Eyes open......!

[axxel57]

Sold a SP MK10 in the Bay and checked it again before shipping.
IP seemed now lower than in the initial tests, so I checked the shims, the new HP seat, changed the piston o-rings (hadn't changed them before), same results.
Finally had a closer look on the main spring..........
For me a first as far as I remember.
The MK10 didn't look beaten up, so I almost sold that reg in this condition to a customer.
Know now what routinely to inspect even more closer in the future.......

 

[ScubaBunga]

Sold a SP MK10 in the Bay and checked it again before shipping.
IP seemed now lower than in the initial tests, so I checked the shims, the new HP seat, changed the piston o-rings (hadn't changed them before), same results.
Finally had a closer look on the main spring..........
For me a first as far as I remember.
The MK10 didn't look beaten up, so I almost sold that reg in this condition to a customer.
Know now what routinely to inspect even more closer in the future.......

That's neat - luckily I have not come across that in my MK10's. I do periodically check the inter-webs for parts like springs as I now have 9 MK10's just in case something like that ever comes up.

 

[rhwestfall]

yikes!

 

[Tanks A Lot]

Over the years I had a handful of broken springs - All without a fail from ScubaPro. It seems that the age made only a slight difference, as I had two MK2 EVO springs cracked, which were only 3 years old from date of manufacture.
All of them broken in the same way as your picture, with a crack in the "middle" coils. None of them broke completely into two pieces and two of those regulators still had an intermediate pressure which wasn't eyebrow raising.

Rolling the springs around on a flat surface usually does the trick, as they start to wobble around.

As much as I love ScubaPro, their springs are probably the thing I hate most about their regulators. To me it even feels and looks inferior than a lot of other manufacturers, but maybe that's just my feeling.

 

[axxel57]

Strange that I have not more often come across damaged or broken springs.
In the more than 30 years I service and repair SP regs I remember only that once my assistant showed me an already broken spring which he told me he had found in a MK10.
I suspected that he might himself had somehow managed to brake the spring.
So I just said that I cannot believe that a diver could survive such a damage if he is deeper under water.
I was sure that a broken spring would instantly shut off the air supply, so how was that fleet reg coming to us with no commentary?
We put back the broken spring into the first stage and pressurized it.
To my surprise it was still possible to breathe, very bad, but air was still flowing, so I was not further discussing the issue, just thought who knows.....?

 

[Fibonacci]

Looks like the crack may have propagated from a deep rust pit on the inside?
A badly neglected Sea Hornet first stage with a similar failure mode, bit hard to see in this pic but started on the inside of the next coil down from the ground end.

 

[Pressurehead]

To my surprise it was still possible to breathe, very bad, but air was still flowing,

Amazing.
Thanks for the write up.

 

[madamimadam]

Strange that I have not more often come across damaged or broken springs.
In the more than 30 years I service and repair SP regs I remember only that once my assistant showed me an already broken spring which he told me he had found in a MK10.

I encountered one of those in a MK25 earlier this year:

 

[SurteesDiver]

Nice job, thanks for sharing! First two pics I was wondering what you were talking about and then nearly missed it in the third. Well done for rechecking something that wasn't quite right