Watches - another OCD problem

[Snowy]

I think the days of a tool watch are well over. Anyone getting a watch in this thread is getting it for jewellery. Mechanical watches don't perform as well as an Apple Watch.. the main reasons for them is romantic ideals, jewellery, or potential investments (not right now of course  :P). Actual diving watches are less than 1K USD for the most part and digital.

As for personal preference, superluminova as it's less obvious. Does just enough most of the time..That said I have an Apple watch as a sleep monitor on the other wrist of a night, so don't really need the lumes either way.

[JDelage]

What brands use tritium except Ball?

Personally, I don't think it matters much IMHO. The circumstances where tritium vs lame would make a material difference are so f'ed up already (darkness, no light, no computer…) that you're in a life and death situation, trying to get out as opposed to monitoring your dive.

[JDelage]

OK, so this is not really really not a serious interest given the 172,000 CHF price tag but I have to say I find this watch absolutely gorgeous. It's newly released and has been popping up on IG and the like.

https://laurentferrier.ch/collection/product/grand-sport_tourbillon_stainless-steel-bracelet/
https://www.ablogtowatch.com/laurent-ferrier-grand-sport-tourbillon-bracelet/

[Giles]

Very striking

[Graeme]

I like the Laurent Ferrier tourbillon too. Unfortunately, the price doesn't work out for me!

[louisbosco]

@JDelage

i have vostok dive watch that uses tritium.

@Snowy

but to reply you both, i suppose i'm looking at extreme points of a functional dive watch, with regards to both tritium and lume. i suppose for the sake of the argument, we can assume that digital watches like an apple watch or a g-shock would make the use of tritium or lume useless. but from a mechanical watch lovers perspective and using a watch as means of telling time, whether convenience or habit, there are a few situations.

one that i've encountered before is in a dark cinema, where tritium will no last outlast lume, whether you're catching a movie midday or in the evening. i find that my rolex's lume wouldn't hold up to my vostok that has tritium. Especially if you're catching a movie at night, and it's past charging when the suns out. i know that we can always take out our phones but who wants to be that guy right? 

i know used dive situation as a point of argument but there are many night situations that makes it harder to tell the time with a lume. at least for us folks that stick to mechanical watches..

[JDelage]

Ah, good point.

The other trade-off between lume and tritium is that lume declines during the night, whereas tritium declines over the long term - each year will be less bright than the previous one. I don't know how much time it takes to loose 50% of the light.

[DougNg]

10-12 years

[Anesthetist]

@DougNg:

10-12 years

And it’s quite noticeable too. I have a couple of Luminox about that age and they have gotten very dim.

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[Graeme]

I'm liking the burgundy and green dials that IWC have introduced on the Portugieser chronographs for this year.

[Eisenherz]

^ nice colours

[DougNg]

I have one watch with tritium in it and it’s fine when your night vision isn’t blown out. Once you see even a moderately bright light the tritium isn’t that useful anymore.

I had some sights on pistols that had tritium in them for night use and wound up not replacing them with more tritium when they burned out. Turned out they weren’t that useful after all. They’re just not that bright.

[louisbosco]

the vostok that i have that's got tritium would've been about 7-8 years now. i wonder how much has it differed since then. haven't taken it out in awhile.. i suppose i don't think we need tritium to be super bright. all it needs is to illuminate the markers sufficiently to provide whatever information needed..

@DougNg night vision can usually be built up through acclimatising your eyes to the dark, unless you have night blindness. in most situations under moonlight, i find that my normal sights and my eyes still work perfect. the only time where it is useful is when it is pitch black under thick vegetation where moonlight cannot penetrate the canopy.

[Graeme]

@louisbosco at a guess, your Vostok's lume will be around 65% of what is was when new. (That's assuming about a 5.5 to 6% fall a year, which equates to a 50% fall over 12 years.)

[DougNg]

@louisbosco:

the vostok that i have that's got tritium would've been about 7-8 years now. i wonder how much has it differed since then. haven't taken it out in awhile.. i suppose i don't think we need tritium to be super bright. all it needs is to illuminate the markers sufficiently to provide whatever information needed..

@DougNg night vision can usually be built up through acclimatising your eyes to the dark, unless you have night blindness. in most situations under moonlight, i find that my normal sights and my eyes still work perfect. the only time where it is useful is when it is pitch black under thick vegetation where moonlight cannot penetrate the canopy.

That’s precisely what I figured out as well, plus the first thing I would do if my alarm system goes off is turn on the lights.

The only time I find it frustrating that I can’t see my watch is at the movies, which is something my wife and I do weekly when there’s not a pandemic.

Tritium is totally useless in that application for me. My night vision is totally blown out by the movie screen.

[Sheepdog149]

Squale Diver[emoji41][emoji1690]

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[LewisStonehouse]

IWC Pilot's watch Mk XVIII

[JDelage]

Very nice watch!

[LewisStonehouse]

Cheers! I love it 

[Pyruvate71]

@LewisStonehouse:

IWC Pilot's watch Mk XVIII

In my opinion, the white dial is perfect for MK XVIII.