Got a hankering for a black ceramic watch and loving the look of the Tudor Fastrider Black Shield with the red. Found it for a very good price but even at RRP it represents seemingly good value compared to other ceramic options I think.
Any thoughts on this watch or any ceramic pieces?
Well, if you like it then you should buy whatever others think, but for me the red is just too bright and lipstick-y. The name logo also looks a bit out of place to me.
Having said that I have a Seiko SRQ013, which is extremely similar in layout and general looks, I really like it though it's not red or ceramic:
Personally I like Tudors in general but not this range. I think Omega Speedmaster Racing do the job better. I find the fast rider a bit cartoon like in the flesh. Just personal opinion of course so I'm sure quality wise it will be to usual high Tudor standards.
There was one in a sale recently at 50% off. I don't think they're as popular as hoped for so you may be able to pick up a bargain.
Personally I prefer the one with the sand colour highlights but that's just personal preference.
I have a yellow dial fastrider, good size and fun to wear, not a great deal of interest in them but worth a go for the right price.
The black shield range looks interesting- the matching date wheel correctly oriented shows attention to detail.
Personally I prefer the gold accent but if red is what draws you
Very happy with my Tudor certainly good build quality
As a bit of a random alternative- black PVD but I only mention it as it is on sale today
http://www.gemnation.com/watches/Deal-Of-The-Day.html
Some interesting thoughts, thanks. Clearly the Tudor Fastrider range draws mixed feelings but Tudor does seem like a highly regarded brand. I once owned the Tudor Heritage Advisor and build quality on that watch is excellent.
I like the red because it's a colour I don't currently have in my collection and I think it looks great with the black ceramic. So much choice out there, guess thats why we enjoy this hobby so much!
I would be interested in your views on the Advisor.
(Don't want you to derail your own thread)
Here or another thread
The Tudor would be a nicer watch if they dropped Black Shield from the dial. To much text and too many fonts.
I have one of these ( photograph from the internet ) full ceramic case and eta movement, I've had it three years and still looks the same.
https://www.ocean7watchco.com/index....c-lm-4-v2.html
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I really like the look of the fast riders. I particularly like the yellow one. For me, it would be a very guilty pleasure though. Part of buying a very expensive watch is recognisable quality. I feel given the boyish motorsports presentation, unlike the ranger or BB, is it immediately apparent that you're strapping on a piece of horological significance?
Gotta say I do love the yellow one.
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Agreed to a point. I guess it depends whether it will be part of a wider collection or be your only expensive watch. The Fastrider would be like no other watch I own and would find its unique place.Originally Posted by jeepie
Good morning,
I have just bought my first luxury watch, a Cermaic Black Shield in red and rubber, so I have no real basis for comparisons.
I first found this model about 18 months ago whilst browsing the web on the train, thought that looks nice and sort of forgot about. Then Fraser Hart opened a branch where I live, Worcester, and they have the Black Shield in the window.
Seeing it I was quite disappointed as the window display was well lit and this makes the watch looked quite washed out, hint to FH don’t shine bright lights onto black watches. :-)
Under natural light and viewed at certain angles or inside it is as dark and moody as some of the best photos on the web. Under most angles that I look at the hour and minute hands are silver, there are only a few times when they appear black and hard to read.
I found the glass to be surprisingly reflective, I was expecting a better anti-reflective coating given the price, but it is by no means a disaster.
Generally I wear white cuffed shirts at work and it looks good against them, but it also looks good against a dark shirt and a navy blazer. I don’t have a black blazer but I suspect that it would look even better.
I too like the sand coloured watch on rubber, but the red is much less dominant on the wrist than you might assume from just photos or looking at the watch in isolation.
I was disappointed that the full sized red second hand only works with the stopwatch, I guess that for a mechanical watch switching modes is too complex. I was also surprised by the size of the strap, I have small wrists and have used the biggest setting, but maybe I am just being stupid and can’t see how to adjust it for larger wrists.
It may be that I am not a watch person but I don’t feel any different putting on the Tudor or my £75 Pulsar. I have tried to take photos but I can’t get them right, the red always appears much brighter than it really is.
Bye
Ian
Last edited by IanSmithISA; 23rd October 2016 at 10:38.
Hi Ian, thanks for your thoughts and welcome to the forum.
Reading your comments, I am unsure whether you are pleased with your purchase or feeling a little unsure? You say you feel no different when comparing it to the Pulsar, I would have thought the Tudor would be quite special given the cost?
Hello,
Thanks for the welcome.
I am glad that you are unsure as it means that I have been clear. :-)
I picked up the watch on Thursday and I haven't yet got excited about it.
It may be that I have been wanting it for a while so it was bound to be a disappointment when I actually got one, or it may be that I am not an expensive watch person and anything would have evoked the same reaction.
I am an enthusiastic cyclist and there is a big maker, Shimano of gears and brakes etc who have a range of components called Dura-Ace, these are pretty much the best that they can make regardless of cost and I get a buzz from them, the Black Shield just feels like a watch.
Before buying it I spent a bit of time understanding movements, case materials and such like and at the moment I am feeling more that I have paid for Tudor's full page adverts in the Telegraph, for the Black Bay than I have got a wonderful watch.
Obviously this is a purely emotional response and others will react differently, at the moment I am slightly disappointed. It is not that the watch in reality is not what it was advertised to be, but for me it lacks the charm that would justify paying more than needed for a watch.
Bye
Ian
Hi and welcome.
Shame you are not feeling much love for your Tudor, unusual choice for a first quality watch. Maybe its the fact its black and not shiny that just doesn't press your buttons, a little too under the radar??
As too the strap, they are not the most generous in size and i find the deployment buckle sits a bit high around my wrist to the 6 o'clock position compared to everything else.
Give it some time to grow on you before you make a judgement.
Happy to help. I only had it for a couple of months but an impressive watch, excellent build quality and interesting movement. Tudor developed the alarm module in house which is quite cool. Let me know what you would lime to know. Cheers
Good evening,
I love the visuals and every so often I look at it in the right light and at that moment the look is almost enough but......
A rubber strap is a rubber strap and there is limited scope for improvements but there are 7 holes punched in the back of the strap and only 5 of those have made it through to the front. For a watch bought from Argos that isn't a big issue, but how the expletive deleted did that get through Tudor Quality Control.
Then I start the stopwatch and it feels cheap, there is no feeling of components moving into place on bearings instead a bit of brute force is needed.
I was also quite generous in my earlier description of the glass's reflectiveness.
As someone new to the market it may be that my expectations are unrealistic but at the moment I feel way worse than I would have expected to feel if I had bought a fake. A fake is supposed to looks vaguely good but it isn't built like the real thing and it isn't the real thing and you know it, but this is the real thing and it feels like a fake :(
At the moment I am very close to asking the dealer if they will buy it back and just accept the loss and move on.
Kind regards
Ian
Last edited by IanSmithISA; 23rd October 2016 at 17:27.
It sounds to me that you need to put this one down to experience, cut your losses and move it on. If you are feeling like this now you will never love it. Take your time buying a watch, try it on and do your research. A 'luxury' watch should make you smile and feel good especially in the first few months of ownership, otherwise buy a £10 Casio.
After your comments I went and checked mine, yes there are seven holes in the back of the strap and only five on the front, as it's numbers one and seven which is maximum adjustment either way I don't see it as being a problem, better really as number one probably wouldn't allow any tucking in of the tail and number seven would leave too much tail for the keepers?
I have too agree about the chrono pushers, very positive and clunky, checked all my others and very different, but it doesn't bother me at all.
Love wearing mine as it's very different to everything else I own, quite a lot of guys flip watches after a few days or weeks as they "not bonding" with them, I've only had this a couple times and never when I've handled it prior to purchase. I sort of liken Tudors to Seat cars in their relationship within VAG, funky and a little bit out there compared to their parent brand. Having had a Pelagos, which I thought was a cracking, if a little nondescript in appearance, austere as it was called by someone here, but on the rubber really looked great, maybe live with it for a few months.
I've never seen that ceramic Tudor in real life. I suspect a photograph isn't a good way to judge it but I'm keen to take a look.
Love that watch. High end Seikos are really getting under my skin, I'm worried I can't stop the fateful momentum that ends in a purchase . I already have too many classic normal Seikos picked up v cheaply but I think I'd like just one extravagant one, like that Ananta or a Grand Seiko.Well, if you like it then you should buy whatever others think, but for me the red is just too bright and lipstick-y. The name logo also looks a bit out of place to me.
Having said that I have a Seiko SRQ013, which is extremely similar in layout and general looks, I really like it though it's not red or ceramic:
An interesting thread and not sure how I've missed the Fastrider Black Shield tbh. I like them!
They do seem to fly under the radar, must be the stealthy dark looks!
You make it sound like quality is an obvious property. How does one recognise quality in a timepiece, exactly?
Yeah my thoughts exactly, I think they do an all black (think Bell & Ross Phantom ish) version, but that is special order only. Sure there was a review on Ablogtowatch, but can't find it right now (on phone.)
I wouldnt say quality is obvious to all straight away, but when looking closely at and handling a watch you get a feel for it, especially the more you handle, collect or acquire. to me it shows in the finish, especially the dial, how the crown moves and feels, loads of things you notice when handling, but there are some superbly well made cheaper watches i agree.
I completely agree with you about elements of quality such as finish and smoothness of action. But there's a lot more that cannot be directly perceived. For example, few consumers can tell bronze from brass by look and feel (vide Magrette et al), few people can tell whether different grades of glue have been used in two similarly-textured straps, and no one can tell whether a load-bearing component has been properly heat treated and annealed until it fails.
So how do we know these things are all good? We trust the brand. And we trust them because of long term experience and because of what they tell us about themselves. The latter is expensive to us (especially in time) and the latter is expensive to them (because marketing in a noisy world is a very expensive exercise). And what they spend on marketing their quality to us cannot be spent on actual built-in quality.
To complicate matters further, many aspects of watch building that were once indicators of quality simply no longer are such accurate measures. Finely detailed dial work? CNC controlled micro-engravers. Accurate timekeeping? Six sigma manufacturing processes. High corrosion resistance? Highly homogeneous stainless alloys globally available at low cost.
I'm not saying that expensive things are low quality, I'm just pointing out that we are generally ignorant of the actual manufactured quality of an item, and so we take our cues from what we can easily discern, and extrapolate from there.
The black shield range looks interesting- the matching date wheel correctly oriented shows attention to detail.
Personally I prefer the gold accent but if red is what draws you
This is the configuration that looks best to me.
Well I went and did it and I am delighted! Beautiful watch, superbly made and in my opinion a real stunner. Thanks for all your comments:
Congrats - look forward to updates and impressions as the information on these is quite thin on the ground
Good morning,
As they are still on the market I thought that I would do a "had it for a while and now think."
Before doing this, why on Earth did they get David Beckham as a brand ambassador, I jokingly asked for a refund in the local AD and I got the impression that the staff sort of got the point.
The only good thing is that most of the photos I have seen have been for the gold/steel bracelet Black Bay which is by far the worst version, sorry to whoever has bought one.
Having had the Black Shield in red for almost 10 months the plus is that the time keeping seems to be pretty good, especially when it it is hot.
During the recent hot spell it was losing around 10 seconds a week, over the winter it was closer to 45 seconds per week. So it does seem that it could do with a regulation tweak, but I like it cold so it could just be me.
If only it looked like it does in the picture, generally it only does in either very bright sunlight or in a darkish room. The rest of the time it is turn you wrist to get past the overly reflective glass and most of the features the two face Tudor badge and the rings and markings on the sub dial are not visible. However I know someone who has a Black Bay Bronze which is just as bad.
The photos often make the luminous hands and markers appear very clear, in practice the lum seems to have quite a short life, which is less of an issue than it might be because of the hand design. The hour and minute hands are so similar that you can't tell if it is 10 past 4 or 20 past 2.
It seems to pick up dust very quickly and this shows, so I generally give it a quick brush with a toothbrush every few weeks and the rubber strap still looks the wrong colour as if it is an aftermarket fit! After a while the shininess of the matt (sic) black ceramic case seems to be less irritating.
Having looked at a number of Tudor watches I am coming to the conclusion that they are in too much of a rush to release models, almost as if there is a deadline we must have a new watch by .... Then after releasing the watch there is a bit of spare time to finish the design, look at the metal cased FastRiders and the the ceramic one.
I do quite like the Black Bay and that seems to be the same, the black PVD version just looks cheap then we get the really nice Bronze and then the two tone strap which looks like we have some parts in a bin lets fit them together. :-)
Overall I remain disappointed.
Bye
Ian
Good morning,
My disappointment with it continues.... :-(
A few months ago it started to make a noise like the rotor was falling off and about to drop a tiny screw in the works somewhere.
Everybody I have spoken to says this is normal for a Valjoux 7753 and it even has its own name "Wobble"!
Even something as simple as a new strap seems to be beyond the dealer, we can order you one in but we don't keep them in stock and we can't tell you how much it will be.
Bye
Ian
Hello Ian, I love you.
You're not much of a watchperson and it's really genuine to have you here.
I hate AD too, especially about straps. They just want to sell you full watches.
Anyway, I hope you willlose your watch virginity soon and become a fully fledged watch idiot savant. Welcome to the internet watch underground!
0_0 ciao
Loving the Seiko ...don't see many of those around.Well, if you like it then you should buy whatever others think, but for me the red is just too bright and lipstick-y. The name logo also looks a bit out of place to me.
Having said that I have a Seiko SRQ013, which is extremely similar in layout and general looks, I really like it though it's not red or ceramic:
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