Marc & Sons Professional Automatik Taucheruhr Diver Watch – MSD-034 Watch Review

It is always a pleasure to uncover a hidden treasure and today I would like to share my thoughts on a fantastic value found from the German based company Marc & Sons. Marc & Sons strives with their watches, “to give our customers a perfect combination of functionality, personal style and way of life along the way.” While striving to achieve this goal they also seem to keep affordability as a focus for the consumer as well. The company produces a wide range of watches but the Professional Diver Watch MSD-034 is the subject of this particular review. You can read more about Marc & Sons HERE. There are several options available with the Professional Diver Watch but all retail for right around $275USD and have the following basic specifications.

•  Stainless steel case Shock Secured shaft
• Screw down crown
• Ceramic Bezel
• Automatic Movement
• Sapphire Crystal
• 30 ATM Water Resistance

First, the packaging is a fairly standard clamshell style case with outer cardboard shell. The case is well padded like most and should provide adequate protection for the watch during the shipping process. Just like many companies Marc & Sons should research the possibility of providing functional packaging such as a canvas travel roll or zipper style travel case with their offerings. Of course packaging isn’t important to most of us and typically finds a place at the bottom of a closest or gets tossed out.

Moving on to the watch case, we find 316L stainless steel composition measuring slightly over 42mm and right around 46mm including the crown. The lug-to-lug measurement is approximately 51mm. The case height comes in at right around 13mm combined with the other specifications noted above and a weight of slightly over 200 grams the wearer is going to know they are wearing this watch. The watch isn’t cumbersome at all and has a real comfortable fit on the wrist. A 7mm signed screw down crown is nestled between substantial crown guards on the right side of the case at the 3 position. The crown is extremely easy to grasp and engage with a smooth buttery action. There is absolutely no play or wiggle in the crown in either setting position. On the opposite side of the case at the 10 position is a 6mm manual Helium Release Valve (HEV). The HEV engages smoothly as well with zero play. While the case isn’t custom the overall design reminds me of the popular Fricker and Ickler dive watch cases used by many watch companies, which most of the people I know with those style watch cases truly enjoy.

The Professional Diver comes equipped with a 120 click unidirectional rotating bezel. The bezel action is smooth and precise with no significant play and doesn’t rotate out of place easily. The bezel is extremely easy to grasp as it has what I consider a segmented gear shaped edge. The bezel insert is the 15min/sec variety and is composed of ceramic. Ceramic upgrades are not often found on many watches in this price category. The bezel does not contain any lume in the markers but does have a lume pip which lends to its functionality as a true dive watch. The watch is fitted is with an Anti-Reflective Sapphire crystal. Beneath the 31mm sapphire opening is a fantastic blue dial with white painted on markers. The dial is quite clean overall with various branding information painted above and below center dial. As I mentioned previously the markers are painted on the dial and are well lumed. Due to the white coloring of the markers I believe C1 Superluminova was used in the application process. The lume has a fairly strong initial charge but fades rather quickly as one would expect with C1. While the lume is adequate, I still strongly suggest that companies research using BGW9 as the markers would still present the crisp white coloring but pack a much more intense and long lasting lume that so many watch enthusiasts prefer. I really like the sword style hands used on this particular model, especially the flair and color contrast provided by the bright orange minute hand. Of course if orange hands are not to your liking there are a couple of model options available without the orange minute hand.