Does anyone out there analyze AIR (not nitrox)

[JcoldwaterIL]

I was looking at another thread reguarding analyzing nitrox and a thought popped into my head. If you get an airfill from a shop that does nitrox fills, or if you get a tank on a charter that also provides nitrox, should you check your air? I was reading that people have in several incidents had fills that were far different than what was labeled on the tanks. Has anyone ever bothered to analyze a regular air fill and found it to be something other than normal? My thought on this is if a tank had nitrox, got the sticker removed then topped it off with air, what would happen? Lets say you accidently get a topped off 36% tank that ends up being around 28% or so. If you go down deep enough for long enough theres a good chance for bad things to happen. I'm not suddenly paranoid about making sure i have air instead of nitrox, but i was just wondering if anyone has had any expereinces like this. Too bad they don't have AI computers that also do oxygen analasys when you turn your air on.

 

[Ice9]

Ya know, for the cost of AI computers, you would think they would somehow be able to build-in an analyzer! Hmm...

 

[do it easy]

I usually blend my own gas and I usually analyze ALL tanks that I am breathing from, regardless of what the sticker reads or what I think is in them. I also analyze it just before or when I put the regulator on the tank. I might anaylze it the night before, but that is just for packing and planning.

 

[wedivebc]

Ya know, for the cost of AI computers, you would think they would somehow be able to build-in an analyzer! Hmm...

they do!. HS explorer and VR3 can both be used with an O2 cell to analyze a mix

 

[do it easy]

Lets say you accidently get a topped off 36% tank that ends up being around 28% or so. If you go down deep enough for long enough theres a good chance for bad things to happen.

Most likely, you would run out of gas first. If you go deep enough for 28% to be a problem, then you have gas management issues to worry about since you will easily go past your NDLs before your O2 time.

 

[MikeFerrara]

I think it's a reasonable concern. A nitrox sticker on a tank that was filled from a fill station that can provide gas other than air doesn't mean anything. The tanks should be analyzed. Since the nitrox sticker doesn't provide any information, it's just clutter and should go away. The visual sticker gives the O2 serve status of the tank, a contents label tells what was put in it and when and an MOD label tells us what we really need to know in the water.

 

[SparticleBrane]

I don't analyze when I fill at school since we only pump air. Anywhere else, I analyze it no matter the mix I requested.

 

[JcoldwaterIL]

Most likely, you would run out of gas first. If you go deep enough for 28% to be a problem, then you have gas management issues to worry about since you will easily go past your NDLs before your O2 time.

all hypothetical, i just pulled random #s out of my head.

 

[daniel f aleman]

Absolutely - part of the dive plan is to use a particular gas. If air, you want to know if it is air (~21%); I also test for carbon monoxide.

 

[wedivebc]

I also test for carbon monoxide.

How do you do that? Are analyzers reasonably priced?