Vulcain has just announced a re-issue of ‘the ringing diver’ aka the Cricket Nautical, first introduced over six decades ago.

The Cricket Nautical was born of a collaboration between three divers who happened to have relevant expertise, and Vulcain. It was the first diver’s watch that featured both a system for determining no-stop dive times on the dial, and an alarm to signal the diver “time to get back to the surface” in a sleek package water-resistant to a depth of 300m.

The three divers-external experts were Swiss physicist/ mathematician Hannes Keller, deep-sea diver, explorer and filmmaker Yves Brandily, and Arthur Droz, a national certified diving instructor and representative of the C.I.A.S (Centre d’Investigations et d’Activités Sous-Marines Center for Underwater Investigations and Activities).

So, today’s new watch – it is Vulcain’s tribute to Hannes Keller, who died on December 25, 2022. On November 3, 1966, in Toulon, France, witnessed and validated by Jacques Cousteau, Keller reached a depth of almost 250m whilst wearing a Cricket Nautical.

The new Vulcain Cricket Nautical Diver is in a 42mm sized stainless steel case (thickness of 17.3mm) with either a domed sapphire or plexi, and water resistance of 300m.

On the semi-matte black dial the functions are the time, a centre seconds, twenty second alarm and, of course, a decompression scale that you adjust using the screen-down crown at 4 o’clock. There is also a decompression table on the dial side. The hands and markers are lumed.

If you’re wondering about the alarm, there is what the brand calls their ‘triple case back’ which functions as a resonance chamber and allows the alarm to function when submerged.

It is powered by the manually-wound Vulcain in-house Cricket V-10 which beats at 18,00 VPH and has a power reserve of 42 hours. Double barrel, equipped with the Exactomatic system. Nickel-plated treatment, blued screws, skeleton ratchets (on sapphire case back version).

The new Vulcain Cricket Nautical Diver comes on a black leather strap with what the brand says is ‘water resistant carbon texture and has an RRP of US $4,862.

[Photo credit: Vulcain]

Categories: Divers watches, Vulcain, Watch Profile, watches