Leaking Octo

[twinkles]

I finished my OW course this past weekend. On the OOA drill with Octo assent, my buddy handed me his octo. I took a breath and got some water in my mouth but it didn't seem to bad. As we were ascending, however, when I took a breath I got a mouth full of water. My buddy had a death grip on my right arm so I couldn't reach my own regulator, so I decided to just hit the purge on the octo and breath it free flowing. When I pressed the regulator to my mouth I could take a breath without water. Turns out the plastic mouth piece had a crack in it. Depending on my bite, head position, etc. it either leaked a little or a lot.

Is this an unacceptable maintence standard for rental gear?

 

[letsgodiving]

Is this an unacceptable maintence standard for rental gear?

How do you know it wasn't recently broken? Did the rest of the gear seem in poor repair?

Just let the LDS know and they will probably repair it.

 

[DennisW]

This is absolutely unacceptable, however, unless some one complains, the shop will not know there is a problem until the next regulator service. The mouthpiece could have just begun to leak. I hope you told them about the problem.

 

[do it easy]

It would be bad if it went out of the shop that way, but it could have cracked on the dive, or in the dive bag when your buddy packed it in there, or maybe just spontaneously because it had nothing better to do.

Are you sure the octo was working when your buddy rented it? There's a quick test to check the second stage- the negative pressure test.

 

[Arizona]

In reality this type of thing most likely goes unnoticed unless a reg is serviced. That is why is it always good to dive with your own gear when possible. As your buddy had the rental gear this is indeed an issue anyone could face. Perhaps the lesson learned could be adding a look at the mouth piece in each reg during your pre-dive safety check. I am sure a small crack would most likely be missed, but I am not sure what else you could do. I am sorry to hear you had this problem, but seemed handle it very well. Some dive operations are better at servicing equipment better than others. Perhaps letting us know which operator had the faulty equipment would benefit us all. Maybe put a bit more pressure on dive operations to keep equipment up to standard...

AZ

 

[redacted]

Is this an unacceptable maintence standard for rental gear?

Unacceptable - Yes

Uncommon - No

 

[sberanek]

I had a rental reg malfunction on me while descending. I could inhale no problem, however, it wouldn't let me exhale for some reason. Fortunately, I was only 10' down. I switched to my own alternate and went back up. I told the owner of the quarry and rental gear and she said "these get serviced all the time so there shouldnt' be anything wrong with it." I told her to hook it up to a tank and check it out, and surprise surprise, she couldn't exhale on it either. I never did find out what was wrong with it, but I have my own stuff now so I don't really need to worry about it.

--Shannon

 

[Tim Greaves]

I finished my OW course this past weekend. On the OOA drill with Octo assent, my buddy handed me his octo. I took a breath and got some water in my mouth but it didn't seem to bad. As we were ascending, however, when I took a breath I got a mouth full of water. My buddy had a death grip on my right arm so I couldn't reach my own regulator, so I decided to just hit the purge on the octo and breath it free flowing. When I pressed the regulator to my mouth I could take a breath without water. Turns out the plastic mouth piece had a crack in it. Depending on my bite, head position, etc. it either leaked a little or a lot.

Is this an unacceptable maintence standard for rental gear?

If you got a mouth full of water then that means that the diaphram isnt sealed correctly or the exhaust vent isnt sealing.. Its possible that you got a rock or something caught in the exhaust vent.. I had this happen to me when I was diving on Sunday..

 

[scubadobadoo]

...and always remember that it is your job to check any equipment before you dive to make sure it is working as intended regardless of when or why it stopped functioning properly. Happy diving and glad it worked out well!

 

[sberanek]

I usually breath a few breaths before I even strap on the gear, and when I had the malfunction it was all working fine on the surface. That's another reason why you have buddies.

--Shannon