This came by the shop today

[FireInMyBones]

If I could buy the collection, I would save 1 set and dive the other.

No kidding. Even never diving vintage, I would, if I had something like that.

 

[james croft]

They are nice regs but the price of a lot off the vintage stuff has fallen. I currently dive a Voit 50 fathom that I bought in 1967 as a second hand reg. I got the same reg, a blue and white 72 steel tank and a fiberglass Snugpack for the princely sum of ten bucks with a depth guage thrown in.

What makes this particular set nice is the combination of regs, snugpack and tanks all with boxes. I can tell you the regs will need fixing. Being stored in the boxes for almost 50 years has put a crimp in the hose and I can tell by the color of the originally gray hoses that they are shot.
A nice silicon diaghram, mushroom valves and duckbill valve will make it a sweet breather.

Fortunately there are nice silicone grey hoses and other silicone replacement parts for this reg. With an overhaul and new rubber they will be better than new. Lloyd Bridges used a 50 Fathom during his second season of Sea Hunt. I also vote for restoring and diving the regs and tank. That is why they were made.

I would buy them if I could but since the one I bought is still going strong I will stick with that one. I would offer them at Vintage Scuba - Vintage Scuba Gear at Vintage Double Hose

 

[duckbill]

If they are really new in the box, there's not a reason in the world to dive them. I agree; I hope whoever gets them does appreciate them for what they are (if they are)- NEW in the box- and keep them that way. There are enough used regs out there to dive.
JMstupidO,
FWIW,
and all that stuff...

 

[Eric Sedletzky]

Maybe you could take just one more really good close up photo so I could make it into my screen saver? that would be swell. Then I could drool everyday all over my keyboard.

That is THE holy grail of DH collectible reg sets.
OMG! two original unused brand new voits still packed in the original boxes, jeezus! LOL!!

 

[elmer fudd]

I feel like an idiot now. I never even noticed that there were two regulators there. I looked at the pictures and somehow assumed that the pictures with two regs were two pictures of the same reg doubled up in the same image. I guess my powers of observation get pretty darn weak late at night.

 

[John C. Ratliff]

I will continue to vote for not diving them. I have the innerds of a Voit 50 Fathom, and have it in a Mistral box, as I did not have the original boxes. This is the only downstream single stage regulator ever made (to my knowledge). When it was manufactured, Voit placed the small hole toward the intake. I found out that if the large hole is placed directly down the intake hose, this is a fabulous breathing regulator. But to do any modifications to these two regulators, especially in the box the way they are, would be to ruin them as examples of the manufacturer's product. I would be afraid of even scratching the 50 year-old painted boxes. So I hope someone who really appreciates them, and can display them for posterity, will buy them.

SeaRat

 

[John C. Ratliff]

Well, I somehow double-posted, so I will continue. This design was made by Emile Gagnan, who produced the first regulator in collaboration with Jacques Cousteau. It actually had a reserve mechanism in the patent drawings. It is patent #3,028,860, filed February 27, 1957 and granted in the USA on April 10, 1962 by E. Gagnan Et Al. The downstream mechanism was designed so that there was a reserve mechanism behind the seat. The reserve mechanism was a ball valve which had a spring behind it to have a reserve.

...This member 50 is also provided with a stepped axial bore 60, the front enlarged portion 62 and this bore 69 accommodating a ball valve 66 resiliently biased by a spring 68.

With this arrangement, air under pressure proceeds through the passage 34, the passage 41, the boring 54 and by overcoming the resistance of the spring 68, through the bore portion 62 and the valve orifice 44 and from an outlet 69 into the inhalation chamber 10 under the control of the diaphragm 14, as is well known...

It's too bad that AMF Voit did not produce the entire design, only the downstream demand part. Take a look at the tremendous lever advantage with these two levers. That was somewhat modified for the AMF Voit Fifty Fathom which is shown in a page from Fred Roberts' book Basic Scuba, D. Van Nostrand Company, Inc., Prinston, New Jersey, 1967, page 216.

SeaRat

 

[Gilldiver]

I go with the dive one set, store the other. The set to be dove would get a full rubber re-build.

For those who don't know these regs, they are single stage meaning tank pressure is dropped to breathing in one step, there is no IP. Here is what the three single stage bodies look like:

The top is the VOIT down stream body that is most likely in these two regs, it was only used for 2 or 3 years and there are two types, the difference being an internal bushing to support the seat. You can only tell what you have by disassembly.

The one on the left is the VOIT upstream body and uses the same seat and levers as the USD Mistral body. Its a very good single stage and parts are available.

The one on the right is the USD body that was used in the Streamair and Mistral. The levers shown are the ones used with both the Voit and USD upstream bodies.

 

[scubafanatic]

They are nice regs but the price of a lot off the vintage stuff has fallen. I currently dive a Voit 50 fathom that I bought in 1967 as a second hand reg. I got the same reg, a blue and white 72 steel tank and a fiberglass Snugpack for the princely sum of ten bucks with a depth guage thrown in.

What makes this particular set nice is the combination of regs, snugpack and tanks all with boxes. I can tell you the regs will need fixing. Being stored in the boxes for almost 50 years has put a crimp in the hose and I can tell by the color of the originally gray hoses that they are shot.
A nice silicon diaghram, mushroom valves and duckbill valve will make it a sweet breather.

Fortunately there are nice silicone grey hoses and other silicone replacement parts for this reg. With an overhaul and new rubber they will be better than new. Lloyd Bridges used a 50 Fathom during his second season of Sea Hunt. I also vote for restoring and diving the regs and tank. That is why they were made.

I would buy them if I could but since the one I bought is still going strong I will stick with that one. I would offer them at Vintage Scuba - Vintage Scuba Gear at Vintage Double Hose

agree about vintage prices haven fallen, a few years ago, during the real-estate/credit bubble-boom, prices were higher, but those days are over, economic reality has set in, and pricing 'reality' has set in too. You might get lucky and attract a high end bidder who hasn't been taken out by the sucky economy, but there will be less of a bidding war than might have happened a few years ago. The earlier estimate of everything going for $ 2K (U.S.) is probably the top end of the scale, $ 1200 - $ 1500 max is probably more realistic for the 'package'. Put it up on E-Bay and the 'market' will quickly give you the 'realistic' price.....also, contact Dan @ Vintage Scuba Supply (in Oregon) and he can likely provide you realistic prices for your reference.

 

[halocline]

I'm going to go out on a limb and say that these regs, and especially the tanks, should be dove. You just want to be very careful, maybe only in clean fresh water, and only on special occasions. I like the idea of replacing the hoses/mouthpiece first, of course saving the originals.

They take Stradivarius violins out to get played, they drive ultra-mint antique cars, etc...


Edit; thinking about the tanks, it would be a shame to put a new hydro stamp on them, so you could do your own vis and fill with your own compressor. Best of all would be a friendly hydro tester that would test them but agree not to stamp.