On behalf of service techs everywhere

[tech_diver]

Oh! I got one...

He: I just puked in my reg!
She: What are you going to do?
he: I don't know.
she: Why don't you call the dive shop and ask them?
he: No Way! I can't let them find out I puked in their rental reg! They might try to charge me a cleaning fee or keep my deposit or something!.

 

[KeithG]

Left overs for the next diver ;P !!!!!

I am not fully clear on what you are getting at. Is this a suggestion to shave my beard and dine with a regulator in my mouth?

Or not. Not sure how my dive buddy would react ( well actually i am) Happy chumming...

---------- Post added March 16th, 2013 at 11:08 PM ----------

But in all seriousness folks. This does highlight a bit of a potential dangerous flaw in the industry.

There are a few common items (sand, puke) that under very normal circumstances can cause your reg to screw up. or maybe not? - please spank me if things like sand and puke can not make a regulator fail. I do not know.

Due to fear, some people may be diving with unsafe gear?

I was trained to be afraid of tampering with my reg. so for years I dragged it back to the shop to be serviced. On a lark I tried a different shop. They called and said my first stage was faulty, but since they were not an authorized Sherwood dealer, they could not get the parts I needed. They explained and Very clearly demonstrated the defect. my first stage has a very small bleed thingy that leaks air under pressure and it was no longer leaking. (sorry to be so technical!). I took it back to the first shop, explained the issue and was promptly told that I was a moron. First stages should never leak air. Now I felt twice stupid.

I did a bit of google research, found my understanding As explained by the knowledgable shop was correct and have never gone back to the shop that called me a moron.

That was the day that I started to unscrew my second stage to clean out debris.

Always a bit of sand. No puke yet. Not looking forward to that day.

I do realize that I am not qualified to service my reg, but I am very confident that I can clean out the little bit of sand that collects in my second stages.

 

[USdiver1]

Hey look on the bright side, at least the user didn't s**t in it. Seriously, what is it with people today? Vomiting in one's regulator used to be a rite of passage: it meant that the diver was hard core, and that nothing, least of all a little bit of puke was going to ruin the dive.

If you've been diving for several decades, you probably have your own chum stories: mine concerns scrambled eggs and getting absolutely the best schooling of pork fish and yellowtail snappers ever seen in the eastern Caribbean. Too bad I wasn't into photography when it happened (no on second thought, considering all the suspended particles of chum, maybe it's best that there is no recorded history). Thank God for a good purge valve, and the ameliorative properties of sea water; good dive, great story rite of passage completed.

 

[Joe Bailey]

My two dive buddies went to Bonaire last year. They are both chummers, one generally when underwater, the other on the surface, but when they catch a glimpse of the other, they will both blow. Ah, togetherness. First dive of that trip, surface chummer loads his regulator, jambs it up. He really did try to wash it out, but the tech found more debris when he went through it. Didn't seem to bother the tech much, he rinsed it out then put it in his mouth to test it. Both chummers almost lost it watching that happen.

It's not that a little puke stuck in crevices gets to me but when I take the purge cover off and chunks fall out that bothers me. I gotten some full face masks that were pretty gnarly but not like this.