Extreme watch abuse: whats the most messed up you've seen a rolex?

[I.AlOthman]

So, I let my family members borrow my watches from time to time. A couple of weeks ago my brother wore my DJ41 on a night out. He always puts them back with my other watches when he gets back home, plus he's usually pretty careful with them. The next morning, I was running late for an early lecture, so I threw on the Datejust and headed towards my University. When I was about half way there, I checked my watch to see how long I had until the lecture started, and that is when my heart dropped to my balls.

The damage on the bezel made it look like the watch was dragged under a Group B rally car and the previously pristine oyster bracelet was scratched to all hell (deep deep scratches). It wasn't even like it was only one or two links that were scratched up too, only like two looked like they were fine. They were way too deep to polish out too.

The watch was so messed up, that it hurt every time I took a look at it. I ended up skipping class and going straight to my AD to get the watch repaired. I had it sent to the service center and they got back to me with the price list for the repairs. It’ll end up costing me around €2,400 to get it all fixed up. Worst part is... this datejust was my first Rolex and a gift from my father. Here is the breakdown of the repair cost.

Bracelet replacement: €1520
New smooth bezel: €145
Service cost: €740
Timeframe: 10 weeks

I am just wondering how much it would have costed to replace the bracelet and bezel on a solid gold piece like a day date or gold sub. That would hurt your wallet a lot more than messing up a steel piece.

My AD actually told me that he has only ever seen two watches that were more messed up than my datejust was. One of them was a sub that survived a house fire (house burned down to the ground). The second one (i forget the model) went through a high speed motorcycle crash.

So the moral of this is to be careful who you give your watches to. Like i would have no problem giving my Dj36 to my bedridden great grandmother to wear but id be more weary giving it to a carefree sibling.