updside down regulator?

[vel525]

Hi all, my friend just finished his openwater and had an incident i'm just trying to figure out why it happened.

him and his buddy were practicing sharing air. as the instructor turned his tank off, he gave the no air sign and his buddy proceeded to hand him her octopus. he took the octopus and purged the reg with his mouth not the purge button and when he took a breath all he got was water. apparently, the buddy handed him the octopus upside down.

i thought it didn't matter if the reg is upside down or rightside up. my thought was that he didn't purge the octopus well enough to clear all the water. can someone explain if using a reg upside will work and why or why not? thanks for your help and sorry if this is a basic question.

 

[Seabear70]

Most commn regs are asymetrical, meaning that they always have on side that is up. Typically, on the bottom side there is a bubble (director?). If you use this type of reg upside down, it will flood everytime.

Some higher end regs, particularly the posideon's are bysemetrical, in that they can be used either way.

 

[alemaozinho]

by a poseidon,lol,there,s no upside down,peace

 

[bluewatertoy]

:dazzler1: Your instructor should have gone through all of this with you before you even got into the pool or water.
Better review your instruction

 

[scubatoys]

Think about the shape and features of a second stage regulator and it should make some sense. The mouthpiece is placed at the top of the reg, the exhaust - near the bottom. That means if water is in it and you hit the purge, or blow into it... the air is filling the regulator and forcing the water out the bottom. If it is upside down in your mouth, as you exhale - the bubbles will simply travel through the water in the reg and escape through the exhaust that is now positioned at the top... and the water will stay there to be swallowed with your next breath.

Really for an easy analogy - it's just like clearing a mask. You hold the mask tight at the top and as you exhale into it, you see the air fill the mask and force the water out the bottom. How good would that work if you exhaled while holding the top open instead?? Not too well!

That is one of the reasons I prefer an octo that does not care about orientation like the Dacor Viper Octopus or one with a swivel like the Aeris Gyro Octopus.

Hope that makes sense!? Kinda' hard to explain without holding it in my hand and showing you what I mean... but hopefully you got it now.

 

[CD_in_Chitown]

Along those lines, your primary will breathe really wet if you invert it as well. Something new divers usually learn the hard way is that when you are head down/fins up trying to peek up under that rip-rap to see the fishies, your primary second stage is inverted in this scenario just like your buddy's was in the air-share drill and the results will be similar. It's not usually a big deluge of water, but until your diving the poseidon or one of these mentioned by Scubatoys its a fact of physics.

 

[JDostal]

That's one nice thing about my Poseidons - they breathe from any angle/orientation

 

[devilfish]

Doesn't anybody teach anymore how to breathe dry from an upside down regulator? It's a basic skill to know.

 

[Rick Inman]

Those cheep, five dollar bright green octo regs breath unsidedown, too (if they breath at all).
Or, with a normal reg, you can just stand on your head.

 

[neil]

Doesn't anybody teach anymore how to breathe dry from an upside down regulator? It's a basic skill to know.

I do. It's not a big deal once the student knows what to expect.

Neil