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Guest
After many more hours of work than I had anticipated, the reasons I did this are just not as clear as they were when I started. I know it wasn't just to save the cost of buying a backplate. That would not have been worth it. But the board had told me that the DiveRite travel wing was not designed to attach to a standard BP. So for reasons involving cost (vs. the Halcyon 27), pull dump for my air2, and ability to back off to a transpac if I don't like it, I decided to turn one of those pieces of 1/4 inch T6 aluminum plate sitting in my garage into a backplate made for single tank use with the DR travel wing.
So far, the result has only been on its maiden voyage in a pool (high 40's pretty tough on this warm water wimp). I only did a couple laps since 6 feet wasn't deep enough to block out my buddy/wife's laughter. But performance was encouraging enough that I will probably have to try the local lake (high 50's should be damn near toasty) this weekend.
With any luck, pictures are attached. Except for the holes I added to attach the lift bag, the 1/4 inch holes were already in the original stock I was recycling and so I did what I could to incorpwerate them in the design. STA were made out of 2" by 2.5" pieces of 1/4 inch Al to provide standoff for the wing and 1/2 inch wide strips to secure the tank. These were drilled and tapped and attached with SS screws. Cutting was done with circular saw, jig saw and power drill. I got a friend in a machine shop to do the bend for me. I tried to bend some of that stock to make STAs which resulted in plan B.
So far, the result has only been on its maiden voyage in a pool (high 40's pretty tough on this warm water wimp). I only did a couple laps since 6 feet wasn't deep enough to block out my buddy/wife's laughter. But performance was encouraging enough that I will probably have to try the local lake (high 50's should be damn near toasty) this weekend.
With any luck, pictures are attached. Except for the holes I added to attach the lift bag, the 1/4 inch holes were already in the original stock I was recycling and so I did what I could to incorpwerate them in the design. STA were made out of 2" by 2.5" pieces of 1/4 inch Al to provide standoff for the wing and 1/2 inch wide strips to secure the tank. These were drilled and tapped and attached with SS screws. Cutting was done with circular saw, jig saw and power drill. I got a friend in a machine shop to do the bend for me. I tried to bend some of that stock to make STAs which resulted in plan B.
