“Unscrewing and operating a standard crown under water would release the pressure on the gasket and may affect the water resistance,” a Ball rep tells me. “Thanks to our mechanism, we’re relieved of this constraint, and we can operate the inner bezel in a dive without affecting the water resistance.”
The watch also features a reworked dial that’s cleaner and more legible. The wavy texture of the original dial is gone, as is the day complication. The date has been moved from 4:30 to 3 o’clock and now has a cyclops magnifier.
Notably, there is also a lot more of Ball’s signature tritium gas lume on the new watch, especially on the indices and fully lumed bezel. The new Ballistic Diver features a total of 48 micro gas tubes, which is also 12 more than the current-generation non-Ballistic Engineer Master II Diver.
Inside, the watch maintains the technology that originally accounted for its bulletproof nature — and then some.
The movement is still protected by the Amortiser anti-shock system and can withstand 5,000 Gs of force (or more, by the sound of it), and it is still water resistant to 300m. But its anti-magnetic resistance has been improved. While the original was only capable of resisting magnetic fields of 60 gauss, the new Ballistic Diver can withstand up to 1,000 gauss thanks to the movement’s protective Mu-metal shield.