Ball Watch Engineer Hydrocarbon watches

The Ball Engineer Hydrocarbon is the rugged sports collection of Ball Watch, the company Webb C. Ball founded in Cleveland, Ohio, in 1891 and which is now based in La Chaux-de-Fonds. Ball made its name in railroad timekeeping. In 1891 a head-on collision at Kipton, Ohio, caused by a conductor's watch that had stopped for four minutes, killed several people, and Webb C. Ball, named Chief Time Inspector, set up tests and standards for the watches used on the trains. The Engineer Hydrocarbon is built around a special crown guard, micro gas tubes for reading in the dark, shock protection and a patented triple folding buckle with an extension system for its bracelets.

The NEDU is the line's dive chronograph. The DC3026A references have a 42 mm titanium case 17.3 mm thick, a sapphire crystal and a rotating 60-minute dive bezel, with black, blue or grey dials on a bracelet or a rubber strap. Ball's current NEDU, the DC3226A, keeps the 42 mm by 17.3 mm case in grade 5 titanium, measures 53.55 mm lug to lug and is water resistant to 600 m, with a patented helium release crown and a luminous ceramic bezel that turns one way. Its automatic, COSC-certified calibre RR1402-C shows the day and date and runs a 12-hour chronograph that can be worked underwater, and 21 micro gas tubes light the hands, dial and pushers.

The Engineer Hydrocarbon Spacemaster Orbital II is a different kind of watch under the same name. It is larger, 45 mm across and 18.3 mm thick in titanium, with a black dial and a compass bezel in place of the dive scale.