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GF Breitling Colt 44mm A17388

Aurelius7

Getting To Know The Place
3/10/20
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33
13
EU
Hi there RWI community!

Just want to share here my review of GF watch, that is - Breitling Colt 44 rep.


So, I have this watch for about a month now. GF has made fantastic job. Movement is working great, it's most accurate of my automatic watches, timegrapher on QC was saying it's +14s/day but from my observation it seems to perform better on days when it's being worn. One thing worth mentioning for people who had never experienced asian eta 2824 - there is significant difficulty with winding the movement, it's not as smooth as you will experience on most of movements, so keep that in mind.

In case of build quality everything is on top, I'm absolutely amazed about quality of it, they repped every single detail, even things like small Breitling logo on bezel, although there are couple I would say... incompletenesses when it comes to this being 100% true to gen - one is obviously the dial. I think that GF intentionally made it different, but not in any means bad. It's a gray sunburst dial, just like on the newer COLT's, it also reminds me of design from Breitling digital warranty card. Personally I think that they are capable of doing matt black dial, for example like the one on UBF COLT but I suppose they made it like that on purpose, just to make it kind of their own. Sometimes I consider it to be better looking than that gen matt dial, but I also have days when I wish it to be one of those super reps and be 100% there. The best scenario would be to have a choice between matt and sunburst dial, saying that - the best choice when you want to go closer to 100% is to go with white dial option. Second incompleteness, smaller one, is the engraving on clasp - it's not as deep as on gen. Third one is the mismatch of both dial and bezel in relation to case, bezel itself is perfectly align with dial.

Lume on this watch is good, bright like C3, but not as long lasting, as I can see from many other reviewed watches, that's common.


If you guys have any questions regarding this watch - feel free to ask ! ;)
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Tucker

Lunnyfied by Raddave
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Very nice looking watch. I have it with a blue dial. GF did an excellent job with the Colt.
 

Aurelius7

Getting To Know The Place
3/10/20
26
33
13
EU
Very nice looking watch. I have it with a blue dial. GF did an excellent job with the Colt.

Indeed, blue version is nice, a bit closer to gen, I was considering it but eventually took black. It's hard to pick basing on pictures, especially as there are not so many of those, that's why I posted my review on couple sites. Light also plays a big role, when it comes to black version, dial sometimes has almost steel look, but in low light conditioning it's totally black, just like gen. ;)
 
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tkingjr

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aurelius
​​​​​​​It has been said many times the minor errors are deliberate so the factory can make V2, V3, V4, and so on. I think there are some Rolex Reps at V11 or V12. I bought an Omega knowing the center link on the bracelet was wrong because the factory wanted to sell off the old bracelet inventory. When they released the new bracelet I bought the watch.
 

Slanglican

I'm Pretty Popular
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aurelius
It has been said many times the minor errors are deliberate so the factory can make V2, V3, V4, and so on. I think there are some Rolex Reps at V11 or V12. I bought an Omega knowing the center link on the bracelet was wrong because the factory wanted to sell off the old bracelet inventory. When they released the new bracelet I bought the watch.

The v2 seamaster 300?
i just ordered mine today! Supposed to be the v2 with Stainless steel..
ordered it over the chronomat bc of the wrong font...
 

Aurelius7

Getting To Know The Place
3/10/20
26
33
13
EU
Yes, but still, for the price... :happy:

I've done some research and I found out that the dial they used in their COLT models is more close to sunburst dial in Breitling Superocean Steelfish ref A17390
 

Aurelius7

Getting To Know The Place
3/10/20
26
33
13
EU
@Aurelius7, how would you evaluate the bracelet?

It feels very solid, I had gen COLT 44 quartz in my hands and I don't remember any significant difference in heft. Visually - I have bunch of pictures of gen and I think they are the same. Only difference is the one that was mentioned - which is engraving on clasp.
 

Aurelius7

Getting To Know The Place
3/10/20
26
33
13
EU
Update on lume.
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I made test - I compared GF COLT 44 lume with my Seiko Turtle.
The source of light was a flashlight (Convoy S2+) - I exposed both dials to light for about 5s
Result is - they go hand in hand when it comes to brightness and durability.
Up to 15 min lume on both is bright and sharp.
After 30 min lume on both is weak, but usable.
No significant difference in brightness during test and on the end.

I'm not aware what type of lume Seiko uses in Turtle, but I assume it's something like C3 standard.
I need to take my words back when it comes to my opinion that GF lume is not as long lasting as C3.
Maybe I had too high expectations, one thing is for sure, I was wrong.
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shinynewbling25

aprilia
29/1/15
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Where your daughter is
I love the Breitling Colt 44. The quality of the case polishing is fantastic. Mirror like and kind of a sensual curve on the tops of the lugs. The bracelet is great with gen like crisp brushing and edges. I guess the clasp is only ok. Trying to compare pictures I could really only see maybe the size of the 24 hour numbers on the dial with the rep's being bolder than the gen. Very underrated rep that looks great on a variety of straps one of the few white dial watches I have.


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Aurelius7

Getting To Know The Place
3/10/20
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Hello, after long time.
I've lost the access to my account - now I'm back and have something interesting to share. :coffee:

When I was buying this watch, I knew that this is not perfect NWBIG watch - but wanted to make it like OR.
For that reason I've made a research, and bought a dial from ANF factory version of this watch - which is the best one on market in terms of dial - totally recommend it.

I bought it from Trusty for around 70usd with shipping.


Obvious thing for GF Breitling is the dial. Gen has matt finish - GF has sunburst effect, which is big mistake from factory. It works for blue version but for black it's total NO.



Dial swap was easy. I was happy with it, although I did not wear it a lot - I'm more a G-Shock guy for EDC ;)





Not so long ago, I've broken the movement by mistake, after re-attaching the second hand (time setting mechanism, when pulling out the stem)

Soon I will post the watch with necessary repair parts for sell - for someone with good watchmaking skill who will give it a new life. 😉🕺

Till this time - here are the photos of parts:

Have a great day everyone! :coffee:
 
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shinynewbling25

aprilia
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Ah, it's unfortunate. Not that major of an issue especially for not a lot of wear and the watch got destroyed trying to "improve" it. Risk vs reward. At least it got 3 yrs of some use. Hopefully someone else who knows what they're doing picks this up and restores it to its full glory.
 

Aurelius7

Getting To Know The Place
3/10/20
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EU
To be honest, I feel like in someway the fault is in the movement, in the quality - in other movements, even eta2824 based, this push button in movement to relaese the stem was more accessible. I was very careful with it, I've done many watch mods before on seiko NH35 movements and miyota's.

What's interesting :
I bought new st213p movement to replace it, because the rapair itself was to much for me. Should be easy, right?

- Agaian, I've done it many times. This time it was not so easy - as it turned out, the watch hands did not work with this new mechanism. I could not put the minute hand on the watch without it falling after couple rotations.

I've been watching it with magnifier and could not guest what's wrong, so I tried many times.

My conslusion was that the canon pinion of the movement I bought doesn't work with those watch hands, those canon pinions are slightly different. The next step in this case, would be to swap the whole canon pinion between the movements and this would make it work - but again I don't have such skill to do it.

I don't want to waste more time and energy on this watch. I've had a great time with it, so I hope I will pass it to good hands. 😉
 
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