Like my last foray down a road less traveled and the subject of my last blog, I found myself acquiring a watch from yet another segment of watch collecting - a "diver". Yes, those rather large watches that were designed for underwater adventures, surviving depths of 100s of meters.
Like many of my "acquisitions", this recent purchase was probably more spontaneous and impulsive rather than strategic (can buying a watch be strategic anyway?). A European marketed Bulova, a "Snorkel 666 feet" from 1970.
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| My 1970 Bulova Snorkel |
These watches, also referred to as "devil divers", were rated for deep dives. As I have found out, printing the depth rating of 666 feet was unique for Bulova as most producers of dive watches printed the rating in meters (200).
My particular watch is equipped with Bulova's Accutron tuning fork movement. My blog "Another Diversion" talks about this type of movement. This particular watch was marketed in Italy as the day window displays the days of the week in Italian.
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| Close up of the two crowns |
The picture above shows the watch's two crowns. The lower crown sets the day, date and time and the other rotates the inner bezel. The rotating inner bezel allows you to mark and determine the elapsed time for your dive. This particular watch has a smooth, fully functioning inner bezel and retains much of it's bright orange paint.
The macro lens on my DSLR is not very forgiving, as this particular example is in great shape.
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| A Bulova ad featuring the Italian version of the Snorkel |
If I'm not mistaken, "Chi l'ha detto Che il Bulova e Caro?" translates to "Who said that Bulova is expensive" (or at least that's what an internet translator said).
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| North American version of the Snorkel. Notice the hands are slightly different? |
I'm not to sure that I will be diving into any oceans with this vintage piece any time soon. I always warn people not to take ANY vintage watch ANYWHERE near water, let alone 666 feet below the surface even if the watch says its water proof; chances are it most certainly is not now.
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