Christopher Ward has finally updated one of its most underrated watches

Christopher Ward has just unveiled the C65 Super Compressor Elite, a new addition to its often-overlooked retro-dive line. The new model offers a number of technical updates as well as a refreshed colour palette. 

What hasn’t changed, however, is that like the original from 2020, the C65 Super Compressor Elite features a genuine super compressor case mechanism that increases water resistance as you descend into the depths.

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This new launch sports a decompression scale on the dial, used historically for planning decompression periods, and an upgraded movement in the Sellita SW300-1 offering COSC accuracy and 56 hours of power reserve.

Christoper Ward’s Super Compressor watch is a very impressive piece of engineering, with a compression spring that measures just 300 microns wide. When descending, water pressure builds around the watch and presses the caseback down against an O-ring gasket included within the three-piece construction.

This clever piece of engineering is visible through an exhibition caseback and is framed around the perimeter of the case by an orange, aluminium ring.

Further tribute is paid through a steel ‘coin,’ stamped with the original EPSA logo and a diving helmet (originally used to denote the authenticity of super-compressor watches in the 1970s) which is affixed to the centre of the sapphire crystal caseback.

A new dial

The new inner dial plays home to a dive timer scale with orange and light blue bands that contrast against a deep blue base. Of course, whilst dive computers are now commonplace for ensuring safety across dives, compression scales were once used to calculate the required decompression period for dives at any certain depth in order to avoid the effects of decompression sickness.

To use it, the diver simply identifies their dive depth (in meters or feet at 12 o’clock) and follows the corresponding ring around the dial, clockwise, to first read the maximum dive time where no decompression is required, and then if the dive extends beyond this point, how long is required to decompress before resurfacing.

So, for example, a 45 minute dive at 40 metres/130 feet will require 60 minutes of decompression for a safe resurface.

Sat around the edge of the dial is a more conventional interior diving bezel which is controlled by the crown located at the two o’clock position and sealed with two gaskets. 

The Christopher Ward C65 Super Compressor Elite is available now on a choice of three straps, light blue Aquaflex, bi-colour Tropic or a three-link Bader bracelet, with prices starting from £1,395 / $1,675.