What better way to kick off May than with a special selection of cool vintage watches! First up, as I mentioned briefly in my previous post on affordable vintage Divers, the highly regarded Swiss brand Fortis was one of the many manufacturers to utilize the iconic big size twin crown Super Compressor case in the 1960s & 70s. And with their classic Marinemaster they did it in a most innovative way: they added an actual dive table printed on the dial in highly legible red and white to be used in conjunction with the inner rotating bezel. With this ingenious calibration a diver could now calculate his safe intervals for surfacing and resting based on how long and how far down he had gone right there on his wrist!
Now, you can find reissue Marinemasters made from NOS parts with Luminova dials and hands all day long. But finding the genuine vintage article from the 1970s with Tritium luminous in unpolished condition and correct crosshatch crowns? Well, that’s something else again. Best of all, this Fortis Marinemaster has just been fully serviced and is ready for years more of enjoyment for its new owner. No, it doesn’t quite fall into the “bargain” diver category. But it’s really not that expensive relative to how hard it is to find an all-original Marinemaster. Some things in life are so cool they’re definitely worth stretching a little for.
