Problems with Sherwood Wisdom

[ctlynch]

I bought a Wisdom last September from Leisurepro and took it on a trip last November to Cozumel. It worked great except that four days into the trip the last digit on the tank pressure on the LCD died. I returned it to Leisurepro who sent me a "new" Wisdom with a serial number older than the one that I bought. I tested it in a pool here in April and everything seemed in order (best I can do in CO).

I just got back Monday from a trip to Turks & Caicos where I had some strange problems with the “new” Wisdom. In brief starting with my first dive (profile was a maximum depth of 87 feet and 42 minutes of tbt) about halfway through the dive with 2k psi left in about 50 feet of water the computer started alarming “Turn Gas”. I’d acknowledge the alarm and it would shut off for about 30 seconds and then go off again, and again, and again. My safe minutes were fine and I couldn’t quite figure out why it was alarming. I went shallow to start dumping nitrogen and got back to the boat with 1350 psi left in the tank. During the interval I got into the setup to see what alarms were on. Usually I dive with depth at 100, turn and 1500psi and end at 500psi and ascent rate. I was unable to find anything amiss. The second dive I watched my nitrogen loading more carefully and noticed that the N2 bar was moving up to the yellow line very quickly. My buddy who was on a different computer but who wasn't more than 5 feet from my depth at any time was fine on his nitrogen loading. Again the “Turn Gas” alarm began going off about halfway through the dive.

I pulled out the manual when I got back to my hotel but was unable to find anything referring to a “Turn Gas” alarm. I went through and turned off everything except depth, turn, end and ascent. The next morning I watched the computer very carefully and had similar problems, despite being desaturated and on a conservative dive profile with a max depth of 75 feet for 46 minutes. On my first dive of the day when I got to the boat I had 5 bars in the N2 on the border with the yellow zone. This struck me as being very conservative. In talking with several other people who dove with computers on the same dive my data was inconsistent. I realize that we didn't have exactly the same profile, but I wasn't even in the same ballpark. I also noticed a few times during the dive where the PSI reading would spike for a few seconds up to 4k PSI and then drop back down. During the interval I went back into setup and turned off all alarms. During the second dive the alarm didn't go off, but in watching my safe time I did see some strange behavior where I’d be at a constant depth of 45’ and my safe time would be 40-45 minutes. A minute or two later it would show 4 safe minutes…then down to 3 and then another minute later it would be back up to 35-40 minutes. The next day I saw at one point where I had the computer spike up to 499 minutes of safe time near the end of my first dive.

In my recollections of my trip to Cozumel with the first Wisdom, I didn’t remember seeing any of these problems. In fact the only alarms I remember hearing in Cozumel were turn and ascent alarms. Given the conservative profiles and with extended safety stops (5-10 minutes) I’m at a loss to explain the “Turn Gas” alarms, the strange rapidity with which the computer indicated accumulated nitrogen as well as the pendulum number of safe minutes at depth.

I’m planning on calling Leisurepro today and arranging to have the computer shipped back, but I’m hoping for some more insight into what was going on. Anyone have any ideas or seen this before? Is it common? Thanks in advance.

Cameron

 

[ArizSig]

Check the log in the computer to see if there are extra "phantom" dives. My Wisdom computer was logging non-existent dives last year. My gear was on the deck of the boat during a surface interval, but was in dive mode, indicating dive time of 18 minutes at 11 feet, water temp 35 F. This was in La Paz, the water never got below 79 F - especially on the boat!

Maybe you're computer is showing a high nitrogen load because it thought it was diving while you were sleeping!

 

[TropicalDiver]

Seems that the Wisdoms are running their own dive plans. I've had three fail within a year, each time doing weird stuff - one zeroed out on me during an ascent from a deep dive (scary when you look down and see zero tank pressure!), one just stopped, and one couldn't decide what PSI was in the tank when attached and what it was when unattached and each time it was slapped it read something different . I truly hope that Sherwood gets the bugs worked out of them soon!!!!!

 

[ctlynch]

Yeah I really began to pay attention to what mode the computer was in. I was concerned that the Wisdow was getting splashed on the boat and was going into wet/dive mode before I even stepped off the boat. Certainly that might explain some of the problems, but going through the log the dive start and end time corresponded correctly with what really happened and the surface interval was correct. Thanks.

Cameron

 

[ctlynch]

Seems that the Wisdoms are running their own dive plans. I've had three fail within a year, each time doing weird stuff - one zeroed out on me during an ascent from a deep dive (scary when you look down and see zero tank pressure!), one just stopped, and one couldn't decide what PSI was in the tank when attached and what it was when unattached and each time it was slapped it read something different . I truly hope that Sherwood gets the bugs worked out of them soon!!!!!

Frankly I'm getting concerned about Wisdom failure rate. I love the computer, the features the ease of use, etc...but this is getting to be very troubling.

 

[bill132]

I'm recently having this same problem. Anyone ever figure it out?

 

[DA Aquamaster]

I had one Wisdom shut down it's own N2 loading functions when it decided it did not know what it was taliking about (it left the PSG reading until the dive terminated than shut itself off for good.) I had another Wisdom do what appeared to be normal dive profiles with normal N2 loadings until I downloaded and noted a dive with several brief (less than 15 second) excurions "in excess of 330 ft" and one 35 hour dive with several ascents and decsents in the 10-20 ft range.

My second Wisdom has not repeated the errors and seems to be working fine, but I am always stuck wondering about it and am not in a position to trust it. I sent an inquirely to Sherwood a couple months ago and have never even gotten a response which does not impress me at all.

We have had three Wisdom customers in our shop (all shop employees) and all three have had Wisdoms that failed. Between the three divers we have now seen a total of 5 Wisdoms - we are still waiting for the third failed Wisdom to be replaced.

Sherwood has indicated the failure rate is about 1.5% but if that is the case then they must be going to great lenghts to ensure we get them all. Statistically, 3 (possibly 4 if you count my second Wisdom's download oddities) failures on 5 randomly selected computers bought over a period of more than a year is just not a reasonable result is the failure rate is only 1.5 %.

At this point I have to say I like the Wisdom's features but I no longer trust it, in part due to the lack of response from Sherwood to my last inquiry and I am no longer recommending it.

 

[nikyyo]

I have had my Wisdom now for approximately 80 dives. I bought mine at LP and had to replace it once as a result of my own negligence. Leisure pro took it back and ended up giving me a new one...no probs. As far as dive info is concerned it has and continues to work flawlessly. I am concerned, however, about all these cases of breakdown and will be monitoring mine closely. As far as the "turn gas" message is concerned in the original post: the computer will tell you to turn around once you reach 1500 psi (theoretically the middle of your dive). This can be changed by the diver along with other alarm functions. Obviously, the different "safe time" remaining readings at the same depth is a problem. One thing I did notice aboaut this computer is that it took a while to get used to all the functions. At times I also thought that perhaps there might be something wrong but when I became comfortable with it's use realized that it was ok (i.e. zero safe time remaining while having 500 psi left in tank). That is another alarm function that can be manipulated by the diver.