First Impression: Ball Engineer Master II Slide Chronograph

Ball Watch happens to be a favorite of ours. They’re one of the few watchmakers out there focusing on improving the resilient nature of mechanical watches – the kinds of things that will really help mechanicals compete with durable quartz watches for the mass market. Following their introduction of the SpringLOCK System, Ball has raised the bar once again with their Engineer Master II Slide Chronograph – pushers are now persona non grata.

While we never really thought of chronograph pushers as “in the way”, Ball decided they needed updating. The Engineer Master II Slide Chronograph flips the script on chronograph starting, stopping, and resetting by turning the pushers into a slide button, and moving them opposite to the crown. The result is a much sleeker look, and a total re-think on how chronographs can be done.

Ball Engineer Master II Slide Chronograph — side view of the slide button

According to Ball, the sliding action is accomplished easily with one finger – which we assume would be with the thumb of your non-watch hand. The slide rests in the middle of its potential up and down range. An upward slide will start and stop the chronograph, returning to the middle after each slide. Resetting the chronograph involves sliding the button downward, also completing with an automatic return to the middle.

The watch itself is a bit on the large side, 47.6-millimeters wide and 15.5-millimeters thick, but we’ll let it slide for this first iteration of the Slide Chronograph. We’re hoping Ball can incorporate this functionality into other chronographs and case sizes. As far as looks go, the new Ball is a rather handsome watch. It manages to somehow capture “rugged” and “sleek” at the same time, if that’s even possible. Along with focusing on the alternative chronograph function, Ball was sure to throw in anti-magnetic, anti-shock, and water resistant capabilities – oh, and of course their standard-setting, tritium gas tube, luminous markers.

It’s to be seen if this new Slide technology will have any appreciable affect on the market, but we love that Ball is at least questioning the status quo. Had they stuck with pushers and released a new ETA 7750-powered chronograph, it would have likely gone unnoticed. In Ball’s price bracket, there’s some seriously stiff competition, and dime-a-dozen watches just won’t cut it anymore. Hopefully they can take this innovation and continue to evolve it into a highly valuable mechanism.

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