Regulator Annual Service & Maintenance, Sport’s Biggest Scam???

[halocline]

No, it isn't silly, because the service time is similar. Is your time worth less when you're overhauling a small piece of gear like a regulator than it is when you're doing a small job like an oil change on a big piece of gear like a car?
Now, the decision to service or replace may have something to do with the cost of the whole unit, but it does not bear on whether a technician or mechanic should be paid a fair wage for his/her work. Calling a fair wage a "ripoff" based on the cost of the gear being serviced is BS.
You're always free to buy the special tools and parts and do it yourself - as frequently or as infrequently as you desire. That's what I do... but if I decide to have a shop do the work I expect the worker to get paid.
Rick

Whoa dude, nowhere did I ever say a fair wage is a "ripoff" or did I ever say anything about what service techs should be paid. I don't know who you're arguing with, but it's not me. Try reading my post again...

 

[MikeFerrara]

I work for a lds and to be honest.
would you be ok knowing one of your chindren was in the hospital being kept alive by life support equiptment that had not been serviced regularly.
probably not!!

Probably not but I don't know what kind of backup equipment or procedures exist in the case of medical life support equipment.

But you are willing to make the same gamble every time you get in the water with equiptment that has not been recently serviced.

Is it the same gamble? When I dive my life is never dependant on any single piece of equipment. I've had and seen MANY regulator failures and no one ever died. A good percentage of those failures, BTW, were right after shop servicing. Of course very few failure modes result in the diver not getting air at all. If I dive a single reg on a single tank I have a buddy and I'm likely shallow enough that I can get to the surface with no reg at all. More commonly I have two regs on an h-valve if diving a single tank or two regs on a set of doubles and my buddy has the same. In that case 4 regs would have to fail before I didn't have a working reg and as I pointed out already, most failures don't prevent you from getting air.

So I think the real issue is what is that peace of mind of knowing the equiptment has been well maintained is worth to each individual.
Or what the life of the individual using the equiptment is worth.

I don't think so. While I wouldn't attempt to put a dollar value on a human life, we really have to put a dollar value on a simple service purchase.

Regardless of who does the work, about the only thing that's being risked is the possibility of having to end a dive early if a failure happens in the water of maybe missing a dive if it fails prior to a dive.

 

[pdoege]

I've found that my regs normally go 150 - 200 dives before needing a service. I only buy regs that have parts available on the open market.

I never had much luck with the various LDS when it came to my regs. I started servicing the regs myself after I had to cancel dives after getting new serviced regs back.

Peter

 

[Meng_Tze]

A...

That gives me a ten year return. ..

This is where I draw the line for myself. I dont look at this as an investment or look for ROI. Having a correctly working set of regs 2 miles in a cave has no ROI... it just has to work.

So let me baseline this.

Each has made a decision to take up diving. This means amongst many other things, equipment, and specifically focussed here are regulators.

These regulators need servicing as we all know and there are guidelines from the manufacturers for this (schedule, what to replace and clean, etc, etc). These guidelines 'protect' the diver and the manufacturer from all outcomes of a failing reg under water.

Now, you have a decision to either follow that guideline, or not.

If you do, then most likely all your dives will be pretty uneventful in terms of failures (barring the odd left corner incident) and the reg should perform as the manufacturer intended. This is where they normally also advise where (who) this service should be done.

If you dont, the manufacturer can no longer warrant/guarantee that the reg will function within the specs it has set.

But this does not mean you are doomed, it just means they can not warrant proper functioning. You can decide to:

DIY: as long as you do it at a minimum according to manufacturer standards, effectively you are complying with their guidelines, just not within their warranty. But the reg should still function as they intended.

The thing is:
do you trust someone else to do the service for you? If yes, then go LDS and pay for the service. If no, DIY and buy the tools and kits.

Bottom line is:

This activity called diving is not without costs for maintenance, the question is where do you spend it........

 

[PhilEllis]

Regulator service interval is a widely discussed subject here in our shop. I will limit my discussion ONLY to the technical aspects of establishing a service interval. The economic aspects of the subject must be addressed by EACH owner.

A scuba regulator is a degrading piece of equipment. By this, I mean that each use of the regulator places a small, almost immeasurable amount of wear on the moving parts. A well cleaned and well maintained regulator can last for YEARS and YEARS between service intervals....some poorly cleaned and poorly maintained regulators should be serviced every three months. EVERY customer thinks they are one of those that take extra precautions and are particularily careful with their equipment. Of course, this is not the case.

When we open a regulator for service, we are often shocked at what we find. Regulators with only a few dives over the past year are often LOADED with plant growth, salt crystals, excessive o-ring and seat wear.....a number of things that validate the service interval. Many other regulators look almost brand new. They could easily go another year, or two, or three. The thing is...we don't know which customer is which. We (nor the manufacturers) have any ability to know how well you will do the user maintenance to your regulator; thus the one year recommendation.

Another issue that the manufacturer considers is maintaining your brand loyality. This is an issue on ANY type of product....they want you to buy their brand when you make a second purchase. With the one-year service interval, they are fairly well assured that any problems will be caught and corrected before you notice any performance drop. This improves your view of the brand and improves the chances that you will choose the brand on future purchases.

Of course, there is also the legal liability....a foolish issue, but I guess that depends on which side of the bar you sit. If they recommend a much longer service interval and are then sued as a result of an accident, a good trial lawyer can make the manufacturer look pretty foolish, and therefore pretty guilty. They obviously don't want this.

The bottom line is simple.......it's YOUR regulator - you choose the service interval. The manufacturer prefers one year and to induce you to agree, they offer free parts. But you are still free to choose any service interval you choose. I also agree with Mike...you should also be free to service your own regulator if you choose and parts should be available to you if you make that choice.

A couple of side notes: I see tons of complaints about regulators failing (mostly free flowing) immediately after service. This is due primariy to failure to properly cycle the regulator after service to remove the new material set from the seat/HP valve interface. In our store, we hardly EVER have anyone come in for additional adjustments after service. I would guess far less than 1 regulator in 100. The other issue is the cost. We charge $60 labor for in-house service for the three stages. A good regulator technician will spend about 1 hour on a regulator for disassembly, cleaning, reassembly, and testing. Of course, a poorly trained technician can do it all in about 20 minutes. We are hardly making a TON of money on service as many on this board often boast. When we add all of the costs, it is far less profit than it should be. I would guess that our shop makes a net profit of about $16 on that service.

Another issue: As many of you know, I have a TON of issues with how this industry works. But to be honest, I can't think of one "rule" designed to "line the store owners pocket" with money. Not regulator service interval, not cylinder visual inspection. No, I can't think of ONE thing that exists for that sole purpose in all of the scuba industry. Anyway, just my opinion.

Phil Ellis

 

[Rick Murchison]

A well cleaned and well maintained regulator can last for YEARS and YEARS between service intervals....

True story. My first regulator was (and is... I still use it) a Conshelf XI, bought used in 1971. First service on it was when the exhaust valve needed replacement in 1995. I intended to just replace the exhaust valve but was talked into an overhaul. Since then I've overhauled it a couple of times; works like a charm.
Rick

 

[mrjimboalaska]

A big factor is also whether you use your regs every day or week, or whether you pull them out of the closet 2 times a year.........
Non use is the best reason to service your regs...........

 

[jbichsel]

Here's my take on it. FYI, I have 3 regs, two A-L Legend LX and one Titan Micra ADJ.

IF, and that's a huge IF, regulators were all properly cared for by EVERY diver between maintenance cycles, I have no doubt that the manufacturers could advise a 2-5 year schedule.

But the reality is that there are people out there that dive in salt water, allow salt water in the first stage orifice, then cap it up and store it away for a year until their next trip.

Trust me, I've spent 8-10 hours each cleaning the growth out of several first stages that this is exactly what happened. The worst one had so much green gunk built up that there was only about a 1/16 inch diameter opening left.

Now suppose that this scenario or one close to it presents itself to some unsuspecting diver renting or borrowing gear.

Beyond that, I like to know that my o-rings are in top shape, not flattened or nicked. I want to know that everything is lubed properly. It reassures me to know that all adjustments are in order and that I have a 99.99999% chance that nothing will go wrong with my reg.

Personally, regulators are rather important to me and mine.

Taking the service of dive equipment to task, what about tanks?

We spend $5-$15 per year for visual inspections, which equals 5-15% of purchase price, approximately.

We spend $20-$30 every 5 years for hydro, assuming aluminum tanks.

We spend $5-$10 every air fill, assuming your not talking nitrox or trimix.

I don't hear anyone complaining about tank service costs.

Do I enjoy spending money on reg service? No, but I do liken it to Rick's analogy of vehicle service. True, the percentages are not equal, but the impotance is. Skip enough $25-$35 (non diesel) oil changes and see what happens to the engine. Then if you have a warranty, guess what the first request will be? They want to see your maintenance records, specifically oil change frequency - did you follow the manufacturers specifications.

Been through it on a Ford Expedition we bought used. We had our records and a total rebuild of the engine cost us $178 versus $4,800.

I'll play the game if for no other reason than peace of mind.

 

[Mo2vation]

So what are your thoughts?

Are we all being fed a line of Bull**** from the Scuba industry to cover their backsides or to generate LDS revenues?

I do not have a strong opinion on this, yet. But, I have to admit it seems that annual service in most cases is over kill.

Good Diving,

Dave

I believe the "anybody can dive" crap bring foisted on us is sports biggest scam.

However, as to reg maintenance: If you're writhing about in the cold sandy surf like we are 2 - 5 times a week like we are, annual maintenance isn't nearly enough. I take mine in twice a year. And everytime, my guy is all "looking better, Ken" - as my post dive care is improving.

I've seen the guts of my stuff... its not pretty. I used to take in such sandy corroded gear to the guy. I'm better about keeping it cleaner now.

Rick was right on - regular maintenance is key, and its comparatively cheap. I have the best reg guy in the world, and dude is worth every penny.

Maintenance doesn't mean a complete re-building. But they do get gunky.

I guess I don't get why the original poster has a zillion regs he's diving with. By my calculations, if he's got that many regs that need to be serviced after that many dives, that leaves about 4.6 minutes left in his average day (accouting for maybe 5 hours sleep a night) after all that diving on all those regs. MAN! On top of being dive monster, gear monger and reg service avoider, he must also be speed typer....

---
Ken

 

[Maule]

This a joke post? You really whining about paying $50.00ish dollars for servicing a piece of LIFE SUPPORT EQUIPMENT? Geez, I bet you were typing this from a Starbucks where you just spent $10.00 for a cup of coffee too.

I would really like to get the opinion of those who really know, (IE work on regulators professionally, have experience beyond what they have been told, etc) if the annual maintenance of regulators is just a gimmick?

I own seven sets of regulators for my family. Even if the parts are covered under warranty the service costs of a regulator can far exceed the original purchase price in a few years. I guess as I have traveled the world diving I have found that the dive shops outside of the US rarely do annual maintenance, if ever. They generally run the reg. as is until it shows a problem that needs attention. Some of the regs I have seen are 5 years old being dove almost every day of the week with no problems.

It appears to me from a cost perspective you would be better off buying a new set of regs every four to five years rather than spending the money on annual service.

I have spoken to a few divers that have been around since the 1950’s that have expressed that since the early ‘80s the parts used in regs are so much better than the early years they don’t believe they need to be serviced all that often.

So anyway, I just had one reg. serviced that had 340 dives on it since new three years ago. I had four additional regulators checked but not serviced. They all checked out fine. They are from 2-3 years old with 50 to 100 dives per reg. on average.

So what are your thoughts?

Are we all being fed a line of Bull**** from the Scuba industry to cover their backsides or to generate LDS revenues?