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I’ve certainly made mistakes servicing my regulators but have always caught the mistake when testing. This might be the biggest difference between self service and shop service; taking the time to carefully test everything. In addition to the obvious vacuum test (suck hard, my friend) I’ll leave...

Cenote diving is cavern diving. The thing is you need a guide to dive in them unless you take a cavern course (and pass it) at which point you can dive without a guide, which obviously is much less expensive. It just costs the entrance fee to the cenotes, usually around $300 pesos, and renting a...

$500 is not much, I’m afraid. The Bay Islands are pretty inexpensive but I don’t know how you’d get there without spending most of your budget on a flight. Probably the best use of your limited budget is going to be day tripping to Cozumel. That way the only non-diving expenses you’ll have are...

I’d be very interested in trying it; I’m always on the look out for MK5 and MK10 springs that have some life left in them. My usual issue is low IP. I always have to use the ‘+’ seats and I still frequently come up around 125 PSI. It’s not the worst thing, but I’d to get them a little higher. It...

I have several D300s and they are fantastic breathers. I don’t find them difficult to work on, unless you have to remove/replace the pre-dive spring, then it becomes an entirely different experience! Once again, a great thread, just excellent work by Rob to share this detailed information.

Sold.

I’m not sure you understand what they’re talking about. Canister light owners use beer cozies as a cover to delicate light heads when carrying them around in a crate or dive gear bag. You take the cozie off when you go diving. Nobody would ever tape up their light head just to carry it to the...

If you have a screw-on DIN dust cap, it seals exactly the same way that the tank valve seals. Perfectly safe for soaking. If you have one of the soft plastic ‘slip on’ type, throw it away and get a good one. While you’re at it, send a letter to SP asking why they don’t include a decent dust cap...

This is timely for me, because I’m putting together an O2 reg and my choices are MK10 and MK2, and I have a MK10+ conversion kit. SP does sell a MK25 ‘nitrox’ rebuild kit with a bright green seat, that would also fit the MK10+ as mentioned. That kit is like $100. I’m way too cheap for that, lol...

Re: WOB for the balanced vs unbalanced poppets, the main difference has to do with the unbalanced using a fully mechanical spring to counter downstream force of IP, vs balanced using a combination of mechanical spring and IP in the balance chamber ‘pushing back’ against the downstream force. In...

A quick take on the canister-vs-handheld argument. As usual, there are pros and cons for each. I switched to a handheld shortly after switching from BM to SM, basically all my diving these days is in Mexican caves. So, long dives, nice clear water. The handheld is more convenient, there’s no...

Glad you figured it out. Most of the time in MX (and elsewhere, I suspect) rental tanks are Luxfers, probably because they were the most common tanks. So if you're going to learn sidemount at home but also rent AL80s for SM, it's not a bad idea to stick with Luxfers, if you can even them any...

Here’s a thread where someone posted tanks specs from the manufacturer, with valve. https://scubaboard.com/community/threads/updated-scuba-tank-specifications-list-in-pdf-and-spreadsheet.572616/ According to that, Metal impact tanks are a full pound less positive empty than Luxfer, but only .1...

You can look up the specs, but it looks like the XS scuba tank is made by Metal Impact and has similar buoyancy specs as Catalina, about 4 lbs positive empty. Luxfer tanks are a bit more positive, 4.4 lbs empty. I don’t know if that’s with or without a valve, which obviously makes a big...

I always buy used regulators (and service them myself). I have several pairs of older SP piston regs and the metal 2nd stages (109 or balanced/adjustable) that I have used for cave diving for years. There is a great used market for these regulators and they work perfectly. What you might do is...

There's nothing on the SP U.S. site about nitrox regulators or oxygen use.

I would be very curious to know specifically what the material is on the seat for the ‘nitrox’ kit. The whole nomenclature is deceptive, because any regulator is fine for nitrox up to 40%, and as far as I know SP specifically says the MK25 is not 100% O2 compatible. In other words, they are...

You might not need the socket to remove the yoke nut; it actually depends on the curvature of the yoke itself. Sometimes you can get a big adjustable wrench to grab the yoke nut and break it loose. I’ve even used a vise in a pinch to grab the nut and slipped a PVC pipe over the body of the reg...

If this is for a MK25, I can sell you a yoke kit, because not that long ago I bought a MK25 used and converted it to DIN because I use it cave diving. In terms of the measurement, the 1st stage with yoke would be about the same distance from the tank as with DIN. It’s the adapter that makes it...

I’m not sure if it fits this discussion, but on the topic of skipping maintenance, just today I opened up my MK2, which I believe was last rebuilt at least 20 years ago. It’s been working fine, but I’m considering turning it into an O2 deco reg, so first I wanted to check the inside. It looked...