OEM one I picked up was roughly $80 USD from eBay.

Polywatch is very easy to use. If I can use it, I'm sure anyone can. A couple of minutes should be all it takes, by hand there's very little risk. If you can clean your glasses or wash a dish, Polywatch is no challenge. I'm not sure why anyone would use power tools on something that's as small and easy to polish as a watch crystal. If there was a scratch so deep it needed power tools, I'd just swap for a new crystal.

Hesalite scratches easily, but polishes easily as well, and does not shatter. If you do need a replacement, Hesalite is inexpensive. Sapphire is resistant to scratching, but can shatter leaving the watch unusable, and the replacements are much more expensive.

If hesalite smashes it will break into about 3 large chunks then need to be replaced for under $100. If sapphire smashes it will break into hundreds of small fragments - most likely also getting inside the movement then the whole thing will probably require a full service at the cost of $500 upwards. Even a sapphire crystal alone can be a few hundred.

Luckily real good quality Sapphire crystal is very very difficult to smash or to scratch, that is why these crystals are found usually in high end watches and in any case scratches can even be polished out of Sapphire crystal if they happen by using Diamond paste (depending if or not there is an anti reflective coating on the outside of the crystal or not but that is your choice when buying any watch)..

In the field, Plexiglass or Hesalite is a good choice for a tool watch being used as it should be and put through its paces but very few people who buy expensive tool watches actually use them for the jobs they were made to do and they treat them like porcelain wrapped in cotton wool.lol

Not many will ever get close to breaking the Sapphire crystal on their expensive watch as they are constantly polishing and preening with it and treating their watches with kid gloves, lol. and Sapphire crystal can be polished just like Hesalite or Plexiglass whatever you want to call it.

.Real Sapphire Crystal which must not be confused with mineral Crystal is expensive compared to a Plexiglass or Hesalite crystal, as the manufacturers know that usually the people that wear these watches will pay the premium to have the crystal replaced in a worst case scenario.

Rest assured once enough people have the New watches with the Plastic crystals in them then the prices to replace these Crystals will quickly begin to rise.

Sapphire is clearer and tougher for watches to be worn in the street under normal use etc whereas Plastic or Acrylic Hesalite is probably safer if you are using the watch they way it was meant to be used like in a military watch in the field etc.

Spend the extra money and get one with the etched logo