Why is There a Helium Escape Valve in a Diving Watch?

For a long time, human exploration of the ocean has never stopped, and it is also full of endless reverie about it. For this reason, humans have launched many diving equipments to assist in exploring this mysterious ocean, such as diving suits. People are trying to move further and deeper. Today, with the advancement of modern science, we can still swim and explore the secrets of the underwater world. However, human exploration of the deep sea is still limited.

We all know that the deeper you go under the sea, the greater the pressure. This increases the risk for every meter of sinking for divers who have been in deep water for a long time. Therefore, decompression is one of the most important issues in all diving equipment.

In 1957, U.S. Navy doctors conducted a medical experiment on the effect of underwater depth on breathing gases, using animals as experimental subjects to observe the effect of diving depth on their bodies.

Experimental studies have shown that when the body's oxygen reaches the saturation point, no matter how long you stay underwater, you no longer need to decompress. Throughout the project, different gas mixtures at different depths were used. The study also showed that if the majority of the breathing gas was helium, then all subjects survived at different depths differently.

This experiment also changed the world of watchmaking, resulting in one of the most recognizable features of a diver's watch: the helium escape valve.

Before this, researchers found that the glass of the diving watch would burst during the diving ascent. This is due to the accumulation of helium gas in the housing, which enters by diffusion through the permeable rubber gasket. Later, in order to solve this problem, Rolex introduced a one-way pressure relief exhaust valve. Once the pressure difference reaches a certain amount, helium gas is allowed to escape from the case.

In addition, Rolex is also working with DOXA watches to research technology that can release the pressure inside the case. The former focuses on commercial applications, while the latter aims to create an affordable dive watch for recreational and professional divers.

The Oyster Perpetual Sea-Dweller Ref.1665 watch that came out in 1967 also added a patented helium escape valve to the left side of the case. When the case is above a certain internal pressure level, the gas can be released from the case through this device without affecting the waterproof performance of the watch. This is the first time that a helium escape device has appeared on a watch.

Regarding the helium escape valve for diving watches, there are currently two types of valves. One is an automatic helium escape valve, which automatically opens the valve and discharges gas when the air pressure is too high, while maintaining waterproofness. The other is a manual helium escape valve. When the diver leaves the water or decompresses, he needs to rotate the crown to discharge the internal gas, and then lock it again after use.

Simply put, the quality of the helium escape valve determines whether the diving watch is damaged or not and the diving depth.

Although the decompression and helium escape functions of diving watches are no longer so common today, the history of the helium escape valve is undoubtedly an interesting one, because it proves that human beings are desperate to conquer the unknown. And these feats of human engineering and ingenuity have propelled our species farther and higher into the future.