Which regulator to buy?

[buddhasummer]

Apeks is the only brand I have dived that in almost 10 years of diving them never gave me any trouble at all. I have dived, HOG, Aqualung, Scubapro and Atomic. There are still the occasional moments I regret moving away from Apeks.

 

[wetb4igetinthewater]

Apeks is the only brand I have dived that in almost 10 years of diving them never gave me any trouble at all. I have dived, HOG, Aqualung, Scubapro and Atomic. There are still the occasional moments I regret moving away from Apeks.

I think the quality of service is an issue. Shortly after having my Apeks XTX50's serviced, one of them failed by leaking (I don't remember exactly how).

This is one reason why I'm switching over to Deep 6. I'm really happy with the regs I set up for sidemount. I'm looking forward to taking the servicing class across the street from DEMA in a couple weeks.

 

[buddhasummer]

I think the quality of service is an issue. Shortly after having my Apeks XTX50's serviced, one of them failed by leaking (I don't remember exactly how).

This is one reason why I'm switching over to Deep 6. I'm really happy with the regs I set up for sidemount. I'm looking forward to taking the servicing class across the street from DEMA in a couple weeks.

Could be, I always serviced my Apeks myself.

 

[ams511]

Subgear was the lower end Scubapro product line - someone once posted some of their models were identical to older Scubapro's so parts were readily available - at least in the US. IIRC the entire product line was integrated into Scubapro's a few years ago - at least in the US. I could be wrong but I thought Subgear was originally a German company.

Subgear was a German company that went out of business and Scubapro (or Johnson Outdoors) purchased the name. Scubapro intended to use Subgear as their "value" brand. Much in the same way Oceanic used Aeris and Sherwood uses Genesis. The regulators had cosmetic differences but were the same as current model Scubapros. The SG500 was a S550 (now S360) with a MK-11 first stage. The SG1000 was an S600 with a MK-17 first stage. There was also a model that paired a MK-2 and a R390. Scubapro latter refreshed the line using the C200 and 300 second stages instead of the S550 and 600. I would not classify these regulators as lower end, they function the same as their Scubapro brothers. The Subgear line only lasted a few years, my take is Scubapro decided to increase their product line offering a wider price range so the Subgear line became redundant. Any Scubapro dealer should be able to get parts and work on them.

 

[ams511]

Thank you.
Does Subgear cause the same problems with spare parts as Oceanic?
Is the second stage of the SG 500 as good as the GT3? I could not find out details about it.

Don't listen to some of the other posters. Subgear is the same as Scubapro except for the covers and some other trim items. You can get parts as long as Scubapro is in business.