Talk to me about the Conshelf XIV Supreme
- Thread starter TheShark1
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I think your tech has no idea how regulators work. I have never noticed them being heavy.
R
redacted
Guest
So, what has changed besides cosmetics, bells, and whistles?
Perhaps your tech can help you find such coprehensive performance data on the "new" regulators you are interested in.
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halocline
Contributor
You're right, none of us know anything. So why do you keep coming back with these absurd comments? Your service tech obviously knows everything, after all he did study for a whole weekend with the manufacturers whose job it is to sell new regulators.
So, here's the advice you've been waiting for and maybe it will succeed in letting you move on:
Go talk to your service tech, and ask him what the newest, most expensive, latest and greatest regulator in the world is. Buy two of them RIGHT NOW so you can fearlessly proceed into the life of a professional scuba instructor doing 2000 dives/year.
2airishuman
Contributor
Actually, very little progress in regulator design has occurred since about 1980. The main change has been from metal housings for the 2nd stage to plastic ones. The plastic ones are cheaper. Whether they are better or not is debatable. They are lighter, which is a benefit, but they are more susceptible to impact damage and more prone to freeflows in very cold water. There have also been design changes that have reduced the manufacturing cost, and production changes that utilize a greater amount of automation. None of this has improved the quality of the end product. There have been slight improvements in the quality of the elastomers used in the consumable parts.
There have been better and worse regs over the years. The differences have to do with ease of service, performance in very cold water, hose routing, DIN vs yoke connection, number and sizes of ports, etc. There have been various approaches to balancing, usually in the 1st stage, some in the 2nd stage. There have been some piston regs along with the now-standard diaphragm regs. In reality even the cheap regs breath just fine. I have a couple of Calypso IVs that I rebuilt that work just as well as anything else despite the fact that they are widely regarded as obsolete.
Progress? No, just the fashion of the hour.
Dude. That study you just linked. It measured regulator performance and suitability. And it stated that there had been significant progress made by mainstream manufacturers in regulator production, in terms of performance and reliability, between 1981 and 1987. Why are you choosing to ignore that aspect of the conclusion? And on what basis are you assuming that regulation performance ceased, then, in 1987?
And the SP A700 is an all-metal 2nd stage.
2airishuman
Contributor
You talking the first stage or the second stage? If you like plastic second stages, you can set yourself up with the plastic version of the Conshelf second stage. It's lighter, easier to adjust, and uses the same parts as the metal one.
I don't notice much difference in the weight of the 1st stages. The Conshelf DIN 1st stage has some gratuitous metal on it but it also has a heavy knurled knob on the DIN connection that I really like.
I'm talking about both. SP MK17/A700. Chrome-plated Marine Brass 1st stage. All metal 2nd stage. Just like the conshelf.
The conshelf first stage seems like picking up a block of cement by comparison. And the 2nd stage is also significantly heavier by comparison--it's much bigger, for one. And that exhaust tee is enormous.
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