this discussion has come up obliquely before with respect to the superprofessional diver. it originally appeared in the '86 T-H catalog (i.e., the first catalog after the takeover by TAG in '85).

common sense tells us that it takes at least a year to come up with a watch design, refine it, get tooling going, get promotional materials printed, etc.

simply based on that fact, one should feel comfortable assuming that the superprofesional diver originated when TAG-Heuer was still simply Heuer and still a respected instrument watch manufacturer.

well, i found a picture which, in my opinion, puts this scenario completely beyond question: an image of a superprofessional diver w/ a Heuer-branded caseback. the dial on this piece was the standard T-H branded style. it's probably from the first year or 2 of production and it was cost-prohibitive for T-H to source new tooling just to change the branding. definitely a collectible piece!

here's the caseback:

here's the caseback from a later piece: