Oceanic Alpha 7

[gldnrm01]

Would You consider this a dependable and safe reg. We dive from 30 - 80 ft., generally and are planning on getting nitrox certified. We dive about 15 times a year and are not interested in going much past 100 ft.

 

[Vie]

From my own experiences, it depends what first stage it is paired with—I was not impressed with the CDX (compact balanced diaphragm)/Alpha 7 combo that I borrowed (on 3 dives) in December last year. During those dives, the Alpha 7 second stage breathed “funny”/I felt it was stuttering and sometimes giving me too much air. Of course this may be maintenance/service/adjustment problem and not a reflection of Alpha 7s in general. My cousin (the owner of the reg) have had some issues with the CDX and it turned out that his CDX was part of a batch that was recalled (and supposedly fixed) a few years back.

I gave the Alpha 7 another try in February—this time paired with a DX4. It performed ok, no complaints, but IMHO is no match for my ATX200 in term of comfort, performance and size.

Another thing I will say is that the purge cover (especially the yellow octopus) on the Alpha 7 is very prone to becoming brittle and splitting/breaking. My cousin has gone through a few and I had to replace one even though I only used the Alpha 7 second stage on three dives and had hardly touched the purge (except during the pre dive checks).