What NOT to do... ruining your equipment

[ItsBruce]

I know of a guy who used loctite as a "cleaning agent and lubricant" for a gun.

For a gun: Loctite - bad; Break Free - good; Loctite - bad; Break Free - good. ...

 

[Mandy3206]

A lesson my husband and I learned was to drive very slow and carefully when getting supplies for the pool. The dive gear is always in the truck and they don't mix well with almost-pure-chlorine spills. Not EVERYTHING was lost, but most the surviving items were considerably weaken.

If you dive every other day, I can understand this, but if not gear should be stored in a cool dry place after being cleaned and dried thoroughly.

Gear in the truck atracks thieves and suffer from excesive heat and/or UV rays, if damp,.............................

:no :no :no :no

 

[almitywife]

about 10 years ago i worked for a guy that was also a diver

he came home from a night dive and put all his gear in a wash tub to soak overnight and didnt put the cap on his yoke regs.

result, one worthless set of regs

 

[muddiver]

I advise not dragging your second stage across an asphalt parking lot while winding your Hooka hose up after a dive.

 

[muddiver]

well, we spray painted my daughter's styrofoam science project once, does that count? It disapeared before our eyes the morning it was due.

That use to be SOP in construction to make voids in concrete without having to strip out wood forms. Make a foam block-out the shape you want and after the concrete is placed and cured pour gasoline or any other solvent over it to melt out the syrofoam. Walla! instant hole.

 

[RTRski]

about 10 years ago i worked for a guy that was also a diver

he came home from a night dive and put all his gear in a wash tub to soak overnight and didnt put the cap on his yoke regs.

result, one worthless set of regs

Even with caps I didn't think it was safe to submerge your first stages for a prolonged soak! Those caps are nice at keeping obvious water/dirt/etc/ out, but hardly hermetic!

My dumbest: after a local lake dive I soaked mine and my wife's wetsuits, boots, BCs, gloves, beanies, etc. in a (clean - used only for this) Rubbermaid trashcan full of freshwater with some of that McNett's anti-stink Mirazyme stuff overnight, then carefully squeezed, seperated, untangled, and neatly hung everything on appropriate hangers and such on a commercial-weight rolling clothes rack we have the garage that my wife somehow got from her years in retail before we were married. Then I closed the garage door after getting out the mower and cut the grass and blew it all off the driveway and walk with a blower attachment on the weedwacker. Was running late so finished in the back and just left the mower out there.

Unfortunately,the garage door didn't close straight, so there was about 1 1/2 inch gap at the bottom when I was blowing all the clippings around. You can guess where this is going

When I re-opened the door the next day expecting to find clean, dry, fresh scented gear, (that Mirazyme stuff really is pretty dandy) instead it was liberally frosted with yellowing, dried, and fermenting (ah, that fresh-cut lawn smell!) grass clippings that had all dried on in the hot 110 degree F or so summer garage temperature.

Took forever to 'scrub' it off before it went back into the soak for another night. I swear that grass had fingers and was holding on for all it was worth...