Tudor’s newest watch is also one of its longest-lived. It was in the 1960s that the Ranger first appeared, and it didn’t look a whole lot different from the model unveiled in London this July: a tough, purposeful and suave timepiece in stainless steel, with a high-contrast dial, a mix of linear hour markers and numerals and a shovel-shaped hour hand.

This is the second time we’ve seen the Ranger in the modern era: it first returned in 2014 as the Heritage Ranger but – presumably in anticipation of this new-and-improved version – it disappeared a couple of years ago. Its return sees it improved in multiple ways: resized from an overly large 41mm to a more wearable 39mm; marginally redesigned (a new crown, a more streamlined case, a cleaner dial); and benefiting both from a sturdy, adjustable steel bracelet and Tudor’s high-spec in-house movement. It’s a fundamentally better watch.

Mixing no-nonsense robustness with a distinctive, offbeat character, the Ranger has a sense of dogged capability and outdoorsiness. In fact, it is the quintessence of one of the richest genres in watchmaking, the “field watch”. Descended from the military watches that came out of the world wars, field watches take different and varied forms, but always with the same capabilities: a field watch needs to be readable, reliable, unobtrusive and tough.

That was something Tudor had been producing for several years before the 1965 launch of the Ranger. Back in the early 1950s, it carried out the ultimate field test on its new range of automatic, waterproof Oyster Prince watches by supplying them to a team of British explorers who spent two years on a scientific survey of the North Greenland icecap: its ads at the time praised “the courageous men who wear these Tudor Oyster Princes [and] have unerring faith in their ability to withstand these tremendous hazards” as they “undergo every ordeal a watch is heir to”.

Clued-up readers will be aware that the “Oyster” name is commonly associated with another brand, Rolex, for which Tudor was and is the more accessible partner. It was Rolex’s waterproof Oyster case that made those Tudor watches such reliable performers in Greenland, though one suspects they’d have been little use at the height of a blizzard, since the style was more 1950s dinner party than Arctic escapade. Which is where the Ranger came in. By 1965, Rolex’s own classic field watch, the Explorer (launched in 1953), was a proven success, and the stylish new Ranger gave Tudor customers a sturdy, characterful equivalent with which to go tramping off into the wilderness. Today, the Explorer has become a product of polished, vaunted and (at retail) barely obtainable luxury. The Ranger, on the other hand, remains stolidly in does-exactly-what-it-says-on-the-tin territory, and will look as good – better, even – when thoroughly scuffed and weather-beaten.

As an all-purpose beater, it’s absolutely on point whether you’re exploring the Himalayas, the South Downs or the school run, while the engineering heft that Tudor is able to marshal sees it outstripping many far more expensive watches in its technical specifications. The brand’s MT5402 movement is a modern powerhouse, with a 70-hour power reserve, chronometer precision certification, and a silicon balance spring for enhanced performance and magnetic resistance. It’s also waterproof to 100 metres – it’s not a diving watch per se, but it’ll manage just fine if you decide to take the plunge while wearing it – even in the Arctic waters around Greenland.

£2,420 on bracelet; tudorwatch.com