Checking Nitrox Tanks

[Scubaroo]

leadweight once bubbled...
Anyway, I am thinking that nitrox has been around enough to be a mainstream commodity. I don't know how all the possible ways of mixing it work, but it seems that there ought to be some automated method that would reliably produce a constant source of EAN 32.

Would this be the same as continuous blending? Ask Uncle Pug about it, I've read where he refers to his mixing station as "dial-a-mix" - you analysis the gas upstream to 32% or whatever), and fill away...

A dedicated industry standard "EAN32 tank" would have to have a different valve, kind of like the reverse DIN valves Scubapro were pushing in Europe for a while - if they were simply yoke or DIN, some dive shop monkey (or just someone not paying attention) would eventually fill one up with air or the wrong mix.

 

[runvus4]

I don't view Nitrox as "custom mix" but, that it's a very low volume business. Low enough volume that in the vast majority of dive shops, setting up a totally seperate fill station/gas panel/etc for one specific mix only, it would be very economicaly unfeasable.

As well, personally, if I had a choice, I would not get special tanks that I would only be able fill with EAN32. I don't have the room to store a double specificly for EAN32, and I don't have the money to buy a pair and set them aside. Unless I won the Lotto and moved to a big house with a large garage, I would always prefer to have a more versatile set of tanks.

 

[SueMermaid]

I don't think analyzing every tank is a pain in the *ss, and I will always make sure it's done and I see the gauge myself.
Just sayin'.

 

[leadweight]

MikeFerrara once bubbled...


The answer is more analyzers. hehe but I do my own regs too.

Perhaps better or more reliable analyzers would help. And, I would expect someone who owns or works in a dive shop to do their own regs. My fingers are far more nimble with a pencil and a calculator than they are with a wrench. There are days when changing the batteries in a dive computer can give me a fit.

OK, I give up. Its just another lead baloon. I am just trying to experss my desire to make things more freindly to the recreational diver. Time to go watch some TV & rot my brains.

 

[Charlie99]

At Scuba Club Cozumel there are 3 type of gases: air pumped on site, and EAN32 and EAN36 that are dropped off.

One day I went to analyze my tanks, picked out an AL80 of EAN32, complete with little gas analysis stick that showed 32.xxx%.

It was really 36%.

Somehow tank labels had been swapped.

A simple error, but potentially dangerous. A minute to meaure and label my own tank of EAN32 reduces the chances of errors.

Charlie