New DPV - Dive Xtras
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Yes, I was going into the water as you were coming out and you were pretty happy with that scoot yesterdayQuarry wasn't frozen over yet so I got mine wet yesterday
Coldish. -2C / -9 deg C (15 deg F) windchill, water temp: 3 deg C ( 37 deg F)
Out of the box…
- Seems tougher than it looks - well moulded / machined material, quality feel and finish
- Trigger feels great
- Nose cone heavy/robust
- Light and very easy to carry, even w/ dry gloves
- Easy to load batteries (using 2x 12ah dewalt DCB612)
In the water - 42min dive to 80ft, fresh water…
- No fuss, it just worked
- Good thrust - pulled me (210lbs+) around effortlessly in my drysuit and sidemount rig
- Default cruising speed “3” was quick, “6” and above and you were really travelling
- Even “1” was too fast to keep pace with other divers who were not scootering
- Switching gears took a little getting used to
- REALLY nice to have an integrated battery / speed display
- Speed migrate works well
- Batteries performed well in the cold, more than 75% after the dive - DPV still showed 4 bars (full), meters on batteries read 3 bars (full). ie w/ the 12’s battery life will not be an issue for me
- DPV as configured out of the box w/ 12ah (dcb612) batteries was slightly negatively buoyant (I’d guess ~ half lb or less) and settles tail down
This is going to work well for my kind of diving - getting to/from objective (wreck etc) ~ 1hr, not much current etc.
Will see what other battery options mean for buoyancy / trim at some point.
Overall extremely pleased.
I bought a pair for my demo scooter. They worked well on New Years Day doing demo dives and I'm impressed enough to order another set. If you don't need the range of the 12 Ah DeWalt batteries, the 9 Ah Waitley batteries make sense, given that you can get a pair of them for $140, compared to just under $500 for 12 Ah DeWalts. For demo purposes 3 sets of 9Ah Waitley batteries make more sense than a single set of 12 Ah DeWalts.
Based on past performance of generic non DeWalt batteries, I suspect the difference will show up 18-24 months from now. In my experience, the DeWalt batteries generally retain a slightly higher percentage of their original capacity compared to the generic off brand batteries. Still, at $140 per pair, you can afford to retire them sooner.
Andy in Gap
Contributor
I ended up getting the Dewalt 9ah batteries. Taking the BlackTip out in the morning for the first time, time to get in the water and see what she can do.
My BlackTips arrived on January 30, so I was able to take one of them to the quarry for demos on New Year's Day.
Overall I was quite impressed with the performance. Visibility was low and not ideal for speed testing so I didn't do any runs over a measured course, but it did a very good job of keeping up with a Piranha.
The trim is very tail low - as in sits vertical in the water. I was concerned that this would be a problem, but it's really not. If you take the time to make it neutrally buoyant it will just sit there nose up with fairly good manners and with it's short length it really isn't an issue. I did however add a stainless steel cable clamp to one of the screws securing the cowl struts so that the tail can be clipped off to either you or to a cave line, using a double ender.
There is ample space in the nose cone for lead shot and there are numerous segments so the shot can be biased toward one side to help further reduce torque. However, the batteries are already mounted on the side of the tube and the torque isn't noticeable. That's vastly different than the Halcyon R14 (a Suex scooter) I took for a test drive several years ago, and based on that experience and it's nice to confirm that even though it's a small DPV for the installed power, its handling is quite nice and not squirrelly at all.
There is a .3" thick mild steel weight in the nose under a stainless steel cover plate. Word is that it's a saltwater plate, but it seems heavy for that purpose, and it'll be a few months before I get offshore to test it in salt water. As it is, it's almost perfect to weight it for 9 Ah batteries. The weight plate wasn't painted and that's probably one of the first things you'll want to do as any water that gets on the inside of the nose cone when removing the nose cone does tend to seep between the weight plate and the stainless steel cover plate. It'll start to rust a day or two later.
The ribbed external surface of the nose cone is my only real issue with the BlackTip. It traps moisture which leads to a few drops invariably falling into the DPV when you remove the nose cone. Unlike the Piranha nose cone, you can't effectively wipe it dry before opening it. You may want to invest in a rubber blow tip to connect to your BC inflator hose after the dive, to you some of your reserve gas to blow the water off it before you change batteries. The good news is that there doesn't seem to be much inside that would immediately be bothered by splash. However, when putting it way after the diving day you'll want to be aware that a few drops of water may have gotten in the scooter, so wipe it down inside and leave it open a day ot two to dry. As noted above, water can drip off the outer o-ring groove and wick under the cover plate. Once I fine tune the weight on mine, I'll probably put a thin bead of silicone around the join between the nose cone and the cover plate and smooth it out with a wetted finger tip to seal that area and prevent moisture from getting under the plate. Having moisture inside a sealed DPV or CCR during storage just creates an opportunity for moisture to start working on corroding the electronics. If you don't seal that area, I suggest you get a 500 gram bag of silica gel desiccant and leave it in the scooter during storage, or store it with the nose cone off.
If you install 12 Ah batteries and dive fresh water, the weight plate will need to be removed, however the holes for the screws to secure the cover plate are long enough to allow the cover plate to be snugged up without the weight plate. When adding lead shot to the nose cone, I suggest you put the screws in their holes to prevent shot from getting into the holes, and I also suggest you use a good quality duct tape to mask off the segments you do not want to fill to keep shot out of them. Once you get the right amount of shot in the right segments, tape over the top of them to keep the shot in place in the future if you remove the cover plate (to install the weight plate, add ballast for smaller batteries, etc) and add some insurance to prevent lead shot from getting into the scooter itself.
The trigger is different in terms of the double and single clicks used compared to a Piranha. With a Piranha, it wants clicks that are fairly closely spaced or it will consider them to be two single clicks (i.e. shifting down two speeds rather than shifting up one speed. The BlackTip, as delivered, seems to prefer that you get your thumb all the way off the trigger with two slower and very distinct clicks to shift up. It isn't better or worse, just different, and it took a couple minutes to adjust to it. I tried switching hands and it's very easy to hold the trigger in with a finger of your left hand, if you do need to switch hands while underway.
The speed and battery indicator is perfectly located and was very useful. It got very positive comments from prospective customers
Customer feedback was very positive. One of them is a current Aquaprop owner and he went home planning to try to convince the spousal unit into letting him buy a BlackTip.
Overall I was quite impressed with the performance. Visibility was low and not ideal for speed testing so I didn't do any runs over a measured course, but it did a very good job of keeping up with a Piranha.
The trim is very tail low - as in sits vertical in the water. I was concerned that this would be a problem, but it's really not. If you take the time to make it neutrally buoyant it will just sit there nose up with fairly good manners and with it's short length it really isn't an issue. I did however add a stainless steel cable clamp to one of the screws securing the cowl struts so that the tail can be clipped off to either you or to a cave line, using a double ender.
There is ample space in the nose cone for lead shot and there are numerous segments so the shot can be biased toward one side to help further reduce torque. However, the batteries are already mounted on the side of the tube and the torque isn't noticeable. That's vastly different than the Halcyon R14 (a Suex scooter) I took for a test drive several years ago, and based on that experience and it's nice to confirm that even though it's a small DPV for the installed power, its handling is quite nice and not squirrelly at all.
There is a .3" thick mild steel weight in the nose under a stainless steel cover plate. Word is that it's a saltwater plate, but it seems heavy for that purpose, and it'll be a few months before I get offshore to test it in salt water. As it is, it's almost perfect to weight it for 9 Ah batteries. The weight plate wasn't painted and that's probably one of the first things you'll want to do as any water that gets on the inside of the nose cone when removing the nose cone does tend to seep between the weight plate and the stainless steel cover plate. It'll start to rust a day or two later.
The ribbed external surface of the nose cone is my only real issue with the BlackTip. It traps moisture which leads to a few drops invariably falling into the DPV when you remove the nose cone. Unlike the Piranha nose cone, you can't effectively wipe it dry before opening it. You may want to invest in a rubber blow tip to connect to your BC inflator hose after the dive, to you some of your reserve gas to blow the water off it before you change batteries. The good news is that there doesn't seem to be much inside that would immediately be bothered by splash. However, when putting it way after the diving day you'll want to be aware that a few drops of water may have gotten in the scooter, so wipe it down inside and leave it open a day ot two to dry. As noted above, water can drip off the outer o-ring groove and wick under the cover plate. Once I fine tune the weight on mine, I'll probably put a thin bead of silicone around the join between the nose cone and the cover plate and smooth it out with a wetted finger tip to seal that area and prevent moisture from getting under the plate. Having moisture inside a sealed DPV or CCR during storage just creates an opportunity for moisture to start working on corroding the electronics. If you don't seal that area, I suggest you get a 500 gram bag of silica gel desiccant and leave it in the scooter during storage, or store it with the nose cone off.
If you install 12 Ah batteries and dive fresh water, the weight plate will need to be removed, however the holes for the screws to secure the cover plate are long enough to allow the cover plate to be snugged up without the weight plate. When adding lead shot to the nose cone, I suggest you put the screws in their holes to prevent shot from getting into the holes, and I also suggest you use a good quality duct tape to mask off the segments you do not want to fill to keep shot out of them. Once you get the right amount of shot in the right segments, tape over the top of them to keep the shot in place in the future if you remove the cover plate (to install the weight plate, add ballast for smaller batteries, etc) and add some insurance to prevent lead shot from getting into the scooter itself.
The trigger is different in terms of the double and single clicks used compared to a Piranha. With a Piranha, it wants clicks that are fairly closely spaced or it will consider them to be two single clicks (i.e. shifting down two speeds rather than shifting up one speed. The BlackTip, as delivered, seems to prefer that you get your thumb all the way off the trigger with two slower and very distinct clicks to shift up. It isn't better or worse, just different, and it took a couple minutes to adjust to it. I tried switching hands and it's very easy to hold the trigger in with a finger of your left hand, if you do need to switch hands while underway.
The speed and battery indicator is perfectly located and was very useful. It got very positive comments from prospective customers
Customer feedback was very positive. One of them is a current Aquaprop owner and he went home planning to try to convince the spousal unit into letting him buy a BlackTip.
Texasguy
Contributor
Yeah? Not in April 2020?
Andy in Gap
Contributor
Yet....
I'm keeping my fingers crossed that there will be by the time I can afford the scooter....
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