Ball WatchesBall DG3030B-S2C-BK Roadmaster Marine GMT Limited Edition Watch

I own a Tissot, Seiko and a PROTREK radio-controlled solar. Now the only features I really need on a watch are second hand, day/date, time-zone. It's peculiar that GMT self winding chronometers like this are back in front of modern (smart) watches when knowing the time - and not a charge - is required. The watch is COSC accurate and has 26 Jewels. Over a month mine gains less than a 1 minute almost exactly. I have been looking for an easy to read night dial for decades. And frankly, tritium tubes are the only solution I found that meet my expectations. My large dial Protrek is decent. But tritium is readily faster to read than any phosphor I've tried. The feature is a big plus for my aging eyes. The rear crystal to see the mechanical movement and the US Railroad back story make this chronometer fun to share and value. A final positive note - I've never liked metal bands on my wrist until now. I bought the watch with their dive band expecting to use it immediately. But the Ball band is silky smooth and I don't notice it. Issues with the watch: One reviewer of Ball watches noted that the hour dial is divided into 72 sections instead of usual 60 sections probably to accommodate reading the GMT dial for the 2nd time zone. His reasoning is likely right. Except I note the minute hand helps tell the flow of time to the next minute as it completely fills the space between any two marks. Whatever. My wish is the GMT font size and/or size of watch could be just a bit larger. Likewise, the recessed day/date, typical of mechanical watches, is a bit smaller than I like. Because tritium gas tubes do have a lifetime of ~10 years, I do recommend knowing the year the watch was made, even if new in box. Buy directly through Ball or an authorized dealer if possible. Each Ball model are limited edition to a 1000 pieces so a pre-bought (but new Ball watch) can have that number engraved on it - or not. It will have the edition number if you request it at no cost from Ball. Cars and bikes don't have jeweled gears but you'll want to have the watch serviced by 10 years anyway to keep things running smoothly.

I have the ball roadmaster pilot GMT, which is like the newer upgraded version of this marine GMT watch with the identical form factor. It has the same green/black colorway.Like all watches from Ball, they Maribne GMT is built like a tank and will survive anything.the good first:* Water resistant to 200m which is unusually high in a GMT watch. (The pilot curiously is water resistant to 300m - it is very strange to see a pilot themed watch which is more water resistant than a marine themed one!)* Very good movement - these are COSC certified (although it will cost you $100 from ball to get the certificate!) so it will keep excellent time. It's not uncommon to see Ball watches that are 10+ years old still within spec. my watch ioses 4 secs a day on a winder which is still very decent.* The tritium tubes are superior to superluminova in my opinion. this watch looks fantastic in the dark once your eyes have adjusted and stays the same brightness for about 10 years and then starts degrading slowly - and at that point you'll want to replace the dial. It's easily the best watch i have for night visibility, i wish all my watches had tritium.* Case is titanium so even on bracelet the weight is reasonable - mine is 155g. on a strap it's about 100g which is very light. scratches way less than my other titanium watches.Some quirks to consider:* The black/green colorway makes the green GMT hand hard to see in some lighting conditions. It's far clearer in the photos than in real like. I'd recomment getting a white dial version tbh for legibility.* This watch is a caller GMT rather than the traveler GMT of the pilot watch. So the pushers on this one advance the GMT hand not the local hour hand. makes traveling a bit less convenient.* bracelet has no micro-adjustment.And lastly, and this is a weird weird one - the hour dial is divided into 72 sections instead of 60 sections like any sensible watch. have a look closely at the dial - it literally turns every 5 mins section into 6 parts which is kinda nutty. i think i know why they did it - so that the halfway point between the hours (which represents an hour on the GMT dial) is an even number of parts (3). i mean, that's the only possible reason i can think of for this design decision. other ball watches are similarly weird and even less understandable - the ball vanguard for instance divides each hour section into 4 parts instead of 5 minutes!!so this is a great watch from a very established swiss watch manufacturer (with an impeccable american backstory around timing trains to avoid crashes). it will last you easily 50 years if you treat it well and you can do pretty much anything with it. it just has some very odd quirks which you might want to be aware of. some people love the quirks and find them endearing, others find them annoying.