37.09 Bluefin

What If

The MING 37.09 Bluefin is our latest dive watch after the Abyss and 18.01 H41. Initially, we wanted to challenge ourselves to exceed the H41 in technical ability. Though we managed, it was at the cost of severe aesthetic and ergonomic compromises we simply could not overcome - there's only so much you can do with a 19mm thick case. Instead, we took a different conceptual path and asked ourselves "Can we create a diver that is aesthetically and ergonomically pleasing and yet meet all the required technical standards of a dive watch?" The result is the 37.09 Bluefin, a slimmer, more elegant diver in our third generation design language.

Elegant High Performance Case

The case may appear similar to its 37-series siblings but was in fact completely reengineered and reprofiled to accommodate two crowns, thicker sapphire crystals, and the additional gaskets required to hit the 600m WR. By tweaking the curvature of the front and rear crystals, prototypes achieved a crush depth of 900m after 24h saturation. The 37.09 Bluefin is thus conservatively rated at 600m despite being sized at a comfortable and versatile 38x12.8mm (2.8 of which are the domed sapphire crystal). Featuring alternating polished and brushed finishes, the Bluefin wears much thinner on the wrist but has a generous visual presence due to the almost complete absence of a bezel.

Dynamic Presence and Visual Character

We take our dials very seriously at MING. The Bluefin dial took us 2 years, several dead ends and a handful of suppliers to realise. The base sapphire is machined and laser engraved (a feat in itself!) while the reverse side of the dial has a proprietary double layer, chromium based metallisation applied before the laser engraved channels are filled with multiple layers of Super-LumiNova X1 and the turning rings are glued onto the dial.

This results in a beautiful colour shift on inversion, a first for us, and creates a lot of dynamic internal reflection and gives the dial further visual depth.

The Bluefin also continues our design tradition of minimizing dial text with new timing scales that are easy to index and read for both main time and elapsed time. Both color and diminishing boldness are used to make it easy to see where the scale begins. Because the dial rotates, the Hyceram hour indices are on the underside of the top crystal.

For optimal legibility, every marking and hand on the Bluefin is treated with various mixtures of Super- LumiNova X1 using a new multilayer process for printing that results in a brighter, longer lasting and more homogeneous lume.

Internal Timing Bezel

Instead of using the traditional rotating bezel, we moved this internally onto a Super-LumiNova X1 filled sapphire dial. A sealed crown at 4 o'clock rotates the entire dial via a 60-click, unidirectional mechanism secured by sprung bearings. Most dive watch crowns screw down for water resistance. In the case of the Bluefin, the crown for setting the timing dial at 4 o'clock is designed to be used underwater - it rotates in one direction only, is double gasketed and does not pull out. 

The red warning indicator on the 2 o'clock crown tube is an easy, visual warning to let a wearer know the crown isn't screwed down. The different coloured infills on the crowns help the wearer differentiate between time-setting and rotating crowns at a glance.

Refined details

Completing the 37.09 Bluefin is something that has been in development nearly as long as the watch itself – a moulded FKM rubber strap, with curved bars and universal compatibility with all of our other 20mm lug watches. It was developed to follow the natural shape of the wrist, with the relaxed curvature of the strap forming a 70x50mm oval. In addition to the sculptural surfacing and our logo on the top, the buckle side is also pocketed to comfortably receive the longer end in the same fashion as our tuck buckle straps. It is keeperless and tapered in thickness to sit comfortably on the wrist, and with a compound balanced between softness for comfort and support for heavier watch heads. We believe it is the most comfortable strap we have made to date.