Aldora: what I've been missing

[ronscuba]

Shore diving with big tanks ?

I'm getting to old to lug around tanks for shore diving and definitely not the big tanks. Maybe I'd shore dive more with smaller lighter tanks in exchange for less bottom time.

 

[BRT]

Shore diving with big tanks ?

I'm getting to old to lug around tanks for shore diving and definitely not the big tanks. Maybe I'd shore dive more with smaller lighter tanks in exchange for less bottom time.

Or use a steel 80 and have even less weight and still more air than an AL80.

 

[uncfnp]

Of course. But when we shore dive I take a 100 and one of my buddies takes a 130 and we break even. Never been to Bonair but can you imagine the advantage of getting in the water with less weight and having 30% more air?

With the typical Bonaire dive you really don't need the bigger tanks. Eric and I dive steels at home, 120's and 100's, but in Bonaire its 80's and 63's and we still get over an hours dive time. By then, knowing the next dive is just around the corner, I am ready to come up for a snack and pee break.

 

[deepsea21]

For the record:

To expect Yamaha outboards to not(or never) breakdown is ridiculous. We happen to have 12 of them operating( all 4 stroke) most of the time and we do not go through an entire month without one or more of them breaking down during a dive trip. Think about diving Barracuda or places even farther north—don't you think they have higher currents than where you go crabbing? Where would you go then? And even if not a serious problem how inconvenienced would be your customers. Running boats in Cozumel with just one outboard engine is silly. Why else do you think Aldora would spend so much money on outboards.

Dave Dillehay

PS Think prop strikes, electrical failure, dead battery, fuel filter, clogged injectors—hundreds of things to stop even the best Yamaha, no matter how well maintained.

Dave,

If you have a total of 12 Yamaha 4-strokes running on your boats and you are experiencing a break down of one of them every month (assuming your 4-strokes have less than 7-10 thousand hours on them) then they are not being properly maintained or the boat's systems are not being properly maintained.

Yamaha outboards that get north of 7000 hours I can understand a breakdown from time to time but if properly maintained an engine breakdown with hours less than that, 90% of the time an engine failure is not due to a problem with the outboard but is caused by another issue... Failure to maintain the boat's electrical system, replace batteries, change or drain the Racor fuel filters and all those other filters throughout the engine that serve to prevent clogged/fried fuel injectors... Send water contaminated gas through a fuel injector because no one cared to check, drain or replace the fuel-water separating filters you'll certainly fry an injector at best and at worst fry cylinders.

Long story short, if you as an owner are spending a fortune on outboards (and I know they cost a fortune in Mexico) and are experiencing such engine failures, take a look at their maintenance. $1 in maintenance today will spare you those breakdowns and save you $20 in repairs down the road.

 

[Dave Dillehay]

Dave,

If you have a total of 12 Yamaha 4-strokes running on your boats and you are experiencing a break down of one of them every month (assuming your 4-strokes have less than 7-10 thousand hours on them) then they are not being properly maintained or the boat's systems are not being properly maintained.

Yamaha outboards that get north of 7000 hours I can understand a breakdown from time to time but if properly maintained an engine breakdown with hours less than that, 90% of the time an engine failure is not due to a problem with the outboard but is caused by another issue... Failure to maintain the boat's electrical system, replace batteries, change or drain the Racor fuel filters and all those other filters throughout the engine that serve to prevent clogged/fried fuel injectors... Send water contaminated gas through a fuel injector because no one cared to check, drain or replace the fuel-water separating filters you'll certainly fry an injector at best and at worst fry cylinders.

Long story short, if you as an owner are spending a fortune on outboards (and I know they cost a fortune in Mexico) and are experiencing such engine failures, take a look at their maintenance. $1 in maintenance today will spare you those breakdowns and save you $20 in repairs down the road.

Your arrogance is amazing! I've been doing this and Yamaha motors for 25 years and it is my money. If you are so damn smart maybe you ought to be here running a dive op.

Dave Dillehay
Aldora Divers

PS I am a degreed Engineer that understands motors more than most ever will.

 

[deepsea21]

Your arrogance is amazing! I've been doing this and Yamaha motors for 25 years and it is my money. If you are so damn smart maybe you ought to be here running a dive op.

Dave Dillehay
Aldora Divers

PS I am a degreed Engineer that understands motors more than most ever will.

Dave, settle down and relax. I know absolutely nothing about running a dive op. I know how to email and book my dive and stay package and then I show up and have everything taken care of from the day I arrive until the day I depart. That is the extent of my dive op knowledge. I just thought I could share some of my thoughts about your engine issues.

I do know more than the average bear about outboards. I may lack an engineering degree but so does most everyone else. We learned by breaking down our old 2-strokes or a friend's engine in a poll barn and rebuilt them over a weekend so they could get running again, pull their pots, and keep making $. Yamaha 4-strokes... Yup, I know them too and can say I've never had to totally break one down because they just don't break down. The furthest I've ever had to venture into mine was to replace the micro filter on the HP fuel pump in the VST tank which, on my model, is buried deep inside that engine (I'd love to find the "engineer" who elected to place that VST tank and that stupid filter so deep inside the engine so I can ram it up his tail!).

If you're Yammy 4-strokes are breaking down and as it's your money, don't get hostile with me but look for the cause and fix it. Isn't that what an engineer does?

 

[scubafanatic]

Scuba is not a competitive sport, although some think it is. SAC rates, how long you can make an aluminium 80 last, who's got cooler gear, etc..

How about, who had more fun ?

If you do the math, a steel 120 is 50% more 'fun' than an AL 80.

 

[Dave Dillehay]

Shore diving with big tanks ?

I'm getting to old to lug around tanks for shore diving and definitely not the big tanks. Maybe I'd shore dive more with smaller lighter tanks in exchange for less bottom time.

At the Villa Aldora we keep a large stock of HP 80s which are much smaller and lighter than aluminum 80s.

Dave

 

[DjDiverDan]

If you do the math, a steel 120 is 50% more 'fun' than an AL 80.

Yes, if you simply divide 120 by 80, you'll find a 50% increase. BUT most AL80 tanks don't actually hold 80 cubic feet of air. Both the Luxfer AL80 and the Catalina AL80, two of the most popular brands, hold only 77.4 cubic feet of air at their rated pressure, 3000 psi. The Faber HP Steel 120, on the other hand, does hold 120 cubic feet of air at its rated pressure, 3442 psi. And if you get a hot fill on an AL80 so that, afterit cools down it only reads 2750 psi, the air volume is even less; and if you get an overfill on the HP Steel 120 to 3550 (still well within the 10% overfill safety margin) you'll have more than 120 cubic feet. So the math based on actual air capacity, at rated pressure, rather than simply looking at labels, shows that the HP Steel 120 is about 55% more "fun" than an AL80. But even that math is misleading, since it ignores the fact that, with either tank, you'll never be able to suck it completely "dry", so there will always be some of that air that you can't use under any circumstances (as a theoretical minimum, the internal volume of the cylinder, which you can never take lower than ambient pressure without a vacuum pump [your lungs sure won't do it]; as a practical matter, anything much below about the last 100 psi). But trying to do that math requires a lot of assumptions - how low will you take tank pressure, for example - 700 psi? 500 psi? 200 psi? And it requires a lot of intermediate calculations, like what is the volume of unusable air left in an AL80 or HP Steel 120 at 500 psi. So I won't even try.

 

[ronscuba]

Yes, if you simply divide 120 by 80, you'll find a 50% increase. BUT most AL80 tanks don't actually hold 80 cubic feet of air. Both the Luxfer AL80 and the Catalina AL80, two of the most popular brands, hold only 77.4 cubic feet of air at their rated pressure, 3000 psi. The Faber HP Steel 120, on the other hand, does hold 120 cubic feet of air at its rated pressure, 3442 psi. And if you get a hot fill on an AL80 so that, afterit cools down it only reads 2750 psi, the air volume is even less; and if you get an overfill on the HP Steel 120 to 3550 (still well within the 10% overfill safety margin) you'll have more than 120 cubic feet. So the math based on actual air capacity, at rated pressure, rather than simply looking at labels, shows that the HP Steel 120 is about 55% more "fun" than an AL80. But even that math is misleading, since it ignores the fact that, with either tank, you'll never be able to suck it completely "dry", so there will always be some of that air that you can't use under any circumstances (as a theoretical minimum, the internal volume of the cylinder, which you can never take lower than ambient pressure without a vacuum pump [your lungs sure won't do it]; as a practical matter, anything much below about the last 100 psi). But trying to do that math requires a lot of assumptions - how low will you take tank pressure, for example - 700 psi? 500 psi? 200 psi? And it requires a lot of intermediate calculations, like what is the volume of unusable air left in an AL80 or HP Steel 120 at 500 psi. So I won't even try.

I graduated college with a bachelors of science degree, but I did sometimes fall asleep in class. Plus, that was over 30 yrs ago. Now, I prefer to keep it simple for my aged brain.

A scuba 120 tank is bigger than an 80.