So you just bought a shiny new luxury watch made of stainless steel, with beautifully contrasting polished and brushed finishes. While most people don’t open the caseback where usually only a watchmaker would look, you’re not most people. There, surrounding the delicate clockwork mechanism, you find a ring made of — gasp — plastic? Are you horrified?
Don’t be. The use of plastic is a documented phenomenon in watches that cost well into four figures. And while it might not fit your romantic image of age-old Swiss craftsmanship, it’s there for a reason: someone decided it’s the right material for the job.
Not all plastics are equal
“Synthetic polymers [plastics] are irreplaceable in society and do many, many important things,” says Dr. Frank Bates, Regents Professor of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science at the University of Minnesota.
“Windmills would not exist without thermoset plastics,” Bates says. “When you need an artificial hip, you’re going to be very happy high-density polyethylene is around.”
While disposable products give plastic a bad rap, it’s in fact terrifically suited to products that are intended to last forever.
It’s easy for a layperson to come away with only a crude idea of what plastic is. The word itself is an oversimplification. Plastics, plural, are an entire family of materials that combine polymers (particularly long, repeating chains of molecules) with other components to achieve a variety of effects.
They can be lightweight like Styrofoam cups, flexible like grocery bags, hard and heavy like bowling balls, resistant to extreme kinetic force like a bulletproof vest — but they’re durable no matter what form they take.