ScubaPro 109 Poppet - here we go again

[Zung]

+1
Yep, try first, buy later.

My main G250 wouldn't work properly with the current lever, the left one in couv's pick. I tried at least 2-3 different combinations of lever/poppet, but it would deliver air in 2 steps: low/high, as if there were something sticking.

I reverted back to the older (center) lever and everything's fine.

 

[Six2Life]

So far I have installed 4 duro's into 109's that I aquired with top hat poppets in them. None of them have required a lever replacement.

I have seen 2 different types of the top hat poppets come out of my used 109's. They look similar but when I measured them with calipers there are some small dimensional differences. I suspect that one is capable of being used with the lever on the right in couv's photo and the other isn't. I don't have any of those levers otherwise I'd test my theory. I believe the poppet in the OP here I need a 109 seat. may require the middle (or left) lever to work properly. That was why I suspected that if ZKY's lever worked with the poppet he posted a photo of, it would also work with a duro.

Of course my sample size is very small (2 poppets), so I could be all wet on this one.

 

[halocline]

It kind of depends what you mean by "work." I've found you can get the new poppet to "work" with any of the levers, but the performance on some is terrible due to not being able to get the lever height/cracking effort adjusted well. On a few of my 109s (maybe 3 out of 10 or so that I've re-done) I've found that updating the lever significantly improved the performance. I have no idea exactly why it seems to be hit-or-miss. Of course, mostly I'm dealing with the s-wing poppet; I like to convert them to balanced. I just think they're easier to tune and keep in tune.

I also think it's worth having a very close look at the square hole in the air barrel that the lever feet rest in. If there's a small burr or worn area in that hole, it's going to affect the action of the lever. On a couple of regs I've cleaned up the edge of the hole with a very small file; it seems to help. The wear I've seen is in the corner of the hole, and the lever feet basically rock back and forth from that corner. A bit of a nick in that corner and the lever can get hung up.

 

[Six2Life]

Have any variations in the air barrel's square cutout been observed between regs? (other than wear/burrs) Or has it been the exact same size and in the same postion throughout the 109's production?

 

[Six2Life]

As luck would have it the 109 I just picked up from the classified section arrived with the wide foot lever in it. I tried it with the top hat poppet I thought might work and it didn't work at all.

 

[rhwestfall]

To give you a better idea of what we're talking about, here is a picture of an S-wing balanced poppet (top) and an unbalanced Duro poppet (bottom.)

Also, I don't remember anyone bringing up the "dreaded lever" issue. If you have the lever on the far right, you'll have to replace it with with one such as the lever on the left or middle. This is true for either the Duro poppet or S-wing poppet.

Is there any good description of these to identify the differences?

 

[Couv]

Unless you have one of each, it's hard to tell the difference between the lever in the middle and on the right. The newest (left) is easily identified by the shape of the "feet." Notice they are not rectangular. The difference between the middle and right is the width of the feet. I'm at work right now, so I cannot give you any measurements, but here is another picture you may find helpful that shows the angle of the bend in the lever which is directly related to lever height (and probably the reason it causes problems.)

 

[Paladin]

To give you a better idea of what we're talking about, here is a picture of an S-wing balanced poppet (top) and an unbalanced Duro poppet (bottom.)

Also, I don't remember anyone bringing up the "dreaded lever" issue. If you have the lever on the far right, you'll have to replace it with with one such as the lever on the left or middle. This is true for either the Duro poppet or S-wing poppet.

The 109 I just finished overhauling happened to have the middle lever and it works fine with the duro poppet.

 

[Six2Life]

In the course of fiddling around with my levers and poppets I noticed that I have two levers that look like the middle one and at first glance are identical. Upon closer inspection, I noticed that the feet on them are at different angles. With the orifice completely backed off and the same poppet installed in the same 109, one of the levers will sit significantly higher than the other. The one that sat lower is a lever I've had working fine with a duro. The other I couldn't get to tune well at all.

 

[redacted]

In the course of fiddling around with my levers and poppets I noticed that I have two levers that look like the middle one and at first glance are identical. Upon closer inspection, I noticed that the feet on them are at different angles. With the orifice completely backed off and the same poppet installed in the same 109, one of the levers will sit significantly higher than the other. The one that sat lower is a lever I've had working fine with a duro. The other I couldn't get to tune well at all.

The first time I ran into that problem, I took a pair of pliers and changed the angle of the feet. Not advised but I must have gotten lucky.