omar once bubbled...
LOL Vance
. (heating up ;-)
But, it seems with the introduction of the oxycheq the price has gone up. The oxycheq MSRP is more than the Atomox distributed by Dive Rite and you have to buy the smart charger on top of that.
As far as operation of the oxycheq you need to screw around opening and closing the flow cap to capture a gas sample every time you want a reading, it takes a minute to get each reading, you need to turn it on and off between readings to save the battery, you can not use the smart charger when the unit is on, and no mention is made if running a high oxygen mix through the sensor/flow cap is safe. So as far as using it for continuous blending it is very limited.
When I continuous blend it is for a number of hours. A limited battery life and not being able to hook it up to the main power supply is a detriment. During start up I need continuous, instantaneous readings of the mix so I can get it dialed in without wasting a lot of gas and the last thing I need is to have to worry about capturing a gas sample for a reading. Atomox recommends the sample flow rate be 2L/min but has indicated that the accuracy of the unit will still be within +/- 1% for flow rates of 1 to 12 L/min. So all I do is turn on my unit, plug in the gas and that's it.
The oxycheq is smaller and more portable which would be a benefit if you were mixing on a boat.
omar