"The "Wrapped" Gold Sub Guide"

[pompompurin]

I find this absolutely hilarious. Those pesky rep makers are at it again. And they would have gotten away with it too, if it wasn't for you meddling kids!! Jinkies!

LOL scooby is on crystal meth

 

[pilworx]

scandalous.
we know the reps aren't real so why should we be fooled into buying fake gold?
these makers and more importantly our "trusted dealers" should stop scamming us. if the stuff isn't gold then say it isn't and don't rip us off for paying for gold that is not real.
market them as "gold look" ffs

 

[robinstyler]

Congrats on the sticky! Well deserved. Now we need to find out what the "GOLD" was made of !

 

[d4m.test]

thank you for the write up, very informative, good to know there is no real gold in there. I do still want to buy a TT sub tho

 

[Slowlex]

Fantastisk write up!
Now, who has a BP link to ship to op?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

 

[robinstyler]

I got the popcorn ready. Im just waiting on a statement, if we ever get any. I think the factories should be held accountable for that. After all they are charging gold prices for something that might be worth only a couple of cents lol.

Sent from the RWI App

 

[kudos]

So glad I stumbled across this thread, I was ready to pull the trigger on a wrapped watch but now not so sure.

 

[C Master]

I doubt it is going to hinder my TT purchases I like them too much I always assumed the gold content if any was negligible, it is good to know what we are getting. The wrapped ones at least look great

 

[DaHokage]

Wow thanks for the informative post! If this is true across the board buying wrapped watches for look and durability is fine, but the super premiums they command should go down since we now know that the metal they put in is worth nothing and we are just paying for extra labor.

 

[d4m.test]

I doubt it is going to hinder my TT purchases I like them too much I always assumed the gold content if any was negligible, it is good to know what we are getting. The wrapped ones at least look great

I guess the question is now, can they really justify the higher price for something that is not gold.

I guess if it looks just like the real thing then it's no problem since these are reps haha

I been eyeing up a 116613 LB myself, still undecided

 

[C Master]

I guess the question is now, can they really justify the higher price for something that is not gold.

I guess if it looks just like the real thing then it's no problem since these are reps haha

I been eyeing up a 116613 LB myself, still undecided

It is a market decides thing really, but being armed with information is a powerful thing. I always thought the price for the BP was way too much. However you would never know there could be a minuscule amount of gold in there lol.

I have seen it justified before as the price of gold is up, so that argument is dead now.

I have a solid 18k Startime TT bracelet but you would want to really love your TTs to justify the price I ended up paying for the damn thing.

 

[nipe]

Surely we never expected it to actually be true 18k gold, but I'm also very surprised to find that it is completely without gold.

TBH it doesn't make a difference if actual gold is used or not, what's important here, is that the colour mimicks the GEN colour and that it doesn't rub/scratch off easily. It is a rep after all and we don't buy these for the "gold content". Just needs to look the part and last longer than plating.

 

[kudos]

They should make the links solid in that case, spending so much on a rep a lot of buyers assumed that there was a small portion of gold in there at least. If they at least made the gold parts solid you wouldnt have to worry if the watch got scratched hence saving it from the waste basket.

Sent from my SM-G9550 using Tapatalk

 

[Pontus]

In the video below here they gold test a gold wrapped Patek 5711

http://www.ttw-1388.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=39_199&products_id=15447

Wich says 75% gold content

welcome to the rep game!

 

[Shadow_]

well it's years i am waiting for a decent 16808, i was disappointed after my first yg rep turned into rg or even something resembling copper colour
i wouldn't even care about real gold being there or not, but if you find an alloy that can mimic gold, why plate the watch in it? Just make the whole watch with that alloy so at least we dont have the scratch problem
also as i saw in some pic in the AP section, we still have the "fading (to black\to copper etch) colour" problem so i believe the alloy they are using it's just not the right one,
perhaps if we place a mass order for YG reps they will research a new alloy or a new method to give us decent YG reps

 

[gamba66]

Surely we never expected it to actually be true 18k gold, but I'm also very surprised to find that it is completely without gold.

TBH it doesn't make a difference if actual gold is used or not, what's important here, is that the colour mimicks the GEN colour and that it doesn't rub/scratch off easily. It is a rep after all and we don't buy these for the "gold content". Just needs to look the part and last longer than plating.

There is no way to mimic gold because precious metals have very different physical properties to standard metals.

Precious metals will shine like crazy when polished especially gold. If gold could be mimicked so easily people wouldn't buy it in the first place.

So whatever this "gold" is made of it will never be able to mimick the warmth and shine of real precious metal! Alchemists have tried this a long time ago

There is really no way that the price is justified for a watch with these cheap alloys. What this is is simply a scam because people were paying the extra money thinking their watches contain real gold. These alloys are not worth anything at all, and why only such a thin plate of them?

Congrats @Parabuteo for the sticky it is very well deserved my friend. Good thing I never made that Thread

Now someone send him a bp wrapped link please!!

 

[Versaceboy54]

In the video below here they gold test a gold wrapped Patek 5711

http://www.ttw-1388.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=39_199&products_id=15447

Wich says 75% gold content

welcome to the rep game!

Interesting, I never saw this... Perhaps BP really does have gold!? For these prices that would be nice

I don't know anything about that machine does anyone know if this test can be faked in anyway? I wonder why he didn't do this for the BP wrapped Rolexs?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[gamba66]

Interesting, I never saw this... Perhaps BP really does have gold!? For these prices that would be nice

I don't know anything about that machine does anyone know if this test can be faked in anyway? I wonder why he didn't do this for the BP wrapped Rolexs?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

So this video is from the guys who have been accused of faking timegraphe qc photos (and have been banned here for different reasons though, I know)..

There are so many ways to fake that video, it really doesn't prove anything

 

[Versaceboy54]

So this video is from the guys who have been accused of faking timegraphe qc photos (and have been banned here for different reasons though, I know)..

There are so many ways to fake that video, it really doesn't prove anything

Yes I see your point.

Someone with a spare BP wrapped link really needs to come forward and this test would be complete! If I had an extra to spare I'd gladly sacrifice it for this test.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Parabuteo]

Update: @robinstyler earlier suggested @andrei01 could test the "wrap" and satisfy our curiosity as to what it is exactly. I took his suggestion and have been PM'g andrei and he kindly agreed to test it, he is overseas and I am conus so it will take a bit for it to get there and get done but will post the results when we have them.

Reading all the replies some things come to mind, first the question as to why it is not all made out of whatever the "wrap" metal is, I am thinking likely because that was very light and brittle whatever it is, like tin....so maybe it would make the rep stupidly light and prone to breakage at the stress points like springbar holes, link joints etc.

Second the BP link or even the Patek possibly being gold of some degree- again I want to stress I just worked with a Noob link, there is a bare possibility other reps are different, but of course I know we are all thinking riiiiight....the whole of the rep industry is so entwined in Asia that that is not very likely.

Finally the BP link testing...you would not need to do a teardown as I did or sacrifice the link really- if anyone @Versaceboy54 ? was willing to take a link down to any local "gold buyer" jewlery business they could take it, scratch it on a testing stone and acid test the result for gold. At worst you would have a scratched link but it would be intact still, I know aaaaaaaughhh! but just to put it out there.

It boggles my mind that they would go to all the trouble of wrapping a link JUST to deceive us into thinking it is gold filled, they do not use remotely the same process, filled is bonded to the base metal as @tripdog posted earlier, the "wrap" is just that, it was barely adhering to the substrate metal. I think it MIGHT initially have just been a method to increase the thickness of the "gold" color on a watch so scratches/ wear are less of an issue than plated. And as a bonus being the devious industry they are- they figured out they could market it as thick "18k gold wrapped" and see who bought into it...the process itself has to be worth something more than just plating so I can see a somewhat higher price than plated.

If they were honest they would say: watch has "thick 18k toned gold metal wrapping" that resists wear and scratches to an extreme degree! But then again they would also say 1:92% copy! Gen clone Swiss! Water resistant to 3 feet (sometimes)! It is what it is.