Everything about Sherwood Maximus or Blizzard

[hamsiss]

As the headline any ideas or technical info about these regs?
I've heard that Blizzard is a good cold water reg but Maximus is also.
Any opinion will help me so much

 

[BRANDY]

As the headline any ideas or technical info about these regs?
I've heard that Blizzard is a good cold water reg but Maximus is also.
Any opinion will help me so much

I use a bizzard and have about 30 dives on it.It seems to be a fairly good reg for the price.If I could rewind I would have gone with a scubapro but for the price it will work.You really get what you pay for so if money is a problem it will do you fine for rec diving.I bought mine with a package deal and plan on upgrading and using it for a backup.

 

[spectrum]

As the headline any ideas or technical info about these regs?
I've heard that Blizzard is a good cold water reg but Maximus is also.
Any opinion will help me so much

My wife and I dive Blizzards we considered the Maximus. Collectively we have about 250 dives with no issues. Included are winter dives to 37F, last winter was mild up here.

The Blizzard & Maximus rate as good as anything for behaving in the cold. For diving beyond recreational depth there are better breathers that can be considered. For typical use it's down to splitting hairs.

The Maximus is essentially the Blizzard with:
* The swivel on the second stage for under arm routing. Some call it a feature, others a failure point. Some like it I never tried it and don't feel like I'm missing anything.

* It has a resistance adjustment knob. Same sort of deal if you want something you can tweak as you go that's the one.

The first stage is identical.

Our LDS was ordering ours in and despite the porential extra sale he described the features & complexity of the Maximus as a wash and was selling almost exclusively Blizzards.

The public safety crowd on big on Blizzards around here.

http://www.sherwoodscuba.com/category.php?cat_id=1

Pete*

 

[Diver0001]

As far I can remember the 1st stage for both of these regulators are pretty much identical. Furthermore, the Sherwood first stage is probably one of the best on the market in terms of reliability. It's not a big surprise that sherwoods are common regs in rental stocks. They're pretty much bullet proof.

The difference in these two regs has to do with the second stage. The Maximus is cracking-adjustable and the blizzard, which, for the rest is pretty much the same design, is not.

The cracking adjustment of the Maximus is pretty much a "must have" because in contrast to their first stages, the Sherwood second stages suck some very smelly excrement. (read: they're *way* behind the modern curve in terms of breathing performance)

The Maximus is a marginally acceptable design because of the cracking adjustment and the fact that it's bullet-proof, but if you intend to dive deep on a regular basis, you'll probably find the blizzard a little .... "stiff" ...

R..

 

[The Horn]

I dive Sherwood and have no issues. Bought first reg in 91 and it is still my primary the seconday is a newer blizzard. the old reg is bullet proof and has stood the test of time. Not too keen on the looks of the newer reg but its low profile is perfect for being under the chin. All around a really good regulator.

 

[johnny_bravo]

I've used my Blizzard in cold water for a few years now as well as on many different dive trips and love it. I mean it's not the smoothest breather deep but if your dives are under 100' then you are golden.

They are super easy to service and are considered workhorses. You see 20 year old Sherwood regs on sale at Ebay all the time.

A friend of mine has the Maximus and the internals are pretty much the same. I'm not crazy about it's underarm hose routing however.

Check out the service manual for the 2004 models:

http://www.rmiscuba.com/pdfSHERWOOD/SRB5900.pdf

Hope this helps.

-J.-

 

[hamsiss]

Do you Sherwood users can define them as "comfortable" or "easy breather" in comparison to Scubapros or Aqualungs (or the apeks seems to be a product of Aqualung)?
If I don't mind the price are they better than Scubapro or Aqualung?

 

[markfm]

I love my Maximus, definitely do use the cracking adjustment, for warm-vs-cold water adjustment. I found the under-arm routing a lot more comfortable, a personal style thing.

The LDS here tends towards blizzards -- pretty indestructible, good for student abuse -- while a lot of the pros locally use a Maximus as their own reg.

 

[spectrum]

Do you Sherwood users can define them as "comfortable" or "easy breather" in comparison to Scubapros or Aqualungs (or the apeks seems to be a product of Aqualung)?
If I don't mind the price are they better than Scubapro or Aqualung?

As many of have said there are more elegant breathers out there. My Blizzard is the only thing I have spent quality time on.

FWIW I'm a 50 and a no athlete, same for my wife and a controled asthmatic to boot and we have been just fine on our deepest dives to date at about 85 feet in 45F water. We experienced nothing that we'd remotely consider to be hard breathing at that depth.

As far as comfort in terms of fit the walrus exhaust Tee actually works as a chin rest and the wisdom mouthpiece is nice too. The scond stage is very lightweight to begin with. With that Tee I never notice bubbles in my view.

Define better... Reliability A+, Ease of locating parts and service A+, Cold Water A+

The price will be favorable. The will be some trade-off in WOB but I have never considered it to be work.

Pete

 

[BRANDY]

Do you Sherwood users can define them as "comfortable" or "easy breather" in comparison to Scubapros or Aqualungs (or the apeks seems to be a product of Aqualung)?
If I don't mind the price are they better than Scubapro or Aqualung?

As far as comfort I would say that they are the same. Iwould also have to say the Scubapros I have used are better breathers. These were nicer models so I dont think you can compare them. Scuba pro puts out some awsome regs and they can get pricey.I dont dive cold water so no help there.