I agree wholeheartedly that its a nice unit and much better than most. Its also a lot safer than the Dolphins, rays and azimuths as its not an active system relying on jets or flow orifices not blocking or you overbreathing it (hence you NEED a PO2 monitor)
On the work of breathing side, the RB80 WOB is definately higher than the Inspiration's and here in Europe it would have to pass the CE WOB tests which are done by a 3rd party. I have been told by a reliable source (who is involved in this testing) that the RB80 would NOT pass. But unless the RB 80 is ever submitted for formal testing we will never know
Point noted on bailout. This is true for all the units. You MUST carry sufficeient bailout for your dives. CCR units cheat a little by providing access to the onboard dil, but you could never class 3 litres suffiient, unless your < 20m with no deco. There are a large number of "Alpinists" however who believe they have god like powers in preparing their units in such a way as they will not fail sufficiently to kill them. As you can tell I do not fall into that camp and believe they are just Darwin award candidates
Scrubber duration we will disagree on. Until the RB80 is tested against a recognised standard by a third party independent test house the duration is a guess. There are some Inspiration owners that rate their scrubber at 10 hours!!!! (I am correlating the first Inspiration user survey) I agree it will last longer than the Inspirations and that 3 hours is not long enough. Remember duration is also shortened by depth, user, temperature and gas mix, packing density, scrubber age and a whole host of stuff, so this is definately not a science. Personally I dont want a hypercapnia episode and will change my scrubber as recomended. Does the RB80 recomend shorter intervals at depth of for repeat diving?
As for a PO2 monitoring device, its essential. The RB80 has a failure mode that will prioduce NO physical warning. Hypoxia is nasty in that most people do not realise anything is up and are incapable of doing anything even if they do (that includes bailing out). Whats worse is that in most passive systems (including the RB80) the key componenet that can fail in this maner is a flexible membrane that is flexed every breath, is inside another component so not readily visible and inspectable and the unit will still pass positive and negative pressure checks if it has failed. You can dive without the monitor and just hope this component never fails or take the sensible option of fitting a O2 monitor. If you use a VR3/oxyguage etc you even get the benefit of real time deco calcs /extra bottom timer etc
The GOLDEN RULE of rebreather diving is "Always know your PO2". Personally I have 4 O2 sensors, 2 handsets, a VR3 and a HUD monitoring mine all independantly of each other
I'm glad I chose a CCR over a SCR, even on club dives in the 40-50m range it has benefits in duration and deco over the SCR divers I often dive with. Most of them modify their units to allow extra plug in mixes so they can richen up on the way up to minimise deco. My unit ends up lighter and gas duration is Never a problem. Tide windows here prevent the 3 hour scrubber from becoming an issue.
On the work of breathing side, the RB80 WOB is definately higher than the Inspiration's and here in Europe it would have to pass the CE WOB tests which are done by a 3rd party. I have been told by a reliable source (who is involved in this testing) that the RB80 would NOT pass. But unless the RB 80 is ever submitted for formal testing we will never know
Point noted on bailout. This is true for all the units. You MUST carry sufficeient bailout for your dives. CCR units cheat a little by providing access to the onboard dil, but you could never class 3 litres suffiient, unless your < 20m with no deco. There are a large number of "Alpinists" however who believe they have god like powers in preparing their units in such a way as they will not fail sufficiently to kill them. As you can tell I do not fall into that camp and believe they are just Darwin award candidates
Scrubber duration we will disagree on. Until the RB80 is tested against a recognised standard by a third party independent test house the duration is a guess. There are some Inspiration owners that rate their scrubber at 10 hours!!!! (I am correlating the first Inspiration user survey) I agree it will last longer than the Inspirations and that 3 hours is not long enough. Remember duration is also shortened by depth, user, temperature and gas mix, packing density, scrubber age and a whole host of stuff, so this is definately not a science. Personally I dont want a hypercapnia episode and will change my scrubber as recomended. Does the RB80 recomend shorter intervals at depth of for repeat diving?
As for a PO2 monitoring device, its essential. The RB80 has a failure mode that will prioduce NO physical warning. Hypoxia is nasty in that most people do not realise anything is up and are incapable of doing anything even if they do (that includes bailing out). Whats worse is that in most passive systems (including the RB80) the key componenet that can fail in this maner is a flexible membrane that is flexed every breath, is inside another component so not readily visible and inspectable and the unit will still pass positive and negative pressure checks if it has failed. You can dive without the monitor and just hope this component never fails or take the sensible option of fitting a O2 monitor. If you use a VR3/oxyguage etc you even get the benefit of real time deco calcs /extra bottom timer etc
The GOLDEN RULE of rebreather diving is "Always know your PO2". Personally I have 4 O2 sensors, 2 handsets, a VR3 and a HUD monitoring mine all independantly of each other
I'm glad I chose a CCR over a SCR, even on club dives in the 40-50m range it has benefits in duration and deco over the SCR divers I often dive with. Most of them modify their units to allow extra plug in mixes so they can richen up on the way up to minimise deco. My unit ends up lighter and gas duration is Never a problem. Tide windows here prevent the 3 hour scrubber from becoming an issue.
