The origin story of the G-Shock begins in 1983 Casio’s head of watch design, engineer Kikuo Ibe, wanted to make a watch that wouldn’t break even if dropped. Conceived of after Ibe broke a watch that his father had given him, the original G-SHOCK was developed so construction workers in Japan would be able to check the time while they worked without having to worry about what they were wearing on their wrists getting broken.
The name G-SHOCK comes from Ibe’s goal of creating a watch that could withstand the shock caused by gravity. Ibe and his team of three engineers began to encompass five other elements: electric shock resistance, low-temperature resistance, vibration resistance, water resistance and shock resistance.
Another element f their design criteria - called the triple ten was It had to be able to withstand a 10 meter drop and 10 atmospheres of water pressure, and it had to have a battery life of ten years.
It would take over two years of drop-testing 200 prototypes before “Team Tough” came up with a hollow watch case structure that supported the core module - a quartz mechanism floating in a urethane foam cradle. I went with the model # GA100-1A1 as it’s rugged looking and it reminds me of my childhood. Yes I grew up in the 80’s and this piece screams Rambo, predator, bad ass! Every time I wear it I turn into GI Joe and know it’s silly, but hey this is my video, my fantasy, my rules. In all seriousness this watch really can take a beating and can handle all kinds of weather and environments. I remember when I was getting ready form my trip to the snow Big Bear Lake to be exact, I wanted to take something that was water resistant and something that was able to take a real betting. At first the Seiko SKX was the top contender, but I was freaked out about possibly falling hard while doing a snow activity and damaging the movement. I ultimately went with this beast, the murdered out gshock, not only did it stand up to the crazy conditions, but it boosted up my confidence while wearing it and I was very pleased with my decision and made me feel like a real mountaineer.
Before I move on I have to say that the rubber strap provided with this watch was boring and being a watch lover I wanted to spicy things up and make it look even more tactical. However to change the strap on these older generation gshocks is not as easy as one may think. You see, you need to buy special adapters from Casio and they will Run you anywhere from $15 and up typically $20. Honestly I wasn’t going to spend that money on a rubber piece so I ended up going with an after market solution that included spring bars and a spring bar remover for less than $8. The watch strap came via watch gecko and was on sale for $6 and it’s pretty well constructed, since this watch is thick 16.9mm thick, I had to modify the nato strap and turn it into a single pass strap so it would sit closer to my wrist. If you want me to make a dedicated video on how to do that, let me know. Putting the nato strap as you can see wasn’t that hard and it really changed the look and feel of the watch.
The elephant in the room is the size as this is what Casio considers to be the X-Large G. This Ana-Digi, “three-eyed” monster measures in 51.2mm and a whopping 55mm from lug to lug, it’s 16.9mm thick and the lug width is 24mm, yeah dwell on that for a second. According to Casio the large anti-skid buttons provide easy operation, embossed indexes gives a 3-D look and a rivet bezel design adds strength to its overall appearance. The features on this watch are insane for a sub $100 watch and they include a lot of features.
As you can see you get a lot of value for your money, no wonder gshock watches are the preferred watch for many service men and women throughout the world. I know this specific model is larger than life and honestly it’s quite difficult to read the time on it not to mention the digital portion of it is impossible to read under the sunlight and the LED light is terrible on it, but hey at the end of the day I really do like this watch and that’s what it boils down to. Obviously if you’re watching this video because you need a true tool watch I would recommend a different model that has better legibility. None the less the gshock line is a total winner in my book and I would recommend them to anyone weather you’re a watch collector or not. I hope you enjoyed this video, please comment like, subscribe and always stay humble my friends.
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