About every two weeks I see S&W watches that meet your criteria from $15-$30- I just did a search, and didn’t find the ones I have been seeing, but came up with these, in the $40 range:
Please note that I don’t own any S&W watch, this was just to show you examples of what is out there. I think Timex has some (perhaps in their Expedition line) as well as other manufacturers.
Timex Men’s Expedition Watch is a good watch i have been wearing one for 9 months now comfortable and robust i work in a warehouse so it and me get banged about abit 9 year battery life to boot. Got mine off ebay for £37 secondhand.
I don’t mind batteries for the right watch. It’s just that I don’t want a full collection of watches that I’ll have to replace 20 batteries once a year. And some brands like Movado are awful with their battery life—less than a year. My Tag Heuer can go 5 years without a battery and so can most of the Casios. So I don’t mind those new Casios having batteries (though Casio does make solar models) but some of these watches are probably going to stay dead when the batteries run out.
I don’t have that many watches, but I do have a dive watch/computer that I have to send out for battery replacement, which is around $60 the last time… it’s not every year, but still a good sized expense.
I have actually let it set without replacing the batteries, at least for now.
Timex Expedition are pretty awesome. Especially here in the US where they cost $30 on average. Durability and accuracy are hard to match for the price.
These Nato watch straps are supposed to be good as well. NATO Straps
Hopefully you won’t need one with a new watch but when did that ever change the chance of having customized something. Cheapy Cheapy on Amazon.
I’ve had a couple Timex expeditions in my shopping cart for a while. They look like good watches. Some models have a mineral crystal and some models have a resin crystal so make sure you know what you are buying. Same with cases. I’d be careful of resin cases too because they can warp over time and then your band will start randomly falling off. Bands can be replaced, but new case = new watch.
Got a Timex compass watch off eBay earlier today£15 ($25) comes with 2 straps one velcro, hopefully I will get on with that better than normal straps (which is why I don’t wear watches)
Oohh I’ve been drooling over those NATO straps for my Citizens with the canvas straps. And there’s another good criteria for watch shopping: making sure the band on your new watch is replaceable and a standard enough size where they are easy to find.