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I am a PADI Instructor.
My wife has a MARES (originally DACOR) H.U.B.
Recently it was serviced by a 5 Star PADI Dive Center and an authorized Mares service center who replaced 6 different parts including a dump valve parts kit.
Two weeks later, on a trip to FIJI, at 50 feet she tried to deflate it and it kept inflating - I had to fight like hell to keep her down and stop a potential problem.
It never did that before and has been on hundreds of dives.
We had to use the emergency deflate valves to control it after that.
We took it back to the service center after the trip and the service person says that he could find nothing wrong, and that he called MARES and they say that the valve needs to pump in a little air to open the deflate valve thats what it is supposed to do. I understand that, but after the dump valve opens, it continues to inflate the BC instead of deflating it.
It is a life threatening situation to be in what would happen on a deep dive and a sudden uncontrolled ascent occurs just regulating buoyancy and your buddy is not up close and does not work out that you have a BC malfunction and can pull the rip cord for the emergency air dump?
I think that the dump valve is malfunctioning and I think that the valve design on the HUB is faulty and it needs to be recalled. Whom can I go to with this information? Does MARES have a QA referral person? The Dive Center people do not seem to understand the gravity of the situation, nor does the tech seem to believe what happened and says that it is functioning as it should, although one of their own instructors was on the dive, witnessed the event, and demonstrated the malfunction after the dive, and told her to bring it back. There is no UL label on the HUB (never was).
Thanks.
My wife has a MARES (originally DACOR) H.U.B.
Recently it was serviced by a 5 Star PADI Dive Center and an authorized Mares service center who replaced 6 different parts including a dump valve parts kit.
Two weeks later, on a trip to FIJI, at 50 feet she tried to deflate it and it kept inflating - I had to fight like hell to keep her down and stop a potential problem.
It never did that before and has been on hundreds of dives.
We had to use the emergency deflate valves to control it after that.
We took it back to the service center after the trip and the service person says that he could find nothing wrong, and that he called MARES and they say that the valve needs to pump in a little air to open the deflate valve thats what it is supposed to do. I understand that, but after the dump valve opens, it continues to inflate the BC instead of deflating it.
It is a life threatening situation to be in what would happen on a deep dive and a sudden uncontrolled ascent occurs just regulating buoyancy and your buddy is not up close and does not work out that you have a BC malfunction and can pull the rip cord for the emergency air dump?
I think that the dump valve is malfunctioning and I think that the valve design on the HUB is faulty and it needs to be recalled. Whom can I go to with this information? Does MARES have a QA referral person? The Dive Center people do not seem to understand the gravity of the situation, nor does the tech seem to believe what happened and says that it is functioning as it should, although one of their own instructors was on the dive, witnessed the event, and demonstrated the malfunction after the dive, and told her to bring it back. There is no UL label on the HUB (never was).
Thanks.
