My Tudor Black Bay 54‘s bracelet is dirty. Understandable after almost daily wear for more than two years. You can see it by inspecting the steel bracelet, and you can see it on your wrist after a full day’s wear.
Something needed to be done.
Additionally, my wife gave me a new watch project requiring a more advanced cleaning solution than manually removing dirt with a stick and solvent. I needed to invest in a domestic cleaning machine for watch parts.
Luckily, it was not a large investment.
Meet my new tool: the HELI ultrasonic cleaner. The dream, of course, would be to have the German ELMA ultrasonic cleaner, but for that I need to change apartments and attend a few more Formula 1 Grand Prix to justify the purchase to my wife. Until then, we’ll make do with this remarkable alternative.
Let me start by showing how it looks from the outside and from the inside. The cleaner came with two trays for holding and, if needed, securing items. The ultrasonic cleaner came with a manual with simple, easy-to-understand instructions.
How does it work? You put your items in the larger tray, place the tray in the cleaner, and fill it with tap water. Being me, I also had to get a cleaning solution – all my watch repair heroes on YouTube use one. I asked the wonderful people at Maison Venus for a recommendation, and they suggested SoniX powder (made in France). The powder came without a scoop, so I used one I had at home that holds 3g. For this first cleaning session, I used roughly 300ml of water – the maximum is 600ml – and 3g of powder. The ultrasonic cleaner has a 3-minute timer; I ran it twice.
But before the cleaning could take place, I had to remove the bracelet. In the photos below, you can already see how dirty the bracelet was.
I have to admit, removing the bracelet with my Bergeon spring bar tool was a struggle. Ideally you’d use special tweezers for this type of bracelet, but I made do with what I had.
With the bracelet off, I gave the watch a closer look. Dirty, as expected. I wasn’t ready to clean the whole watch just yet, but since I had everything set up, I figured I’d do what I could. See below.
Luckily, I had plenty of cleaning swabs with a flat cotton tip. A couple of minutes was all it took, and the watch came out better than expected.
Thanks to my wonderful macro lens, you can see the bezel has some bits of dirt too. I tried to clean it, but that will have to wait for another time.
Ready to see how dirty the bracelet was?
This is what you get after more than two years of daily wear. I used to clean it with a toothpick, but that never did much. Then, after the Belgian Grand Prix – during which I sweated quite a bit with the watch on my wrist – I decided enough was enough and it was time for a proper clean. Doing so would also help with future watch projects – stay tuned for those.
In goes the dirty bracelet into my brand new ultrasonic cleaner.
As you can see, the water turned a dark grey after the first cycle. I took a photo, then ran a second.
The outcome exceeded my expectations. I didn’t know what to expect – I just hoped the bracelet would come out cleaner than it went in. As you can see below, the dust, dirt, and sweat are all gone. A shiny bracelet has emerged.
This outcome wasn’t the only surprise.
Could the spring bar in Tudor’s bracelet be broken? When I removed the bracelet, one spring jumped out. I initially thought it was by design, but after a quick search on YouTube – where others successfully removed their Tudor Black Bay bracelets without issues – I concluded the spring bar had simply snapped. I tried pushing it back in, but it wouldn’t hold. Trying to reattach the bracelet with the loose spring yielded the same result: nothing.
Luckily, when I purchased the ultrasonic cleaner, I also picked up a set of spring bars in various lengths.
I swapped the spring bar and, with next to no struggle, put the bracelet back on.
I hope you can see the difference.
These close-ups will also show you that this watch is being worn – and I like that. Watches, especially tool watches like the Tudor Black Bay 54, are made to see and experience the world. Every now and then, they should be cleaned too. A couple more years until its first service, but the occasional bracelet clean won’t hurt.
I enjoyed this project. I usually watch others do the cleaning – now I’ve done it myself.
Lastly, I can wholeheartedly recommend the HELI ultrasonic cleaner. It passed its first test with flying colours – and immediately after, on special request, a jewellery cleaning too. Two for two.
Kindly,
Olaaf
