Nitrox Fill Question?

[ScubaMarc]

In curacao, ocean encounters, I asked for 32, i got 24 and 26!

 

[Walter]

I wasn't speciic to this thread with that comment. I was talking about some of the general comments I read from time to time.

That's simply ridiculous. I've never seen anyone ever claim PADI doesn't teach anything right. Showing one example of PADI teaching something correctly is not an indication of them teaching anything either correctly or incorrectly.

 

[VBlueV]

oh lighten up walter..

i've run across some padi haters too.. but i'd attribute it more to rivalry than anything else..

just because you haven't seen it doesn't make it not so. and to say the premise is ridiculous makes you as bad as the dive shop dude that scoffed at a customer asking to test his tanks.

do YOU like ford or chevy?

 

[ronbeau]

I recently became Nitrox certified and also boiught my own tanks. Yesterday I went for my first fill post purchase and cerification and thought I would be testing the fill content and logging the fill per PADI training that I just went through.

In fact the local LDS where I got the fill (and who I really trust) said "OK here's your tank " with no indication of a need to analyze the contents or log.

Being the newbie that I am, I asked "Do we need to test and log this?" and I received an answer to the effect "If you really want to I can do that" accompanied by a look that said "if you want to be a geek",

This lead me to ask the fill person what most people do and I was told most people pick up there tanks and skip the analysis and logging.

I want to be prudent, but no more of a geek than the next guy so I wonder what everone out there in the Ohana does?

I will give you an example of why the preactice at your LDS is not acceptable.

I was diving with Ocean Encounters in Curacao. They indicate that their NITROX is always 31.8 (approx EAN32).

When I analyzed the two tanks provided to me one was just hsort of EAN 36 while the other was just short of EAN 32.

My first dive was to the Superior Producer at 105 feet.

If the tanks were not analyzed I might have been in serious trouble since the MOD for EAN36 is 95 feet at a PO2 of 1.4

Risking Oxygen Toxicity is never acceptable based on lazinees on the part of the LDS or the diver.

You were totally correct questioning this but should have insisted that the cylinders be analyzed. Remember from your training it is you (the diver) that is ultimately responsible for analyzing the contents of the cylinders that you will be using.

The LDS is really opening themselves to a serious liability should anything happen to a diver based on the cylinders not be analyzed.

 

[ronbeau]

In curacao, ocean encounters, I asked for 32, i got 24 and 26!

I dove with them last summer and got one tank at EAN32 and the other at EAN36.

I was diving to the Superior Producer which is at 105 feet. EAN36 at 105 feet is not a good thing to say the least.

 

[MauiScubaSteve]

As long as we are just exchanging info, PADI uses the most conservative Eanx tables in the business, based on a PO2 of 1.4. NOAA's origional Eanx tables, IANTD's inagural recreational Eanx tables, NAUI and many other agencies all use a PO2 of 1.6. For all divers certified for 1.6 PO2 math, 105ft is fine with 36%.

 

[BKP]

As long as we are just exchanging info, PADI uses the most conservative Eanx tables in the business, based on a PO2 of 1.4. NOAA's origional Eanx tables, IANTD's inagural recreational Eanx tables, NAUI and many other agencies all use a PO2 of 1.6. For all divers certified for 1.6 PO2 math, 105ft is fine with 36%.

I'm not sure where you're getting your information from, but NAUI also teaches a recommended partial pressure of 1.4 ATA for recreational diving. (Naui Nitrox Diver curriculum, page 35).

And it's actually the Navy dive tables that tout the most conservative EANx numbers.

 

[Walter]

PADI's RDP is one of the (if not the most) most liberal tables anywhere.

 

[MauiScubaSteve]

My bad as far as NAUI goes, 1.6 is contiguous like PADI. I hadn't considered NAVY tables as recreational so I hadn't considered NAVY tables.

It still seems ultra conservative semantics to me. Agencies that teach ppo 1.4 say if you happen to go deeper you can go to 1.6, so they give you tables that go to 1.6. I'd like to hear about the dive computer manufacturers, how different are their Eanx formulas?

 

[miketsp]

When picking up Nitrox fills I'd always ask to use their analyser and see the result for myself.
But how many of you ask for an SPG as well?
At some tourist places where not everyone is diving Nitrox I've seen the shop repeatedly underfill Nitrox tanks to cut short dives and keep the boat on schedule with the air divers. Even though the divers were paying quite a lot more for the EAN fill.
Once you're on the boat it's too late to exchange them.
When the divers complained on board, the standard answer was "well you were offered the tanks to check at the shop.."