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Making My Own Dial - Questions

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8.3K views 23 replies 5 participants last post by  Leszek Kralka  
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#1 ·
Hello!

This is my first post as I am starting to get into watch making. I want to attempt making my own dial from scratch. I would make the design with the proper measurements and get it laser cut/engraved in aluminum or brass with date windows and centre hole. I would then polish it and begin the design. My questions is how do I achieve a high end professional finish? Would I do light coats of enamel spray paint for the base colour then get the design PAD printed? I also came across these two videos (links below) and it seems like they painted the top of the SS sheet with some type of black and the laser ends up a finished white/silver detail. I am trying to achieve an end product similar to the picture. I would laser engrave the guilloche pattern and do lights coats of white enamel paint finishing with high gloss lacquer. Would this process work?

Since this is my first post, I am unable to add links. I will add the links as a reply to this post.

Thank you!
 
#3 ·
Ohhh … I tink you have a lot of research in front of you
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Just some hints! Dial manufacturers use specialized spray painting processes so you will probably not be able to achieve the same results ( even if you can get rather close to them ) at home. regarding the paint / thinner System. You can achieve rather good results with the standard cold enamel paint sold by e.g. Humbrol or Revell to paint plastic models but you have to thin it down to use it in the airbrush.. and be safe... wear a mask with the right filter class . How it behaves under laser engraving … no idea and not any laser is suited for engraving metal!!
Alternative ... there are plastics out there which switch from black to white when lasered… you'get them in the marking and engraving store.. but as always you need the right kind of laser to get this done.

regarding transfer printing I ease my doing .. just read the FAQ s on the TAMPOPRINT website
 
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#4 ·
Regarding the paints for the base color, I personally use automotive paints sprayed with an airbrush. They are designed to withstand the harsh elements and UV light so I'd say they are good enough for watch dials.

Dial making involves few different skills and the pad printing seems to be the most difficult to master. Personally, I only design, make the dial blank and paint the base color before I outsource the pad printing. It's not cheap though.
 
#7 ·
You tell him Dan!. (Said with a wry smile.)
BTW benwatch this is a private joke for Dan and not meant to put you off making your own dial.

benwatch, if you have a look on youtube you will find a number of ways of printing dials but the best quality and versatility comes from pad printing.
Unfortunately it's also the most difficult.

I'd suggest staying away from screen printing. I just saw a youtube video from a company that proports to screen print dials.
There was an end shot of about 40 dials all in one frame and I can even tell from a quick glance that they are all junk.

If you are into the whole watchmaking thing then I'd suggest learning as much as you can about watchmaking skills.
For the dial my suggestion would be to try some of the stick on transfer methods till you get something you like and then get it pad printed if you want something else like lume on it.

Others might have suggestions on how to mock up a dial to see how it really looks on a watch.

Dan, I should have something for you next week.
 
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#5 ·
Thanks for the help! I have been doing a lot of research over the past week and I'm having trouble finding the answers I want. I guess I'll just have to trial and error it myself. I know there is spray paint made for metals such as brass and aluminum, I am wondering if that would work with a top clear coat. Regarding PAD printing, it seeme to be to costly since I want to design 1/1 watches. I have been looking in UV flatbed printing, it seems like some watch companies are begginin to use that for their dials. Thoughts?
 
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#6 ·
What is the difference between me using enamel paint thinned down compared to enamel spray paint? I also saw some mention of lacquer paint but that seems to be an outdated technique. Both of these types come in a spray can bottle, I would assume an airbrush will give me better control and therefor a better finish?
 
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#8 ·
From my experience enamel paints (at least the hobby types) are quite soft when dry and they take a very long time to dry, so I wouldn't use them for dials. The enamel dials produced by watch companies are not painted with enamel paint, the process is completely different and involves use of a furnace. Lacquer or acrylic paints are good for dial painting.
 
#9 ·
Depends on how you are able to process the paint.. as enamel is that slow it perfectly flattens out in the oven.
For engraved dials I would NOT recomment it as it fills the engraved lines and so destroys all the effort you put in a nice engraving.
But for highly thinned acrylics paint you also need a perfect application technique as this paint brings nuances and details out but is rather non forgiving as it immediately dries. Another thing is that you need a basement which accepts the color and keeps it even as the metal of the dial is polished. And if you think of padprinting the color should not be dissolved by the following layers..
 
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#11 ·
I think I have watched every YouTube video there is on watchmaking and dial printing so I think I know which one you are talking about. The black dials with white text? If not, can you please share the link? My logic was to spray/airbrush the dial and once that completely dries, days later get the numbers UV printed. I wonder how close it would look to PAD printing since I would only be printing the numbers and not the whole dial as they did in the video.
 
#13 ·
This is the vid
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Have a look at 1:39. Terrible. But I did overestimate the number of dials.

I get the concept of UV printing but I can't comment on its quality for a watch dial.

But it also depends on what you want to do. If you want to put murals on your dial then it sounds great.

As has been mentioned, the base colour is painted not printed.
I use spray packs but you just need to be careful and sometimes repeat if it goes wrong but a simple flat black gives an apprearance like many diver faces.

If you do get something uv printed it would be very interesting to see say a 50X pic.

Also AFAIK, lume can't be applied by UV and doing it by hand after getting a dial printed sounds counterproductive.

I'd suggest just trying a few options.
The paint will usually come off pretty easily if you soak the dial in thinners. Just remember to wear a respirator and/or have good ventilation.
 
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#14 ·
Paint on polished metal and the color will not keep on the surface of course you will clean the surface and prepare everything well. But a very little touch or a grip with the tweezers will pull of the color in flakes .. so you may roughen the surface a bit and first apply a thin basecoat which works like a mediator in between the color and the metal.. If I were you I would and I would like to go for e.g. pad printing I would try to get my color system + the support from the producer as e.g. Tampoprint! The have the greatest experience with that stuff as they sell and develope it .. of course the colors are a bit more expensive, but that pays out by the expertise they stand for!
 
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#18 ·
Yeah, it doesn't look the best in that video. I do think they are doing a sloppy job. I came across some videos of Seiko and Shinola doing screen printing. Here's a link I found:

I'm going to give this a try. I'm going to do a basecoat before the screen print and see how it turns out!
 
#15 ·
Mechamind may have found that the paint is very fragile but I usually use an etching primer and then paint over that.
The paint will mark if you treat it roughly but it is not super sensitive.

Regarding pad printing, yes its the best solution and the ink manufacturers will definitely help but there are not a lot of people that will even know how to advise on the typical total loss open inkwell system that you would probably use.

Knowing what I know now I'd take the easiest solution to give you the solution you want. And pad printing is not the easiest.
I'd say its the hardest, but it could just be me.
 
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#20 ·
1afc said:
Mechamind may have found that the paint is very fragile but I usually use an etching primer and then paint over that.
The paint will mark if you treat it roughly but it is not super sensitive.

Regarding pad printing, yes its the best solution and the ink manufacturers will definitely help but there are not a lot of people that will even know how to advise on the typical total loss open inkwell system that you would probably use.

Knowing what I know now I'd take the easiest solution to give you the solution you want. And pad printing is not the easiest.
I'd say its the hardest, but it could just be me.
Click to expand...
Right, I plan on sanding then polishing the aluminum. And doing a coat of etching primer for the acrylic paint. Then I would pad print or whatever other methods I decide on. This should work, correct? I would do a top coat of UV gloss varnish. My only concern is that I want the dial to last a very long time and not chip/fade away. Just like any other watch.
 
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#17 ·
Yeah, it doesn't look the best in that video. I do think they are doing a sloppy job. I came across some videos of Seiko and Shinola doing screen printing. Here's a link I found:

I'm going to give this a try. I'm going to do a basecoat before the screen print and see how it turns out!
 
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