Info Lack of OC WOB data for BOVs

[Mod63]

I for one am thankful to Brad for his rebreather fatality list, where he blamed a manufacturing flaw for a number of deaths where the user was a Darwin award winner.
That list ,along with other open safety materials were used when the EU decided on the CE safety standards.

You mean the list that to this day also includes at least 1 OC accident

 

[Dr Simon Mitchell]

You mean the list that to this day also includes at least 1 OC accident

Yes, extraordinary isn't it? Same with the cases where coronial inquests or protracted lawsuits with copious expert testimony have determined that AD's version of events is incorrect, all you see on that list is AD's version of events.

The tragedy of all this is that there could have been some extremely useful contributions to the field if their underlying philosophy wasn't seemingly focused on destroying other rebreather manufacturers. That 'list' is a classic example. When they first emerged with it accompanied by an invitation to relevant researchers to get involved in maintaining the list, a large group (including me) enthusiastically got behind the idea because of the obvious potential value. That lasted until it became clear that amendments to causal determinations would only be accepted if they agreed with AD's preconceptions, and those almost invariably focused on demonstrating that the accident was caused by some perceived flaw in a competitor's product (even in cases where there was no evidence that this was so). It took about a year for everyone with any credibility to drift away from the project. A massive wasted opportunity.

Occasionally when Brad posts on stuff where he stops claiming how good his product is and how bad everyone else's is, it is useful and on point. A pity it was not like that from the start.

Simon M

 

[Madddogggy]

I know, and yet when I was doing my research on what reb to get IANTD and TDI representatives for eastern europe sent me that list along with the other open safety garbage, the same package of data was used in the CE materials when the recreational agencies were asked for their opinion on how to set the CE standard, as for some reason OS is (or i hope, was) considered unbiased.
In my previous comment I was being sarcastic. I'm just glad that the non CE rebs were not completely banned.

As Winston Churhill said: "A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to get its pants on"

 

[Brad_Horn]

Hmmm, Brad, maybe you have a good BOV product, but as you can see from the first few responses to this thread, people are disinclined to believe anything you say; with good reason.

For the generation of divers who have no idea why Brad's post has received the negative response it has, here is a very quick summary.

Brad represents a company that in the mid 2000s claimed to be building a cheap yet extraordinarily safe rebreather with multiple unique monitoring and safety intervention systems. They aggressively denied the opinions (and attempted to trash the reputation) of multiple experts (including me) who pointed out that some of these systems would not work as designed. They began taking deposits for this rebreather in 2008 with a promise of a 16 week delivery time.

That was fourteen (14) years ago.

This rebreather is still nowhere to be seen, almost certainly because those experts were right and it simply doesn't work adequately.

Worse, they leveraged the 'reputation' associated with the promise of this rebreather and the hypothetical safety standard it represented to insert themselves as expert witnesses into multiple lawsuits or coroners investigations against other rebreather manufacturers (e.g., here), in all of which the side they represented lost. However the stress and financial fallout for parties on both sides of these lawsuits was devastating, and the legally fraught environment created around rebreathers was probably the reason for our community having the manufacturer of one of the most reliable oxygen cells withdraw from our market sector.

For the avoidance of doubt about the claims about when this rebreather (the so-called intervention closed circuit rebreather / iCCR) would ship, a video of Brad at DEMA 2009 claiming that 'customer spec' units would ship soon can be found here.

Simon M

G’Day Simon,

Long time no friendly discourse.

I don’t have to say anything, the stunning silence from lack of knowledge of the OC and CC mode WOB for other BOVs by their buyers is telling in itself!
You still don’t even know the WOB of your own AP OCB BOV do you? Little embarrassing, No. https://www.opensafetyglobal.com/Safety_files/Rebreather_Marketing_vs_Engineering.pdf

Not sure where you ever got a 16 week delivery time from as in 2008 the Apocalypse Type IV iCCR hadn’t even been audited for CE; in fact at that time it was still a prototype. Now the 2009 units at DEMA were ‘customer spec’ units with fully working End-Tidal CO2 Monitor, PPO2 Monitor both with buddy display, voice alerts, lowest WOB on the market, fully flood recoverable, gag strap, single finger BOV bailout etc etc Dave Sutton demonstrating it here
It dived and still dives beautifully
As you know full well it then took until 2011 to receive CE certification to EN14143. No requirements required to be made to the rebreather to pass. All NCRs were resolved through testing/documentation.
The doozy is that the 165 odd Scrubber Duration tests that had been already done were required to be redone for audit of SGS by SIRA as the CO2 was taken from the inhale breathing tube. This of course reduced the scrubber duration when it was then measured at the mouth but that was a safer result…. and that testing at the mouth for CO2, that takes into account the BOV dead-space, is still unique to Open Safety I note!

Unfortunately just prior to Open Safety getting CE in 2011 for all our rebreathers, folk elected to force dive another make of rebreather, despite it saying No Dive. That was reviewed and the auto-bailout feature of the iCCR trigger wasn’t up to the standard of safely bailing out a diver who was forcing the loop open onto a known unsafe breathing gas. ALVBOV has now been updated to enable this and the latest Open Safety HUD is presently being test dived in production specification. As shown fitted here
What systems are you still claiming didn’t work as designed? Rebreather has been out shipped since 2011 when it received CE and not a SINGLE tested metric has been quibbled over. Neither the fact that it has the lowest OC or CC WOB for a rebreather, nor its scrubber duration, nor its underwater flood recovery capability, nor its hydrostatic performance and the list goes on. See https://deeplife.co.uk/or_dv.php then try and find another rebreather with published/any testing to the same criteria.

Simon, how many rebreathers manufactured by Open Safety haven’t been seen? Open Safety Equipment Ltd
though yes we have only sold 5 of the Commercial Primary Life Support for 350m Saturation Diving units
Including 2022 manufactured Incursion iMIL-ER, Incursion CMR O2/SCR and Incursion BMR as shown. Yes multiple militaries are VERY happy with theirs!

Off topic for this topic but it is interesting that you mention the couple of cases that Dr Alex Deas has attended as an SME. And I note that he hasn’t yet been proven wrong in any of his accident analysis.

If memory serves me right the fix for the battery brown out due to bouncing batteries in the Barrett case was a 7quid part! It would be interesting knowing how many other units that could be tested to have the same flawed design also resulted in being listed here https://www.opensafetyglobal.com/Safety_files/RB_Fatal_Accident_Database_100725.xls

And for the water blocked cells that by design led to either Hypoxia or Hyperoxia in the Skiles case and quite potentially the other 5 or 6 known incidents on the same unit, see the yellow highlights in
https://www.opensafetyglobal.com/Safety_files/DV_O2_cell_study_E4_160415.pdf
then compare with https://www.hollisrebreathers.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/Prism 2 User Manual - English - 12-4072 Rev. 13.pdf
"The collection of condensation on the sensing surface of the sensor (standing water) reduces the signal output. Once either drying or gravity removes the standing water, the signal output will return to normal within 30 seconds. For example, a thin layer of water over the sensing surface will reduce the signal output of a sensor from 11.8 mV to 10.1 mV within 20 minutes; remove the standing water and the signal output returns to 11.8 mV in 30 seconds.”
That sound familiar to you Simon? At least some in the industry are learning…

CE certification of the Open Safety rebreathers at Open Safety | Certifications inclusive En61508 Functional Safety certification as required by EN14143:2003 and which certification of is still unique to Open Safety’s rebreathers.

Apocalypse Type IV CCR User Manual for those with an interest in learning a bit more about it https://www.opensafety.eu/manuals/OR_Apocalypse_User_Manual 100426.pdf

Now about the topic of BOV WOB

 

[Brad_Horn]

Simon,

On the topic of BOV WOB, you’ve published some interesting work that highlights the importance of this as a rebreather selection criteria and yet are strangely silent on reference to the actual WOB data itself. I wonder why?

“Minimising equipment-related breathing resistance
All underwater breathing apparatus, including rebreathers, should be designed with the goal of reducing their external breathing resistance as much as is practicable. Other than choosing a device with good related design and testing characteristics there is little that divers can do in this regard.”
https://gga.kr/wp-content/uploads/2...-Scientific-Diving-Proceedings-2016-simon.pdf

'Should be designed with the goal of reducing their external breathing resistance as much as is practicable', is a great goal but whose the sole manufacturer whom can claim that?
That’s odd, the one rebreather manufacturer who actually does so and is quite open about their testing, is the only one you take offence at Simon!
Open Safety ALVBOV:
Lowest BOV OC WOB 0.89J/L on Air at 50m at 62.5lpm https://www.opensafetyglobal.com/Safety_files/DV_DL_ALVBOV_Breathing_Params_A3_100318.pdf
Lowest BOV CC WOB 0.57J/L on Air at 40m at 75lpm at 4’C https://www.opensafety.eu/datasheets/ALVBOV_40m_75lpm_air_081014.pdf

So Open Safety have both achieved and defined ALARP for rebreathers and their BOV.
Why isn’t this the norm?

Why is this important?
Maybe because your words are being deliberately misconstrued by the industry because they deliberately are not publishing their WOB data as it isn’t ALARP. At best probably barely even passing the minimum EN250 requirement again see You are being redirected... for how bad this is…..

"Equipment, respiratory rate and many other factors can affect WOB. Equipment differences are typically small, and divers tend to manage other relevant factors before they enter the water, leaving divers to contend with gas density as a primary modifier of WOB in many situations and a focal point for hyperbaric researchers. These experts are increasingly finding that the effects of depth are more extensive than previously understood, and many are suggesting it may be time to reconsider how and what we choose to breathe.”

Performance Under Pressure

Gas density is one of the unknown mechanisms on the forefront of hyperbaric research.

dan.org

But the equipment differences from WOB aren’t small are they Simon! As you well know….
Per NEDU testing your chosen Inspiration failing EN14143 WOB criteria on Heliox below 70m at 75lpm and even 90m at 62.5lpm.
See Table 10 and Figure 9 https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/pdfs/ADA550047.pdf

And that’s without a OCB BOV fitted so who knows how much extra WOB that adds. I say extra as they’d be marketing the results openly if it was better……

Speaking of just how BIG those equipment WOB differences are Simon, we know from You are being redirected... that just scraping through EN250 at 3.0J/L is bad and 0.89J/L for a BOV in OC mode is within ALARP. Pretty big Delta that, No.
And that isn’t even taking into account that probably half the BOVs in active use are known to have failed meeting EN250 for WOB…..

For those interested in how much the CC WOB of a BOV/DSV can vary see the selection on pg63 where its nearly a variable of 4x https://www.opensafetyglobal.com/Safety_files/FMECA_OR_V4_180821.pdf

At the exploration end, it’s interesting that equipment WOB isn’t yet discussed as a factor - maybe because of the above lack of knowledge - and it would be interesting what the effect on the dive is if they selected a rebreather with half or less the actual WOB for the dive (see page 64 for how wide the spread of rebreather WOB really is https://www.opensafetyglobal.com/Safety_files/FMECA_OR_V4_180821.pdf) than playing around with exotic gases. Come Out of the Bloody Cold: The Case for Neoprene with O’Three founder Sean Webb

For more on just how low the WOB of the Open Safety rebreathers is see https://www.opensafetyglobal.com/Safety_files/DV_OR_WOB_Respiratory_C1_101111.pdf and which uniquely for the diving market includes the WOB data for dives down to 350m on Heliox….. I’d love to see those compared with other units on the market, how about it Simon?
Not that anyone wants a proven LOW WOB rebreather Open Safety Equipment ----< capable of deep diving and staying within the known work of breathing limits.
Which Open Safety had slated to release to the civil market as the Apocalypse Type II, but as has been pointed out there is no demand for a true dual scrubber, long duration to whatever test standard is picked, underwater fully flood recoverable, lowest WOB and relatively lightweight unit. Shucks, guess we won’t produce it…. Pity our new larger factory is currently maxed out for production as well, at least until we scale up yet again.

 

[Brad_Horn]

You mean the list that to this day also includes at least 1 OC accident

Did you report that too DeepLife to have it removed? https://deeplife.co.uk/or_accident.php
There's only some 600 odd rebreather fatalities listed; over half of them with at best a place holder, indicating that a known rebreather fatality occurred based on the linked reporting....

Prove their information wrong and it gets updated. I've done that several times.

 

[Dr Simon Mitchell]

Not sure where you ever got a 16 week delivery time from as in 2008 the Apocalypse Type IV iCCR hadn’t even been audited for CE; in fact at that time it was still a prototype.

Six lines into your post we find the first confident yet incorrect assertion. Why don't you talk to your boss about it. He was the one claiming 16 weeks (Rebreather World in 2008).

What systems are you still claiming didn’t work as designed? Rebreather has been out shipped since 2011 when it received CE and not a SINGLE tested metric has been quibbled over.

The iCCR has NOT been shipped. That is a simple, indisputable fact. All you have shipped is the rebreather loop with an oxygen addition system.

In relation to systems that don't work it was obvious to multiple experts that the original proposal for measuring end tidal CO2 would not work, and we subsequently proved that in a relevant experiment published in a scientific journal. You claimed to have fixed that problem, with an approach that sounds almost as implausible as the first. It still remains to be seen whether that works or not. Similarly, it is an open question whether the auto-bailout system will be anything like as sensitive or specific as it needs to be in order not to be thrown in the garbage bin by irritated users (or even cause more accidents than it prevents) after release to the wider community. That too had inappropriate parameters programmed into it in the early days.

We can resume this conversation if you ever do release the iCCR and we get a chance to test it. Every time we have met over the last 10 years you have said it was going to be released soon but it never comes. There are now PADI open water divers who were not even born when you took the first deposits. Just get it released Brad, then we can have a real conversation.

Off topic for this topic but it is interesting that you mention the couple of cases that Dr Alex Deas has attended as an SME. And I note that he hasn’t yet been proven wrong in any of his accident analysis.

He will never be proven wrong on anything to his most devout fanboy, but he was proven wrong to the satisfaction of two courts of law after consideration of detailed evidence from multiple expert witnesses. In one of those cases, despite the fact that the diver had borrowed the rebreather and had no training on it (which you describe as "suicide" in your own manual), had misassembled the rebreather, was diving alone, had no bailout, and had taken opiate drugs, Deas still claimed that a poorly characterized potential problem was to blame even though there was absolutely no evidence that it had actually occurred in that case. The court, correctly, did not accept his argument.

Regarding your BOV narrative:

That’s odd, the one rebreather manufacturer who actually does so and is quite open about their testing, is the only one you take offence at Simon!

The problem is Brad, other than your BOV, you don't have any equipment on the market that I would be interested in using. Yes, I use an inspo; it is available, on the market! Yes, I have published extensively on the importance of work of breathing, but its no use you banging on about sub-optimal work of breathing when your unit which is allegedly better is not available. And regarding the BOV what would you have me do? Tell everyone that they should rip whatever mouthpiece is on their rebreather off, and buy Brad's BOV? How would we know if that's going to make a material difference to the WOB of the unit as a whole, and it would probably invalidate their CE (something you consider a mortal sin).

In addition, based on my interactions with you and your colleagues, and your statements around issues that I know a lot about, I personally have a fundamental lack of trust in your claims. Most (if not all) of your testing comes from the "Baltic Assessment Institute"; a Russian testing house that one contributor on Rebreather World claimed had the same IP address as AD's company (which he also said changed very quickly after it was pointed out). Moreover, after testing of your equipment was finished, the "Baltic Assessment Institute" disappeared off the face of the earth. It certainly can't find anything else they have done. I don't know exactly what all this means, but for me personally, it does not inspire confidence.

I can only work with what is out there on the market. Like I said earlier Brad, stop wasting energy talking about other manufacturer's rebreathers (which exist) and get yours (which currently doesn't) on the market. Then we can have a proper conversation.

Simon M

 

[cathal]

G’Day Simon,

Long time no friendly discourse.

I don’t have to say anything, the stunning silence from lack of knowledge of the OC and CC mode WOB for other BOVs by their buyers is telling in itself!
You still don’t even know the WOB of your own AP OCB BOV do you? Little embarrassing, No. https://www.opensafetyglobal.com/Safety_files/Rebreather_Marketing_vs_Engineering.pdf

Not sure where you ever got a 16 week delivery time from as in 2008 the Apocalypse Type IV iCCR hadn’t even been audited for CE; in fact at that time it was still a prototype. Now the 2009 units at DEMA were ‘customer spec’ units with fully working End-Tidal CO2 Monitor, PPO2 Monitor both with buddy display, voice alerts, lowest WOB on the market, fully flood recoverable, gag strap, single finger BOV bailout etc etc Dave Sutton demonstrating it here
It dived and still dives beautifully
As you know full well it then took until 2011 to receive CE certification to EN14143. No requirements required to be made to the rebreather to pass. All NCRs were resolved through testing/documentation.
The doozy is that the 165 odd Scrubber Duration tests that had been already done were required to be redone for audit of SGS by SIRA as the CO2 was taken from the inhale breathing tube. This of course reduced the scrubber duration when it was then measured at the mouth but that was a safer result…. and that testing at the mouth for CO2, that takes into account the BOV dead-space, is still unique to Open Safety I note!

Unfortunately just prior to Open Safety getting CE in 2011 for all our rebreathers, folk elected to force dive another make of rebreather, despite it saying No Dive. That was reviewed and the auto-bailout feature of the iCCR trigger wasn’t up to the standard of safely bailing out a diver who was forcing the loop open onto a known unsafe breathing gas. ALVBOV has now been updated to enable this and the latest Open Safety HUD is presently being test dived in production specification. As shown fitted here
What systems are you still claiming didn’t work as designed? Rebreather has been out shipped since 2011 when it received CE and not a SINGLE tested metric has been quibbled over. Neither the fact that it has the lowest OC or CC WOB for a rebreather, nor its scrubber duration, nor its underwater flood recovery capability, nor its hydrostatic performance and the list goes on. See https://deeplife.co.uk/or_dv.php then try and find another rebreather with published/any testing to the same criteria.

Simon, how many rebreathers manufactured by Open Safety haven’t been seen? Open Safety Equipment Ltd
though yes we have only sold 5 of the Commercial Primary Life Support for 350m Saturation Diving units
Including 2022 manufactured Incursion iMIL-ER, Incursion CMR O2/SCR and Incursion BMR as shown. Yes multiple militaries are VERY happy with theirs!

Off topic for this topic but it is interesting that you mention the couple of cases that Dr Alex Deas has attended as an SME. And I note that he hasn’t yet been proven wrong in any of his accident analysis.

If memory serves me right the fix for the battery brown out due to bouncing batteries in the Barrett case was a 7quid part! It would be interesting knowing how many other units that could be tested to have the same flawed design also resulted in being listed here https://www.opensafetyglobal.com/Safety_files/RB_Fatal_Accident_Database_100725.xls

And for the water blocked cells that by design led to either Hypoxia or Hyperoxia in the Skiles case and quite potentially the other 5 or 6 known incidents on the same unit, see the yellow highlights in
https://www.opensafetyglobal.com/Safety_files/DV_O2_cell_study_E4_160415.pdf
then compare with https://www.hollisrebreathers.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/Prism 2 User Manual - English - 12-4072 Rev. 13.pdf
"The collection of condensation on the sensing surface of the sensor (standing water) reduces the signal output. Once either drying or gravity removes the standing water, the signal output will return to normal within 30 seconds. For example, a thin layer of water over the sensing surface will reduce the signal output of a sensor from 11.8 mV to 10.1 mV within 20 minutes; remove the standing water and the signal output returns to 11.8 mV in 30 seconds.”
That sound familiar to you Simon? At least some in the industry are learning…

CE certification of the Open Safety rebreathers at Open Safety | Certifications inclusive En61508 Functional Safety certification as required by EN14143:2003 and which certification of is still unique to Open Safety’s rebreathers.

Apocalypse Type IV CCR User Manual for those with an interest in learning a bit more about it https://www.opensafety.eu/manuals/OR_Apocalypse_User_Manual 100426.pdf

Now about the topic of BOV WOB

I am sure it’s just a coincidence that the only customer type whom you claim to have purchased your CCR just happens to be the only customer type who can not confirm whether they bought it due to operational security concerns, and most certainly will not give a public review of its actual performance. There may well be militaries who have bought your unit and there may well not be at all. We the consumer only have your word to rely on whether these alleged sales actually ever took place at all.

 

[sylverbard]

Wow - looks like there is some history here! As a new rebreather diver I have not heard of the iCCR and out of sheer curiosity would like to know: what did it promise and why didn't it work?

like anything beginning with the [apple] i, it takes far too much time to produce at far too ridiculous a price with far too restrictive user friendly adjustments / upgrades and literally one human on earth who wants it.