# Remove a brand logo from dial



## Zinezine (May 3, 2014)

Dear watchlovers,

I am some kind of a maniac with brands and just hate to see them on me, that applies to my clothes, shoes, my motorbike as well as my watch. 

This said I am planning to remove the Seiko name from a dial, the skx779, as I'm doing a mod with my actual skx007 (dial, hands, bezel, insert, chapter ring and strap). 

Problem is: I've been reading stuff about brand removal but not a clear and legitimate explanation. 
Here are the 2 technics so far: 
- toothpick and aluminium polish (Nuvite): scratch lightly the brand logo with the toothpick (dipped in Nuvite) till it remove itself: result should be fast: 1 min working time
- cotton bud + alcohol: rub the brand logo for 5 min, it should come off eventually.

I want to use the safest and most efficient way in order to avoid damaging the dial (the paint) and remove completely the brand name from it, as it was never there. Please, share you experiences and help me out. 

Thanks,

Z.


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## mpalmer (Dec 30, 2011)

Welcome to the forum! I will be interested to see what is suggested. I have wondered before if this is feasible...


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## Toothbras (Apr 19, 2010)

just out of curiosity, what kind of shoes do you wear? curious how you removed the branding


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## justbecauseIcan (May 8, 2013)

I'd remove it as well if it said Seiko (calm down, just a joke. Or is it?)

Is the black dial itself pure material or also coloured in black? If so, whatever you are doing to the white logo may happen to what is underneath and render the whole dial useless if there is a smudge - you'll always notice that smudge. 

Curious to see how you go.


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## salayc (Mar 29, 2012)

The alcohol technique seems to me the most sound idea, although you will almost certainly damage the dial. At least, you will burnish the paint under the printing. If you want it to be perfect, have it reprinted without the logo.


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## Zinezine (May 3, 2014)

justbecauseIcan said:


> I'd remove it as well if it said Seiko (calm down, just a joke. Or is it?)
> 
> Is the black dial itself pure material or also coloured in black? If so, whatever you are doing to the white logo may happen to what is underneath and render the whole dial useless if there is a smudge - you'll always notice that smudge.
> 
> Curious to see how you go.


I understand your remark as a lot of people undervalue Seiko as a cheap/jap/gadget watches company. Truth is, it's a 130+ years firm which revolutionize the watch business with the first worlwide quartz movement wristwatch, they created the most accurate watch of all time: "the Astron". I'm sure you know that quartz watches dominate the whole watch business now.

To go back to the topic, i think it's pure black material but I'll have to check that back home and come back to you.

Cheers.


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## Zinezine (May 3, 2014)

Okay it seems that it's an aluminium dial with a black coating. Any ideas how I should proceed beside cotton bud/alcool?


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## pithy (Aug 22, 2010)

Zinezine said:


> I understand your remark as a lot of people undervalue Seiko as a cheap/jap/gadget watches company. Truth is, it's a 130+ years firm which revolutionize the watch business with the first worlwide quartz movement wristwatch, they created the most accurate watch of all time: "the Astron". I'm sure you know that quartz watches dominate the whole watch business now. To go back to the topic, i think it's pure black material but I'll have to check that back home and come back to you. Cheers.


Definitely Rustoleum high temp paint applied with a sable hair brush or a poly interior house roller. Mask the balance of the dial off will polym tape and be sure to press down extra hard to make sure that it's seated. We don't want any seepage.


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## Zinezine (May 3, 2014)

Hi Pithy,

thanks for the advice, just to be clear as I'm a rookie, when u say cover the balance of the dial with tape u mean the whole dial but where the Seiko brand is located?


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## Sonic_driftwood (Mar 5, 2014)

That's going to be a tough paint job...and you can never get back that patented Seiko lume if you paint it or take it off. I would try the isopropyl alcohol. Go light, and cover the whole center of the dial. Then, once the branding is removed, very lightly treat the whole surface except the lume to eliminate any isolated marring (dulling really) of the paint. You may end up "aging" the rest of the text slightly, but as long as you aren't going at it like a paint scraper you should be able to stop short of totally removing it. The trick is going light. You may even want to fray the end of a toothpick to blunt the fibers and use that instead of a cotton bud so you can be a little more precise.


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## Somewhere else (Feb 17, 2006)

As someone who has printed dials, I think most of the suggestions seem like they might work, but you are dealing with a very thin coating here.There's may reasons for the popularity of aluminum as a dial material over brass, which used to be the standard material. aluminum is even used by some very high quality watches, so there is nothing wrong with your dial per se.The black, however is produced by anodizing the dial with the correct inorganic salt for color. The result is a very tough, long lasting coating which can than be easily printed over. It does in one step what used to take two steps and a lot of manipulation. The trouble is that this coating is micron thin. No matter how you try to take off the printing, which is thermocatalytic ink designed to be extremely tough and last well into the next century, you are going to be trying to remove ink that is even tougher than your anodized coating. The only way to do this is by abrasion. And your chance of ruining your dial is very high, but it's your watch, so go ahead. Alcohol should have no effect on this type of printing. What you are left with is the idea of rubbing it off using a tooth picked dipped in metal polish. I don't know Nuvite, but every liquid metal polish is exactly the same: corundum (usually synthetic) ground to micron size and suspended in a base of stearic acid and alcohol. Like all other metal "polishes" it's an abrasive.That's how you "polish" metal, by rubbing it with a light abrasive.So going after the logo with Nuvite (or whatever. Brasso is one I used to use in the USA). My advice to avoid going through the black is to due it very slowly under as high a magnification as you can so you know right when to stop.

If you do screw up the dial in some small spots, look around for various types of felt tip markers made for artists. Some of these felt tips are extremely thin for fine work and will fill any pin holes you leave in the black unnoticeably.A lot of artists markers are water proof and oil based. These are the best. the brand I use here in Japan is Sakura Pigma. I've fixed more than one dial with them. Don't know if they have them in your area, but they do cover up mistakes well.


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## cs12 (Aug 19, 2012)

Zinezine said:


> Dear watchlovers,
> 
> I am some kind of a maniac with brands and just hate to see them on me, that applies to my clothes, shoes, my motorbike as well as my watch.
> 
> ...


Radical thought but what about a watch with minimal branding.


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## RustyMainspring (Nov 16, 2010)

This is a really dumb reason to change the dial of a watch. Are you ripping the decals and hood ornaments off your car too?


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## pithy (Aug 22, 2010)

RustyMainspring said:


> This is a really dumb reason to change the dial of a watch. Are you ripping the decals and hood ornaments off your car too?


You so funny. You make me laugh for a long time.


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## rik_68 (Jun 5, 2012)

I'm quite curious to see a picture of the final result


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## Eidian (Jul 9, 2012)

RustyMainspring said:


> This is a really dumb reason to change the dial of a watch. Are you ripping the decals and hood ornaments off your car too?


I've seen a lot of SQUIDS taking off the "600" from their Supersports because they're embarrassed; damn bikes still do 0 to 60 mph in less than four seconds but to them, it's "only" a 600. Stupid.

Of course I'll never take the Z1000 off of MY bike.

Sent from my DROID RAZR using Tapatalk


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## Zinezine (May 3, 2014)

RustyMainspring said:


> This is a really dumb reason to change the dial of a watch. Are you ripping the decals and hood ornaments off your car too?


well as a matter of fact I am, never heard of customizing?

You seem quite quick to judge though. First, it's not an original dial already (the base watch is an skx007). I'm customizing my watch with a new dial, insert, inner ring, strap, new set of hands and will look for a modified bezel later. 
The reason why I do this is because I want my watch to be designed to my liking and be kind of unique. It's enjoyable to see a nice modded watch on your wrist especially if you chose each part thoroughly and put hard work in it.

Here you have the whole story, now you can judge.

thanks you all for your advices, there's quite a few technics it appears...please do continue to propose new ways if you have any experience in that matter.


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## Sonic_driftwood (Mar 5, 2014)

Good luck! Please note, I have NOT done this myself on a Seiko dial, but I have read it recommended in a book that covers quite a few Seiko mods. I have, however, used it on a model in the past and it worked to remove unwanted print.

Definitely do post pics (good or bad) so we can add to the collective WISdom tricks.


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## Archer (Apr 23, 2009)

RustyMainspring said:


> This is a really dumb reason to change the dial of a watch. Are you ripping the decals and hood ornaments off your car too?


Debadging - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


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## Chronopolis (Apr 8, 2009)

.


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## Drop of a Hat (Dec 16, 2011)

This is a two part thread. Part two will debut soon titled "HELP! I'VE RUINED MY WATCH!!!"

"He's just a witness"


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## Sonic_driftwood (Mar 5, 2014)

Well, you could always buy a sterile aftermarket seiko dial. I'm sure they are readily available. Then, you could try to debadge the seiko one anyway just to see if it works? I'm confident it could be done, but then again I just ordered a sterile dial instead of going that route on my 7002.


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## Zinezine (May 3, 2014)

Thanks guys for so many advices, what I'm going to do this week-end is that I'm going to use my original dial as a guinea pig and see how it goes (it seems to be the same logo aspect):

if I ruin my dial I'll know that There's 2 choice left: paint it with a professional black gel pen 0,2mm or patch it. Will see and keep u posted. 
Thanks Sonic but that's what I was looking for originally, unfortunately this dial was not available in sterile version, there was only yellow sterile version which I'm not interested in.


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## pithy (Aug 22, 2010)

Zinezine said:


> Thanks guys for so many advices, what I'm going to do this week-end is that I'm going to use my original dial as a guinea pig and see how it goes (it seems to be the same logo aspect): if I ruin my dial I'll know that There's 2 choice left: paint it with a professional black gel pen 0,2mm or patch it. Will see and keep u posted. Thanks Sonic but that's what I was looking for originally, unfortunately this dial was not available in sterile version, there was only yellow sterile version which I'm not interested in.


Dependent upon how flat this second dial is I believe I could cut much of the Seiko Automatic type off with the laser. It would have to be positioned (and trued) several times to avoid damaging the hour markers. What ever oxidized residue that remained could then be easily polished off (hopefully).

If one wished to truly make a statement (and I'm not for sure what that statement would be (or be interpreted as): Seiko hate? Anti-capitalism? Anarchy? ???) you could die cut a precision masking and apply it to the dial and then abrasively blast the dial surface to baremetal in the area of the logo. Then its former presence would be witness ongoing and your eradication of it. This would be the more dramatic statement.


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## geronimo95 (Sep 5, 2013)

why dont you just buy a new blank dial off of ebay?


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## Zinezine (May 3, 2014)

geronimo, blank/sterile dial of this model are not available, at least not in black.

thanks for the tip Pithy but laser cutting/abrasive blasting seems to be out of range for the rookie that I am..


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## Zinezine (May 3, 2014)

Hi guys,

Ok so her is the result of my experiences: 
I tried he alcohol and the rubbing with a toothpick on the Seiko logo, the logo is quite resistant but the painting of the dial much less, after 1 min of work the painting was removed and the logo still almost intact 







I think that the result would have been different if the dial was made of bkack metal (not painted)
So here's what I came up with: black tape, matt, sand aspect (just like the 2 dials)







After giving my guinea pig a hard time I did it on the new dial:







Thank you of for your advices!


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## Zinezine (May 3, 2014)

I just discovered, when putting the hands back that the date change when the clock hit 23:42, is there a way to fix that? Can I simply turn the hands again till 23:42, when the date change I simply push with a toothpick the hour and minutes hands to midnight position, would that work? (Yeah I'm a rookie)


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## Eidian (Jul 9, 2012)

Zinezine said:


> I just discovered, when putting the hands back that the date change when the clock hit 23:42, is there a way to fix that? Can I simply turn the hands again till 23:42, when the date change I simply push with a toothpick the hour and minutes hands to midnight position, would that work? (Yeah I'm a rookie)


You run the risk of bending the hands out of shape and/or ruining the bore thus making them loose. Take the hands off properly and remount them.

Sent from my DROID RAZR using Tapatalk


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## justbecauseIcan (May 8, 2013)

I could not live with that bit of tape over the logo, are you that desperate to be without branding? 

How can you ever look at that dial and not see anything but a sticker?


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## Sonic_driftwood (Mar 5, 2014)

Oh man. Sorry the brand removal did not work as planned. I guess seiko has changed their ink and paint. I just looked at my old seiko and he dial is glossy by comparison. Maybe easier to remove the brand off gloss. I'm grateful you shared the result though!


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## Zinezine (May 3, 2014)

justbecauseIcan said:


> I could not live with that bit of tape over the logo, are you that desperate to be without branding?
> 
> How can you ever look at that dial and not see anything but a sticker?


I understand ur point but keep in mind that It''s a close up, with the dial out it's case, with the lamp right on top of it in order to give u guys a clear view. I'll send u a pictures once it's back in the case, here's with the dial, no zoom:








Ok I'll remove the hands and put them back well.cheers!


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## Chronopolis (Apr 8, 2009)

justbecauseIcan said:


> I could not live with that bit of tape over the logo, are you that desperate to be without branding?
> 
> How can you ever look at that dial and not see anything but a sticker?


The mind, and mind alone, creates things to be bigger/ smaller than they really are.
I think OP did a good job. I can barely see it.


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## pithy (Aug 22, 2010)

It thought the dial turned out pretty good. Is there a crown, caseback or movement that we can likewise delogofy, desecrate, dismember or otherwise obscure Seiko on?


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## Zinezine (May 3, 2014)

Ok guys, here it is, skx007j1 fully modded (might just change the bezel in the future, but with same new insert) 
before (not my wrist):


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## Zinezine (May 3, 2014)

After, fully modded & debadged (thank u all for your support and advices):


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## justbecauseIcan (May 8, 2013)

is that an aftermarket PO bezel insert?


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## Zinezine (May 3, 2014)

Yes it is!


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## pithy (Aug 22, 2010)

Are you going to post a picture of the crown?


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## woof (Mar 15, 2013)

Any plans to make the black dog look like a different breed? Maybe give it collie highlights?

I'm reminded of what a philosophy professor said back in college: "Everything it what it is and not another thing."


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## RustyMainspring (Nov 16, 2010)

What's up with the black lump on the dial?


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## Zinezine (May 3, 2014)

Crown is the original one, and no, I'm not going to mod my dog


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## Tanguero (Dec 16, 2010)

Don't be silly woof, You would never get stickers to stay on the dog!


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## Cobia (Nov 24, 2013)

RustyMainspring said:


> This is a really dumb reason to change the dial of a watch. Are you ripping the decals and hood ornaments off your car too?


Heaps of young guys here remove the decals and badges on their cars when they trick them up, its very popular when guys customise their cars.

To the OP, i really like your custom job, love the orange hand and love the face, looks fantastic, im not very keen on the black tape, i think a felt tip sharpie could have done a better job, but each to their own, your custom job looks way better than the original watch design, cheers


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## Zinezine (May 3, 2014)

Cobia said:


> Heaps of young guys here remove the decals and badges on their cars when they trick them up, its very popular when guys customise their cars.
> 
> To the OP, i really like your custom job, love the orange hand and love the face, looks fantastic, im not very keen on the black tape, i think a felt tip sharpie could have done a better job, but each to their own, your custom job looks way better than the original watch design, cheers


Agreed, I still think that there's a better solution, but the good thing with the tape is that there's a "try again" As I'm not sure I got such steady hands for such small characters.


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## pithy (Aug 22, 2010)

Zinezine said:


> Crown is the original one, and no, I'm not going to mod my dog


Can you post a photo of each?


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## Cobia (Nov 24, 2013)

Ive been trying to mod my girlfriend for a while now, but gave up as i ran out of money  jokes


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## Zinezine (May 3, 2014)

pithy said:


> Can you post a photo of each?


here u go:


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## pithy (Aug 22, 2010)

Zinezine said:


> here u go:
> View attachment 1499157


What's that written on the crown?


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## Zinezine (May 3, 2014)

The crown (or stem) is clean my friend, nothing's written on it.


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## hydrochrono (Jan 6, 2014)

Looks like a nice mod.


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## pithy (Aug 22, 2010)

Zinezine said:


> The crown (or stem) is clean my friend, nothing's written on it.


OK. Now, how about a photo of the caseback and you dog.


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## Crystalfit.co.uk (Apr 16, 2014)

Please don't try to move the hands without removing them. Not so much because you could bend the hands but because there's a high risk of damaging the minute wheel

Sent from my GT-I9505 using Tapatalk


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## Zinezine (May 3, 2014)

Crystalfit.co.uk said:


> Please don't try to move the hands without removing them. Not so much because you could bend the hands but because there's a high risk of damaging the minute wheel
> 
> Sent from my GT-I9505 using Tapatalk


thanks for the tip, I removed the hands last w.e and and put it back again: working perfectly now.


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## Tycho Brahe (Nov 29, 2014)

This dial can be debranded with isopropyl. I went further using diluted lacquer thinner and removed everything except the white enamel indices- which were just thicker and more resistant and held. I then buffed and used a mix of carnauba and graphite to polish it to a dull silver and it looks very cool but waiting on some Blue lume.


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## Futterman (Jul 21, 2017)

The solution "cotton bud + alcohol" works well with chinese cheap watches ! They use bad ink to print their logo. Anyway you have to do it carefully , do not press on the cotton bud cause your dial will be scratched. (It was the case the first time i have do it). Check the cotton every 5 seconds, if you see the background color on it, you have to stop. Here's an exemple with one my 5$ Gonewa subs... The awfull Gonewa logo is still visible on some lightning conditions... Well It's far from perfect but you can wear your cheapy more proudly than ever


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## slevinsbrother77 (12 mo ago)

Zinezine said:


> After, fully modded & debadged (thank u all for your support and advices):
> View attachment 1497183


Joined here just to say you are my hero with this persistence. Awesome logo removal. I want this.


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