just discovering the problem with suunto transmitters

[GreggS]

This is so freaking entertaining. One side is trying to convince the other that vanilla is better than chocolate flavor when the other side is stating that strawberry is better. I say, screw you all, chocolate is best and anyone preferring anything else is wrong and should be locked up away from humanity!!!


Love you all!!!

 

[Belzelbub]

Also, that speed, precision and mechanical inclination of yours is WAY above the average bloke, legendary lv. I would say SO please don't compare yourself with the rest of us, incompetent apes.

Thank you for noticing. But, I’m not the only one with legendary mechanical inclination. Many in this thread are at least at my level.

ps. What is a screwdriver?

Vodka and orange juice.

 

[tggm]

hi guys. i bought a suunto dive computer and paired it with one of their transmitters. im away from any dive shops as im in tonga. sending anytinh back to australi for "service"would take about a month. i was told the transmitter would be good for 100 dives or 2 years. well its done about 40 dives, prehaps closeish to two years. the battery is dead and it seems no dive shop will sell me the battery kit becase suunto will disown them. anyone else have issues with suunto like this? its 4 screws. one with red paint so they can tell if you have done it yourself. Kits on ebay are about 70au. also taking a month to get here. a mate has a scuba pro transmitter and got a kit for 37au.

anyone else have a less diyphobic company i should buy gear from? whats the best for diy kits? the transmitter battery is also a rare cr 1/2 battery that no one stocks.

Hi @shirtz,

I complained about this very issue recently, to sum up: I went through 3 transmitters (the basic ones for the D-series computers) which all came with low battery warnings on first use.

Eventually I gave up and decided to bring the transmitter to a dive shop for battery replacement (which set me back 70€ in Portugal).

My opinion on this is that you simply do not know the state of the battery that comes with your device. Is it 100%? 75%? 63%? 10%?!

Sending two transmitters back only to get the third one also with low-batt exhausted my patience for this and I decided to pay from my pocket to make the issue go away.

Like others said here, suunto decided to prevent you from replacing the batteries yourself. There were kits available (battery+oring+cover) but were discontinued. You might still find them online.

As far as I know, the main issue with replacing just the battery is the o-ring losing integrity (but you can try and find a compatible o-ring online) and the threads on the plastic cover becoming worn out and unable to "grip" the screws properly. It's a no-brainer job technically speaking (people assemble their own first stage hoses all the time, so why would suunto decide that replacing that battery is off-limits?)

So, you can do it yourself but you'll need to keep in mind:

1) Is the o-ring still good?
2) Are the threads on the cover still intact?

I don't know how many times one can replace that battery until the o-ring or the plastic fail. I also don't know what would happen if the cover fails underwater. Is it just a flooded sensor? Or would we have a HP leak at 300bar? I don't know....

Despite the traditional forum response for suunto problems being "Buy a Shearwater", which is all good but not very helpful, I'd recommend you taking the issue with suunto and complain. Send them your dive logs to prove you did less than 100 dives with that transmitter and insist on a free repair.

Be prepared to wait.

 

[undrwater]

I agree. As long as it's dark chocolate.

 

[GreggS]

I agree. As long as it's dark chocolate.

Dark chocolate popcorn?

 

[undrwater]

Dark chocolate popcorn?

Listen, I don't like your tone...

 

[Belzelbub]

Dark chocolate popcorn?

It’s a real thing.

Dark Chocolate Popcorn

Cocoa powder, sugar, and butter make this decadent chocolate popcorn recipe a simple and delicious holiday treat.

www.allrecipes.com

 

[GreggS]

It’s a real thing.

Dark Chocolate Popcorn

Cocoa powder, sugar, and butter make this decadent chocolate popcorn recipe a simple and delicious holiday treat.

www.allrecipes.com

I'm not surprised. I know a guy that went into the flavored popcorn business. He had something like 30-some different flavors. I tried a couple of them and it actually tasted like what it was supposed to. One of them I tried was dill pickle. But, ya know? If I want dill pickle flavor, I'll eat dill pickles. I don't recall seeing dark chocolate flavor though.

I do like caramel popcorn, though.

 

[GreggS]

Listen, I don't like your tone...

Tough noogies.

 

[Wibble]

Had one of my transmitters (Aqualung) fail whilst setting up the rebreather whilst away for a week's diving in a remote location. One minute with a 10c coin and the battery was changed -- without even depressurising the gas -- and, voila, it's back to life. It is easy to forget to power down the diluent so the transmitter keeps pinging the life out of the battery, possibly for days.

Cannot for the life of me understand how Suunto went for that stupid "only replacable by the LDS at considerable cost" strategy. Are they utter imbeciles? Everyone knows a battery is a consumable item and it renders the equipment unusable if the transmitter's not available. Not that Suunto seem to care.

Even worse is Suunto's designed obsolescence. A metal screw into a plastic case has a very limited number of operations and with 4 screws there's 4 times more chance of one breaking the plastic screw-hole.