Ball Engineer Hydrocarbon AeroGMT II: A Familiar Face in a Brighter Light

You could be forgiven for taking a first look at Ball Watch Company's new Engineer Hydrocarbon AeroGMT II USA Edition and thinking that you've seen this colorful design before The Ball representative who showed it to me acknowledged up front the influence of Rolex's famous GMT-Master on this model, but take a closer look and you'll find that this sporty travelers' watch offers up some of its own unique charms The 24-hour bidirectionally rotating GMT bezel, in the red-and-blue "Pepsi" colorway that first debuted on Rolex's iconic aviator watch, is here made of scratch-resistant sapphire and also boasts Ball's most emblematic element, micro-gas tubes filled with tritium to illuminate the numerals.

Tritium, used by Ball and very few other watch brands, glows brighter and longer than Super-LumiNova, the luminous substance used on most watch dials The micro-gas tubes are used liberally on the dial as well, glowing yellow on the main hands and hour markers with double tubes at 3, 6, and 9 o'clock; orange at the double 12 o'clock marker, and green on the GMT pointer as well as the bezel's numerals The model, which Ball touts as "The world's brightest-bezeled GMT aviator watch," comes in the aforementioned bracelet options, along with an additional NATO strap.

In case you're wondering, yes, you will definitely not have to dig as deep into your wallet for the Hydrocarbon Aero GMT II as you would for a Rolex GMT-Master: it's priced at $3,449. . Source