Amount of tritium does not necessarily indicate brightness. Phosphor does, and as you mention, the color has a huge effect on the perceived brightness.

Also, T25 means <25mCi of tritium, and is required to be legal in the majority of the world. T means more than 25, but less than 100 mCi so you can't really calculate how much more any watch has - T watches can have 26 or 99 mCi - quite a range.

I do have a little beef with DB riding on Ball's coat tails regarding the hard work Ball did petitioning the NRC to get T100 approved.

 

Deep Blue is also incredibly sloppy with the way the deal with the T25 and T100 designations. You frequently find people mistakenly posting about T25 tubes and/or T100 tubes and those people are invariably Deep Blue owners. I've read some statements from DB's owner which strongly suggest even he doesn't fully understand what those designations mean and there are no such thing as T25 or T100 tubes.

 

The watch on the left looks exactly like the dial of the newest Ball Fireman Night Train also, which glows like a torch.

 

First green is the brightest tube color, but Ball goes into more color with tri and four color being more common. After your eyes have adjusted I find the green too harsh on the markers and prefer it on the hands only. The Blue seems to be easier on the eye once you adjust. Personally I've always felt the Aviator Dual Time has the best Ball Lume with a tie between the X-Lume or the SC DLC Glow.

 

While I have to admitt that initially I was confused about the "T", T100, T25 designation (and to a large degree I still am) I have found Ball also has "T100" printed on some of their watch dials. The whole system really makes no reasonable sence; a T25 watch can have 24.99mlc and a "T" or "T100" can have 25mlc of (tritium?) making both watches for the most part identical as far at the mlc goes. A t25 watch can technically have as little as .001mlc and a T watch can have as much as 100mcl? Or anywhere in between. I'm sure the technicalities have legal reasons behind them. Both Ball and Deep Blue (and others) use this confusion to their advantage for marketing and advertisement purposes.
Before anyone gets on me about my loose understanding please note that I am no expert in any of this. This is just my understanding of a very confusing (to the average joe) consumer, me.

 

The whole system really makes no reasonable sence; a T25 watch can have 24.99mlc and a "T" or "T100" can have 25mlc of (tritium?) making both watches for the most part identical as far at the mlc goes. A t25 watch can technically have as little as .001mlc and a T watch can have as much as 100mcl? Or anywhere in between.

Correct. The reason is because it's a radioactive substance and therefore regulated. The standard all over the world is <25 (except the Netherlands, which bans it completely). Ball extensively researched the regulations and found that in the USA, up to 100 would be allowed under certain conditions, which their watches met, and they did the work to get the necessary licenses.

I agree about the T vs T100 nomenclature and the confusion about "T100/T25 tubes"

 

One thing I've wondered about was why Ball stuck with T100 despite it being a misprint originally. Perhaps they did it to differentiate between T as defined by ISO 3157, and they way they were using it. ISO 3157 says that timepieces can be marked T if they're under 5 mCi and T<25 if less than 25 mCi (this was written at the time when watches were still using tritium paints). Or they may have changed it so it clearly designated the limit. They said this in one interview a couple years ago: "The designation T is better explained as meaning "self-luminous". While It does not designate a limit, the licensing limit for BALL is 'less than 100mCi'."

Also, imo Ball doesn't use the whole T25 v T100 to their advantage, at least like other brands. If you look on their website, or in their catalog, there's no mention of T25 or T100 under a watch's features/specs. On the other hand, Deep Blue often uses T100 in their actual model names like Daynight 65 T-100. Android does the same thing with their model names. I've also seen many Android ADs call their tubes "t100 tubes" in their descriptions, but Android USA's actual website doesn't do this. And then there's ISOBrite who really misleads customers on their website: "Unlike ordinary tritium watches that use T25 tritium illumination, the Isobrite watch uses ultra bright T100 tritium illumination. This makes it 4 times brighter than the competition!" Ball doesn't do anything like the above AFAIK.

 

Stan owner of deepblue is on these forums perhaps he can chime in . But DB seems to be p e of the more prolific sellers of t watches my DB recon defiantly

has more light than my t 25 luminox but has 4x the tubes. Either way it is a pretty awesome watch

 

Stan owner of deepblue is on these forums perhaps he can chime in .

He's welcome if he wants to talk about Ball watches?

 

Ball currently has two versions if their Arabic COSC ii. A t25(I assume for sale out if the US) and a T. I would like to see a side by side lume comparison. I am in the market for the T version only because I'm under the assumption that the T is brighter. Look at the dial on the first picture t25, and the very last picture of the Ball ad T.
http://item.mobileweb.ebay.com/viewitem?itemId=321100387963&index=4&nav=WATCHING&nid=75128069268

 

I seriously doubt you would notice it. Chances are is is just a minuet gain in length or width on the marker tubes and the hands that makes the difference between markets. Remember 25.001mci makes it a T watch while 24.999 is still a T-25.

 

First I would suggest reading all the material up in the reference area. This also explains the two mismarked watch model. Just to be clear "T" is the proper designations. One thing to note is sometimes Ball makes a T and a T25 version for markets that don't allow over 25mci of tritium. This only applies to watches that are just over the line for the T-25 limit. The Arabic is one of those models. In the case of the Spacemaster and the Spacemaster X-Lume the variance between the two is too much so separate models were made. Ball US decided to offer both here.

l Sorry DB has not fully embraced GTLS tube watches and has a very limited offering. Using green tubes on one and orange on another does not make it a new model. By count less than 50% of the line even use tubes. DB is currently using both single a two color configurations, no applied markers, no dress watches (OK, I know the name implies mostly divers), and no aviators ...just divers. Ball has 13 real T level models in may styles, and every watch has tubes in the current line. Dress watches look funny with too much lume and it's nice to see offerings like the Legend that don't go overboard with the lume and ruin the watch. I'll stick with my statement no one does tubes better than Ball.

As a note I believe MB micro tech the tube manufacturer actually holds the T-100 license that these other brands use. Balls still are license by the T which is exclusive to Ball.

 

I'll stick with my statement no one does tubes better than Ball.

X2 - I would almost say lume in general, not just tubes

 

If you want a Japanese watch then go with a Seiko. Ball makes a far better watch then Deep Blue and Seiko in my book. Though I heard the Grand Seiko's are really nice. Some Deep Blues are Swiss and some are Japanese made. Sorry if I came off to harsh before.

 

At one time it was believed that the full Moon induced odd behavior in some individuals by providing too much light during nights which would otherwise be dark&#8230; this was known as lunacy. It appears that Ball watches too, by providing light in circumstances that would otherwise remain dark, can also induce odd behavior; perhaps we could call that lumacy?

Actually, I'm reminded of the scene in This Is Spinal Tap where Nigel Tufnel is showing off his Custom Marshall amp, and proudly points to the knobs declaring "Look, these go to 11!"

 

I own 3 Deep Blue's and one Ball.

The Ball is the Engineer Diver II in black face, the DB's are the Night Ops and the Flat tube version of it, and the T-65.

The first 2 listed DB's are at least 3 times the Lume as my Ball, and the T-65 is equal to the Ball.

Fit and finish of the Ball is about 3 times that of the DB, but so is the price point.

Different strokes for different folks.