Workbench Update!

[Caveeagle]

Inline adjustment tools are amazing. I haven't been able to/had to use one for many years diving Poseidons, and the one from VDH is great, especially for the price.

Too bad they are currently OOS on those. First on I have seen without a gauge on it.

 

[tbone1004]

no longer July, but here's a workbench update.

Being in Greenville, I am unfortunately not close to any dive shops that can really handle technical divers which led me to purchase an Invacare Homefill to generate and compress oxygen to 2200psi, as well as purchase a compressor and storage bottles to be able to bank EAN32 and fill O2 at home. Compressor is annoyingly gas, and since I'm in an apartment complex, I don't have 220v in the garage so it was going to be delicate to run the compressor long enough to fill the banks. On a whim I went over to the local fire department next to where I work and asked if I could bribe them with food to use their scba compressor. Fire Chief told me not to bother and just use it whenever I wanted but I figured I'd bring up a couple of pork butts just in case since I had over a dozen bottles to fill after coming back from hydro.
They manage 3 stations, two of which have compressors, but the main station that is manned has a brand new Bauer Unicus that has the integrated containment station. Great safety feature, but with very short whips and an autoshutoff for the door it wasn't going to work. Had to drive 10 miles to the other station for the last two sets of fills where they have an older compressor with a normal whip block coming off of the wall. I have since figured out how to bypass the door shutoff *which is just flipping back the latch to make it think the door is closed* and that drives us to where we are right now.

The main whip is CGA540 to yoke for oxygen filling, including needle valve for precise measuring *will be putting on a T for a gauge in a minute because I forgot I had one waiting for it and thought I had to order it*.
That allows me to transfill out of a commercial bottle, but more important is the adapter laying next to it. That adapter is a custom QD with one way valve to CGA540 that allows me to fill from my Invacare Homefill system where I can generate O2 up to 2200psi. I originally had that adapter on the whip itself, but the SCBA access changed plans.

The black hand knob on the top left is an O2 to inert gas adapter to be able to transfill argon or helium directly out of their bottles using the oxygen whip or if I needed to for whatever reason my oxygen regulators. Nifty little adapter to keep around to minimize the number of whips.

On the far right is a CGA346 adapter to go from their fill station and is now a DIN adapter. Due to the short leads on their compressor, I'll be swapping the DIN over to CGA540 so I can use the O2 whip to fill out of their compressor.

Next phase is to build a 4:1 whip with inline shutoffs on two of the leads to be able to fill my sidemount bottles simultaneously as well as fill a stage bottle or two, or another pair of tanks off of a single fill whip. Need to swing down to my local hydraulics guy to get the 4 HP hoses and another CGA540-NPT adapter that I need and will go from there. Technically you could fill 4 sets of doubles off of one whip as well, but that'd destroy any high pressure in your banks.

 

[tbone1004]

couple tweaks to the Katana to get the dual UWLD's mounted to it for my cave trip in a couple weeks.

Added some bungee triglide retainers from VDH to hold my jetstreams as I don't like putting loops under the d-rings.
Put a custom double d-ring on one of the canisters to hold reels and what not since the butt plate is completely covered by the canisters. Used some velcro hose wraps to keep the two cables together through the rig itself.
There are a couple of tabs that are sewn in on the body side of the wing that are unfortunately not large enough for the UWLD heads to go through. If they had been elastic it would have allowed the hoses to be retained which would have been nice but oh well.

Big thanks to @cool_hardware52 @OWIC647 @Bobby and the crowd at Cave Adventurers

 

[tbone1004]

well, I get everything working, or at least think it's working, and then something inevitably breaks. Below you can see the homefill compressor with the cover removed. Strange QD adapter monstrosity on the right side going into the fill whip above.
I get the fill whip done last weekend, all excited about it because it's sexy, and then go to fill an O2 bottle to make sure it's pressure tested etc etc. Come back the next day *this thing fills at 2lpm max...* and it's only up to about 1200psi. Serious WTF moment. There is a check valve in the QD assembly so I figure the whip must be leaking. Put a new bottle on it and come back next day. Same thing. Start diagnosing and the pressure switch is bad.
No big deal, but I figure while I'm in there, I should probably check and make sure the compressor is working properly. Put an automotive fuse to short the wires normally attached to the pressure switch *you can see the fuse in the pic actually* and fire her up. Leave the cylinder valve off so it works at a somewhat reasonable pace and since i ultimately want this to pump to something like 2600-2800psi instead of 2200psi. The ratios aren't published so I figure I'll take a gamble and see if it will go up. The burst disc says 3300# on it so I figure I should be OK.
Get to 2500, 2600, BOOM!

Friday afternoon I get the switch ID'd which is interestingly enough a local Greenville company so that should be easy enough to get a hold of, but the burst disc is a bit of an enigma. I want a burst disc on there because this runs without me babysitting it, but I can't get an ID on it after cursory research. Will try to call a couple of the glass blowing companies that use these things to see if they have some sort of part number or manufacturer and we'll see what happens. Unit is a bit old so it's not surprising that it went prematurely, just frustrating since I can't fill any O2 until I get the burst disc sorted out.

 

[tbone1004]

some custom bottle ID and canister light ID vinyl stickers for when you love diving with your buddies wife and tolerate her husband @victorzamora
More coming, just have to find the other white vinyl roll. Pretty slick, it's similar to what is used in the industry, but this stuff is rated for 10 years in an outdoor environment for labeling pipes so it should work out pretty well.Only downside is the ribbon is only 2.25". I can get it in 2.25" or 4" but didn't have any 4" on hand. The 2.25" is about $2.50/linear foot, and at 4" is about $3.50. The big stickers are about a foot long so not cheap, but about th esame price as the commercial stickers from DGX which are about $3 each, but these are completely custom which makes me happy as it removes the need for the mailbox stickers that I never liked

 

[2airishuman]

On the far right is a CGA346 adapter to go from their fill station and is now a DIN adapter. Due to the short leads on their compressor, I'll be swapping the DIN over to CGA540 so I can use the O2 whip to fill out of their compressor.

Things must be different there. I didn't think there were many firehouses that pumped OCA.

 

[tbone1004]

Things must be different there. I didn't think there were many firehouses that pumped OCA.

brand new compressor, has good filters in it. Know the guy that services it and have seen the record, was quite surprised

 

[tbone1004]

well, have been thrown a bit of a monkey wrench so this may change some of the updates going forward. While I was volunteering with NCSU, my dive trailer was stolen. Lost a couple can lights, computer, almost 2 dozen tanks, the trailer itself, etc etc. Next few months will be spec'ing out a new trailer and replacing the gear that was lost.
In the interim though, there have been a couple updates

Digital gauge upgrade to my fill whip. Nothing exciting about it, but the analog failed, so figured I'd at least get an accurate pressure gauge. Left the gauge on the tank side because it was there and didn't feel like putting an NPT plug in there.

4:1 whip spider that I've been wanting to make for a while. Initial plan was to do a 2:1 for sidemount bottles, but I'm regularly getting fills with a buddy, or also filling my stage bottles. These are the super slick DIN ends from Northeast Scuba Supply that have a standard SPG plug on them so they will eventually get DGX button gauges put on them, especially for the two with the shutoffs on there so I can have those shut off early if filling steels and aluminums. This is going to be particularly nice for diving with NCSU or getting fills from my fire station since I have a 100ft whip coming so tanks can stay in the car and we can fill remotely. Will be swapping the CGA inlet for the DIN inlet when the new one comes in as well

 

[Couv]

Lost a couple can lights, computer, almost 2 dozen tanks, the trailer itself, etc etc.

Very sorry to hear that. I hope the authorities catch the SOB who stole your stuff.

 

[sea_ledford]

I need to make one of those fill spiders for my O2 side. No booster, so I have to trans fill out of three 3 storage bottles... that's a lot of bleeding and moving hoses.

Fill 4 40's at a time? Sign me up!

-Chris