Rinse or soak?

[wgmontgomery]

I've owned SP regs my entire diving life...4 or 5 in total. I've owned Mk15, 20 & (currently) 25s w/ 250/600s. My afterdive care regime was soak everything after diving.
There seems to be quite a bit of...controversy on this site regarding the rinse vs soak. My LDS says to soak, but many here have (rightly) pointed-out that the 1st stage has a DUST cap...not a WATERPROOF cap.
So, I thought that I'd go to the source (so to speak) & ask Scubapro directly: is it OK to SOAK (& yes I know not to push the purge button) the reg after diving or should the reg only be RINSED?
FWIW my current regs are MK25 (DIN) & either G250 or S600.
Thanks!

 

[Brad Roy]

Soaking will get the regs cleaner than rinsing. Your first choice is to soak them while attached to a cylinder and pressurized. This will make sure no moisture gets inside. If you don't have a cylinder available, a securely fastened dust cap will keep water out.

 

[DiveMaven]

I've always soaked my regs and never had a problem until recently. Our new Atomic regs have a 3 year service interval and when I recently had them serviced, there was considerable damage from soaking. The tech said to always simply rinse them, never soak....the dust cap keeps dust out, not water. So IMO unless you can soak them pressurized, you're better off rinsing.

 

[tbone1004]

so the best thing is to rinse and or soak before they dry off and the salt crystallizes. I know this is difficult, but the earlier the better. The next is running water is better than standing water. Best thing to do in my opinion is get a tank so you can pressurize them and then soak, but move them around a bit every 5-10 minutes. An AL30 or 40 are very useful tanks to have anyway and they can easily fit in a bathtub, though most tanks will fit in a bathtub with no issues, so that would be my preference.

 

[johnnywulff]

I agree with the soak pressurized method, if you can't have a small tank that goes into the bathtub, at least at the operator put the 2nd stage into the bathtub pressurized from your dive tank and rinse the 1st stage at the same time.

 

[wgmontgomery]

I don't have a small cylinder that'll fit in the tub. I use a soft cooler as a reg bag & usually put 2 gallons of water in the trunk. When I get back to the car I pour 1 gallon in the reg bag/cooler & the other in my BCD. When I get home I rinse/soak in the tub.

 

[Diving Dubai]

So I'm lucky in 2 respects. ! I have Aqualung regs which seal when disconnected so the dust cap is only there to protect the O ring. The second is that for most of the year our cold water is warm (or hot)

For rinsing I use 2 x 60 Gallon Rubbermaid bins. Exposure protection & fins go in 1 and the rest of our kit (both my wife and I dive) go in the other.

For the regs I submerge then as much as I can, My wife has Din caps on her SP regs to seal them And leave them over night. The warm water dissolves the salt. The next day I'll manipulate purge button and the reg control out of the water, agitate them with fresh water and hang them to dry. They get used weekly, serviced yearly and none of the 1st stages have had water damage.

Although not the topic, I'll submerge our wings, and add some water to flush the insides. Every month I disconnect the kidney dump and fill them with water leaving them to soak inside and out, hanging to dry afterwards.

Everything is completely dry within 12 hrs, wet suits included so gets packed back into the net backs for the next week, it's almost a production line

 

[wgmontgomery]

Has anyone used SaltX on their gear? I used it on my old SP Mk20/G250s & DUI BCD ~15 years ago. I'd rinse w/ fw, soak in H2O & SaltX then rinse again. Mike, the owner of my old LDS (Matthews Water Sports) in NC, commented on how good everything looked when he serviced it.
I can't find it locally; I also figure that the rinse-soak-rinse routine had more to do with the gear's great shape than the SaltX. Still, I may order it again.

 

[CptTightPants21]

I've always soaked my regs and never had a problem until recently. Our new Atomic regs have a 3 year service interval and when I recently had them serviced, there was considerable damage from soaking. The tech said to always simply rinse them, never soak....the dust cap keeps dust out, not water. So IMO unless you can soak them pressurized, you're better off rinsing.

Soaking is always better, but Atomics can only be soaked while pressurized because of their seat saving orifice.


Surprised the reg tech didn't mention it.

Also, dust caps have an O ring. They keep water out just fine.