Not as impressive as my Sugess but very close. crown threads like butter. accurate nh34. very strong amplitude. bracelet and clasp could be better. bidirectional bezel feels incredible. cyclops almost spot on. wish the rehaut was a bit slimmer but it is what it is
I've been going down the Chinese watches rabbit hole for a month and all I hear is San Martin this and San Martin that so I finally found one cheap to try out.
I knew it wasn't going to be as good as the St 2130 or pt5000 model but I figured it would still be marginally better than my $58 steel dive. Spoiler alert they appear to be almost the same exact watch unless you nitpick and even then it's pretty much splitting hairs
Case appears to be identical except that the San Martin has a smaller case back which attributes to the 1 mm less thickness which I was hoping would be in mid case design. The mid case is identical from the side profile in thickness except that the steel dive tapers a little bit earlier which makes the lugs .1 or .2mm shorter. The rehaut, crystal seat, crystal and cyclops look to be identical down to the wonky magnification.
The bezel appears to be slightly different, the San Martin is a little bit thinner and the insert is also less sloped which exposes slightly more Crystal at the top. The text on the bezel is platinum paint versus lumed like the steeldive. Bezel action appears to be pretty much the same on both. No lateral play on either of them and only very slight back play. I do not know if the San Martin uses a ball bearing and spring/detent system.
The dial finishing indices and lumes are identical the hands also appear to be identical. The steel dive is slightly more accurate using timegrapher but I'm sure that is just random nh35 accuracy.
I'm just comparing watch heads so I think the San Martin bracelet will be slightly better and the clasp is more original.
The crown is the biggest difference, the San Martin is much sharper and seems to thread a little bit better.
Both watches have decent alignment of the hands and the day changes at exactly 12:01 or 12:02.
My final thoughts is that there's no way that the San Martin is worth double the price of the steeldive. I am also pretty sure they use the same parts or maybe even made at the same factory. Seems like you are paying a San Martin tax these days. If you're going to get 017 I recommend getting the upgraded version with the slimmer rehaut, otherwise save yourself 50 bucks and just get the steeldive if you're looking for a submariner clomage.
The sugess sub clomage is definitely on a higher tier than the 017. Tomorrow I test the cronos gmt2 Batman clomage and report back.
I hope somebody finds this useful who is in the market for both of them.