Yearly maintenance

[scubafanatic]

First, are you evelwormil's surrogate or did you hijack his thread with annoying posts on your own initiative? The six regulators I utilize (Scuba Pro, Apex) are the top of the line models sans titanium offerings. Just for the record, I send in my regulators for servicing every two years with the exception of my loaner rig which goes in for servicing every year. I have been called many names but 'free-loader' is not one of them. I am frequently the diver who is reaching into my well stocked tool kit on dives for other divers without complaint. I have been diving since 1983 and have not witnessed divers being a burden regarding their regulators with the exception of O-rings which are extremely inexpensive. If a diver has a significant regulator issue he/she simply does not dive that day. How is that being a burden? Ironically, if a diver is having major regulator issues on dive day it probally just got back from servicing. This is a discussion board. Preach somewhere else...

....so my posts are 'preaching'...but your posts aren't ??? If you pay attention I already stated I'm not defending the magical 12-month interval annual...I've said a 'reasonable' service interval...additionally, the OP think's it's OK to go 10 years without servicing......and if a cheap-skate diver has a reg crap out underwater....and messes up the dive for the rest of the group...or gets himself/herself hurt/bent causing my spendy/week-long liveaboard to abort my trip and cancel the vacations of a couple dozen other divers.....many of which scrimped/saved that trip money and allocated precious, valuable vacation time......to a reasonable person that constitutes a "burden" !

 

[Thalassamania]

Actually, if someone died from a reg failure, I'm absolutely sure it would make big news here and elsewhere. Do you have any examples of any person who has died as a direct result of not servicing his/her regulator?

How about safe diving practices like the buddy system, use of alternate air sources, training to deal with emergencies, etc? You think any of that might play into diver safety? Of course it's a little harder to use to sell gear....

Thinking back on my days at the National Underwater Accident Data Center I can remember only one regulator maintenance based fatality. It involved a ScubaPro Pilot that had, improperly, been sprayed with silicone on the inhalation/exhaust diaphragm, which, as a result slipped out from under the retainer clip, thus causing the regulator to stop delivering air and the diver died.

 

[scubafanatic]

Well, which is it? Just a revenue source for dive shops, especially in a bad economy or a legitimate time schedule for servicing?

.....well, yes, it IS a revenue source for dive shops...duh.....the 12 month interval isn't something that was just recently invented for our present 'recession', so don't blame the recent bad economy for the 12 month number. Is it legitimate ? ...well, it might be easier if you provided the name/names of those on the board you'd believe, that way the rest of us won't waste time responding as we're unworthy of providing an acceptable response.

...the main point of the 12 month interval is that it's easy to remember to do the service on a periodic basis.....kinda like changing you car's motor oil every X months/X thousand miles. However, if your car (or reg) sees heavy useage/abuse/severe conditions....use common sense to adjust the interval as appropriate.......going 10 years without service isn't 'reasonable'.

 

[scubafanatic]

I have three sets of regs. I simply don't like spending unnecessarily or being scammed.I have other stuff I'd like to buy instead.

...... assuming there is nobody from a local dive shop holding a gun to your head right now...you are free to do what you want......are you looking for a sworn affidavit from some certain/special SB member to put your mind at ease on this ? ...or maybe just do one of those SB poll thingys and if 51% of the random readers/posters out there vote that an 'annual' is for suckers...then it's case closed!

 

[redacted]

......well, as a reasonably serious/well-read diver, I'll share a few resources of places that have had plenty of such examples:

scubadiving.com (see Training: Lessions for life section)
Alert Diver (DAN's publication)
Undercurrent Magazine

Could you be specific. Perhaps one incident from each where the conclusion was that the cause of the accident (not just a contributing factor) was regulator failure due to ignored annual service recommendations?

 

[Scott L]

.....well, yes, it IS a revenue source for dive shops...duh.....the 12 month interval isn't something that was just recently invented for our present 'recession', so don't blame the recent bad economy for the 12 month number. Is it legitimate ? ...well, it might be easier if you provided the name/names of those on the board you'd believe, that way the rest of us won't waste time responding as we're unworthy of providing an acceptable response.

...the main point of the 12 month interval is that it's easy to remember to do the service on a periodic basis.....kinda like changing you car's motor oil every X months/X thousand miles. However, if your car (or reg) sees heavy useage/abuse/severe conditions....use common sense to adjust the interval as appropriate.......going 10 years without service isn't 'reasonable'.

Are you in an involuntary institution somewhere? Did you break into nurse Ratchet's office and fire up her computer?

 

[halocline]

Thinking back on my days at the National Underwater Accident Data Center I can remember only one regulator maintenance based fatality. It involved a ScubaPro Pilot that had, improperly, been sprayed with silicone on the inhalation/exhaust diaphragm, which, as a result slipped out from under the retainer clip, thus causing the regulator to stop delivering air and the diver died.

Well, this is an example of fatality associated with having someone work on your regulator poorly, not with failing to do annual maintenance. Of course, in this case the diver should have simply switched to an alternate 2nd stage, just like if the mouthpiece came off a reg in your mouth. A flooded 2nd stage should result in a mouthful of water, maybe a little gagging, but nothing more serious than that. And where was this diver's buddy to assist?

But, even if you assume that immediate failure to produce any air by the regulator was in fact the cause of death, the problem is that lack of maintenance is highly unlikely to cause this type of regulator failure. A worn-out regulator will leak causing a freeflow. There are very few failure modes that result in loss of air.

Nobody is suggesting that proper care and maintenance of a regulator is a bad idea. I learned how to do it myself precisely because I think it's important. But the bit about connecting forgoing annual "repair" by some completely unregulated, unlicensed worker at a dive shop with life-threatening danger is just absurd.

 

[Scott L]

There is a segment in the recently published book Diver Down that tells of a real life diving fatality as a result of a regulator failing after sitting unused and unserviced for three years. Good book.

 

[redacted]

The only thing stupider than having no plan to service your regulator is the idea of servicing it at some fixed time interval with no other consideration. Makes a bit more sense to me to service it after some number of dives as usage has a greater impact than storage under proper conditions for reasonable periods of time. Sure, o-rings and seats take a set which make lead to sealing failures. Such failures can be expected to start as a small problems and increase with further usage. Sure, some soft components can degrade over time but that time is on the order of 5 years or more; not 1 or 2 years.

Whatever method you select to maintain your regs, if you couple that with simple inspections and basic performance tests, a diver can expect to avoid most potential major problems.

 

[Thalassamania]

Well, this is an example of fatality associated with having someone work on your regulator poorly, not with failing to do annual maintenance. Of course, in this case the diver should have simply switched to an alternate 2nd stage, just like if the mouthpiece came off a reg in your mouth. A flooded 2nd stage should result in a mouthful of water, maybe a little gagging, but nothing more serious than that. And where was this diver's buddy to assist?

But, even if you assume that immediate failure to produce any air by the regulator was in fact the cause of death, the problem is that lack of maintenance is highly unlikely to cause this type of regulator failure. A worn-out regulator will leak causing a freeflow. There are very few failure modes that result in loss of air.

Nobody is suggesting that proper care and maintenance of a regulator is a bad idea. I learned how to do it myself precisely because I think it's important. But the bit about connecting forgoing annual "repair" by some completely unregulated, unlicensed worker at a dive shop with life-threatening danger is just absurd.

I agree with you completely, I cite this case because it is the only maintenance related case that I remember ... and it points out a potential danger of having servicing done, e.g., getting a crappy job.