Diving With The Beast, The Extreme Blancpain Fifty Fathoms X Fathoms
Taking Bancpain's all-mighty diving watch, a true mechanical computer, down below the waves.
It’s impossible to talk about the modern scuba diving watch and its evolution without talking about Blancpain. As one of the earliest creators of the purpose-built tool watch, they are responsible for multiple innovations in the field, including using an o-ring to seal the case back, and a pioneering crown seal system. Their name belongs right up there with the likes of Rolex and Omega and Panerai when discussing the inception of the dive watch as we know and love it today. And to see if Blancpain can still hold its own in the world of dive watches, we go diving with the all-mighty Blancpain Fifty Fathoms X Fathoms.
Under the hood, Blancpain has created a movement that is truly remarkable in its ambitious functionality and groundbreaking tech. A few diving-centric features have been added to this mechanical marvel. Inside you will find not one, but two different mechanical depth gauges. Using a new material called “liquid metal” in a pressure-sensitive membrane made this possible. One gauge counts single metres up to 15 (the blue scale), and then a second one counts larger increments up to 90 metres deep (the orange scale). As part of the depth-gauge package, there is another hand that notes your maximum depth, and keeps it in memory until reset with a dedicated button.
This button is covered with a protective titanium button guard to make sure you don’t accidentally reset it. Another diving feature not found in any other mechanical watch is the inclusion of a 5-minute countdown timer, meant to help you keep track of decompression or safety stops. The timer is started and reset with a single, dedicated button. Things are rounded out with a whopping 5 day power reserve. How Blancpain was able to fit all of this tech into a movement a mere 9mm thick is a mystery to me, but boy am I glad they did and this thing exists.
UNDER THE WAVES
We talk frequently about how diving with mechanical watches in the modern era of dive computers is a largely esoteric, and, honestly, pointless pursuit. All the data you need when diving can be tracked more easily using a dedicated dive computer. Blancpain set out to change all of that. Strapping this monster over a wetsuit using the integrated, dual-pronged rubber strap, feels no different than strapping on a big dive computer, and that is by design. If I had done a little bit of math beforehand, I could have theoretically used only the Blancpain Fifty Fathoms X Fathoms on these dives, and been just fine. Probably not advisable from a pure safety standpoint, but the point is, it’s possible, and that makes this watch something pretty special.
I did not forswear my dive computer for my underwater jaunts with the X Fathoms but tried to do as much as I could using only the data it provided. I kept an eye on its depth gauges when descending, and both were spot-on accurate when compared to their digital counterpart. When it was time to ascend, I followed the gauges back up to five metres depth and clicked the chronograph countdown button to start the five-minute safety stop timer. Doing all of these things mechanically is something I had never experienced before, and it was nothing short of delightful.
TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS – BLANCPAIN FIFTY FATHOMS X FATHOMS
Case: 55.6mm diameter x 24mm height - titanium case, brushed - depth gauge construction with amorphous metal membrane - decompression valve - screw-down crown - unidirectional rotating bezel with sapphire insert - depth memory reset pusher - 300m water-resistant
Dial: Black dial, luminous markers and hands - indications: hours, minutes, seconds - depth indication with 2 hands (0-90m and 0-15m) - max depth memory - 5-minute retrograde counter
Movement: Calibre 9918B - automatic - 36mm x 8.65mm - 48 jewels - 411 components - 28,800 vibrations/hour - silicon balance spring - 120h power reserve - time and mechanical depth gauges
Strap: Integrated rubber strap with titanium clasp
Reference: 5018 1230 64A
Price: USD 40,700
EUR 41,410
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