No 185 - Ball Skindiver

I had been looking at Ball Watches for so long and when they finally released the Skindiver I just couldn’t resist it. Their whole concept with filling up the whole dial with tritium tubes just felt so ridiculously cool. Today I’ve grown apart from the tritium tubes but back in the summer of 2013 I still thought they were an awesome feature.

Initially I had had my eyes on the Ball Engineer Master Diver II COSC version but the misalignment with the day and date window looked horrible. I was therefore considering the non-COSC version but quickly realized the green or red details on the inner bezel would be too much and start to annoy me. But then Ball announced the Skindiver. It had a great retro design, a lot of tritium tubes in different colors and it even had a lumed filled bezel. So I started scanning the for sale-pages for a used one and eventually found one in a really good condition from a seller in United States who agreed on shipping it overseas. Said and done, the Skindiver was on its way.

#185 - The Ball Skindiver.

A slightly domed crystal.

Great artwork on the case back.

I was really impressed by its finish and overall high quality. It looked stunning. And the case back, WOW! Ball must have one of the coolest line-up of case back engravings in history. I can’t say I liked the appearance of the bracelet very much but I must admit that it was very well engineered and was super comfortable to wear. It measured 40mm excl. crown and sizewise it felt like wearing a mix between a Rolex Submariner and a Marathon SAR. 

Why I started to get second thoughts about Ball, and all watches with tritium tubes in general for that matter, was because even though the tubes are supposed to be glowing for 25 years they actually start to fade quite quickly and just in a couple of years you can notice a huge difference in decreased glow capacity. I want a watch to age with dignity. Older watches actually tend to look better the more they age (to a certain extent of course) but newer watches just start to look like shit the more they are used and the older they get. Of course that statement doesn’t apply to all new watches but that’s just how I feel for a lot of newly produced models. 

How can you not fall in love with this product image? (borrowed from Ball Watches)

After owning the Skindiver I felt that I barely had scratched the surface of all cool Ball watches to discover but I actually haven’t had a single one since then. On Swedish watch forums they are rarely seen for sale so I really haven’t had any good opportunities either. I honestly can’t say that I’m sure I will own something from Ball ever again. At least that’s how I feel today.  

© All pictures by a Watch Flipper's Diary unless noted.

No 150 - Helson Skindiver

This was a quick catch and release. I knew it probably wouldn’t bring anything new to the table compared to the MKII Stingray and bought it just because I had nothing else to buy at the moment. Helson had impressed me with the quality of their Sharkmaster so I expected nothing less from the Skindiver. The seller, who I had done several deals with in the past, gave me a couple of names of people who also had shown interest in the Skindiver and told me to contact them if (rather a question of when) I decided to sell the watch, to spare me from having to put it out for sale.

It was a Tuesday afternoon back in October 2012 and Swiss cheese fondue with the boys was scheduled for the evening. I hurried home from work to prepare everything but managed to stop by the post office and pick up the watch. I remember coming home, tearing the package open and putting the watch on the wrist thinking “Domed acrylic crystal! Sweet!” and then carried on with all the preparations. Sometime during the dinner I looked down on my wrist and paid attention to the teeth of the bezel. “Hmm… that’s some sharp teeth alright.” Dinner went on and I recall pouring Kirsch all over my suede Minnetonka slippers. “Damn!” Even though we were drunk and suffering from fondue coma I still managed to send a PM to one of those people, whose name I’d been given from the seller, and sold the watch the same evening. My head was hurting so much in the morning the next day when I was wrapping it up again that I totally forgot to take a picture of it before I rushed off to work.

I contacted both the seller and the new owner just a couple of days ago and they both managed to supply me with some pictures of the actual watch. Thank you guys! Much appreciated. 

#150 - The Helson Skindiver. (picture contributed by the previous owner)

(picture contributed by the previous owner)

(picture contributed by the previous owner)

Sweet looking lume! (picture contributed by the new owner).

So what about my thoughts regarding the watch? Well, it’s all a bit of a blur but I remember it was even better than I expected it to be. The finish was great, water resistant to 200m, bright C3 luminova, reliable movement (ETA 2824-2). But the best detail in my opinion was the domed acrylic crystal which I think contributed a lot to the overall impression. Is it a homage or a copy then? Well, let’s not get into that discussion right now.

© All pictures by a Watch Flipper's Diary unless noted.