Tanks

[SaintAugustineDiver62]

so im guessing steel is best way to go HP I do like to shed weight when I can . I live in Saint Augustine

 

[kwinter]

the infinitely better decision is to find some LP72's in good shape and grab them for $50 each since they are basically like neutral buoyancy 80's

Yeah, what he said.


iPhone. iTypo. iApologize.

 

[USFpsychDiver]

Tanks were the last pieces of gear I got. In my area dive shops charge roughly $10 for an air-filled AL80, $15 for Nitrox, and $5 for an air fill, $10 for a Nitrox fill, so the tank rental is about $5/tank/day (probably $10/day for a steel HP100 in the rare shop that rents them). Takes a lot of diving to pay for that $5/day rental. Also my preference in tanks keeps changing; what I'd buy today is much different than what I would have bought a couple of years ago. Of course once I started buying tanks I went kind of nuts, but I dive doubles with a stage and a deco bottle now and don't want to have to go for fills between dives and like bigger tanks for some dives and smaller for others so the current menagerie is: Steel: 4 LP 108's (one pair of Worthingtons, on pair of Fabers), 2 LP 85s (Worthington), 2 LP 80's (PST); AL: 2 80's (stage), 1 40 (O2). I almost never dive the Worthington 108's (to heavy) or the PST 80's (too small) so they'll probably go on the block sometime this summer. All these tanks were bought used for about half of retail new except for one of the AL 80s. This isn't an investment, it's regular compulsive scuba gear buying.

 

[icechip]

This isn't an investment, it's regular compulsive scuba gear buying.

Amen to that!

 

[Aqua-Andy]

All this talk of TCO of tanks and no one has come up with the impromptu dive after work or other time the LDS is closed. Some of my best and most memorable dives have been spur of the moment decisions that could only happen because I owned my own tanks. Nothing like reading your e-mail right before leaving work and finding out a buddy had a crappy day and needs to decompress under water. This is one of the reasons I keep my dive gear packed and tanks full as soon as the gear is dry from the last dive. I can literately go from answering the phone to dive gear packed in car and on my way in under five minutes. This is something you can only do if you own your own tanks!

 

[Eric Sedletzky]

I never understood neutral aluminum tanks. First, even regular aluminum tanks are heavier than a similar steel tanks out of the water, plus needing more weight on a belt and you have a lot of weight to carry around (I'm thinking shore diving).
So they make AL neutral 80's or 100's and now you have a hell of a heavy kludgy tank out of the water and you still need the same weight belt as you would using a steel 72 filled to say 3000. So it's still beach diving hell.
The only thing I think is maybe price, but I hear they weren't that cheap.
All I know is there's a ****load of aluminum in them which could better be served in some other form, not wasted on scuba tanks.

Steel 72's are a far superior alternative to any aluminum tank IMO.
I have 5 of them and they were all free.

 

[Pullmyfinger]

They (the neutral or "compact 80") were common on Guam when I lived there.
I have never liked them.
Divers imagine they are gaining some advantage by not having to wear a 4 lb. weight welt.
I don't think wearing a weight belt with two lead bricks on it it that big of a deal.
If you have them......you can't double them up, because they suck for doubles in warm water diving.
The aluminum 100s are also a bad choice.

In my opinion of course.

 

[Nemrod]

If he is diving in south Florida, St Augustine Florida and south, then the recommendations for the very negative steel tanks might not be so good. It would be very easy for a diver in warm water in a rash guard and swimsuit or even a neoprene top to be severely negative and not have any ditchable weight. An aluminum 80 is better suited to such conditions. I would get standard 80, not the neutral 80.

N

 

[tbone1004]

Nemrod, what very negative tanks were mentioned? At worst case an LP104 is only 8lbs more negative than an AL80 when empty, and that is one of the most extreme being 3.3lbs, most of them are between 1 and 1.5lbs, so if the diver has 6lbs of lead to offset an AL80, in the same rig he can switch from an AL80 to a HP100, HP120, LP95, HP130, and there is no change in lead. Even safer being in a rash guard or light neoprene top because there is less depth compensation, so as a HP130 only has 10lbs of air in it when full, the diver should only ever be 10lbs negative in a total wing failure. If the diver can't physically kick 10lbs back to the surface and keep it there for a few minutes, they have no business diving because they aren't fit enough to safely do it, it is literally that simple. One of the first skills all of our students are required to do is recover a 10lb diving brick from the bottom of the pool and bring it back to the deck, with no fins. With fins, you should be able to scull at the surface holding the brick at your chest for quite a long time before becoming fatigued. It is very possible to dive a balanced rig without a wetsuit and use steel tanks, the issue becomes when the rig goes unbalanced due to using SS backplates, cam bands, and an STA which adds 10lbs of ballast. In that case the diver is overweight, and that is part of the beauty of that setup is that with AL80 tanks, the SS rig tends to offset the tank and the diver with no need for additional weight.

The ditchable weight discussion is moot per that above rationale, and due to the physics, LP72's are just better than AL80's in all conditions, less weight on land, no lead requirement in the water, longer lasting, lower working pressures, the AL80's have no merit unless you can't find 72's for cheap, or need positive bottles for stages and what not. Swap the above SS plate for an aluminum/kydex plate which turns almost 6lbs, into 2 ish, and that is about the weight difference between a LP72 and an AL80. Drop the SS cam bands for plastic cam bands, and that is the difference to get to almost all of the 3442 tanks, except for a few Worthingtons, and quite a few of the LP steels. This heavy steel tank BS has nothing to do with the tanks or steel vs. aluminum, it's people not diving balanced rigs.

 

[Searcaigh]

As Aqua Andy said, having your own tanks means you can dive whenever you feel like it.

I always like to have different mixes available too depending on what the next dive might be, and since my daughter returned to live at home and also dives, it's proved useful as well as having gas for visiting diving friends since it is not easy to rent Nitrox at short notice here in my locality.