What Are The Chances?

[sparky30]

I think hot fills are a fact of life at most dive stores...
I have not found one where they can keep up with demand during a summer weekend.... If you want your tanks filled while you wait and you have 10 people with two tanks each in front of you, you will most likely end up with a hot fill.. The big tub of cold water will minimize the effect, but not by much.. All the more reason to drop your tank off a few days ahead of time.. so they can top it off and there is no rushing..

 

[seahunter]

If you come into a LDS on Thursday or Friday night or on Saturday morning it could be a bit of a wait. We can fill 4 tanks at a time and can control the fill rate of each individually so it shouldn't be too bad but, you're right spark, Friday night in July can be crazy.

Most LDS including us don't like tanks left for fills. Strictly speaking they must be tagged for service since they are our responsibility while in the store. More than once a customer has left a tank and then not picked it up for several days or even weeks!! When one goes missing (not tagged!) it's a real problem. The owner has no tag, we have no tank - who's at fault? We should have tagged it and given him a service number. Without that we have no responsibility but... at our store I hate to disappoint anyone so I've actually given the customer a new tank based on his word that he did bring it in AND didn't already pick it up. Now you see why we don't want tanks left for fills. The same applies at other stores. If you leave the tank, be certain to get a receipt. The store does not have to give you anything without one.

Ther answer is to bring your tank in during the slower periods. Weekdays anytime, Thurs, Fri, Sat or Sun midday. It may not be the most convenient but I suppose it not a lot different that lining up at a ski lift or golf course on a Saturday morning. For sure it's not fair to blame the owner of the LDS.

Let me suggest that most tanks coming in for fills are at 1000 psi or more. Therefore losing 200 to 300 psi from a regular fill is really more a problem in the divers mind than in practice. However, I too would be irritated if I thought I was paying for 3000 psi and didn't get it. Maybe a change of thought is in order. As I said earlier, you're not paying for the air in the tanks - you're paying for the compression and delivery of the air. Since 2500 is as good as 3000 for most dives, reguler fills are not as big a deal as they're made out to be. If you can accept that idea great. If not and you insist on 3000 psi, you may have to line up.

We get very few divers complaining about the time needed to get a good fill. Perhaps because we don't charge for air fills and also the pro shop is interesting.

 

[Butch103]

So true....I rarely use all the gas in the tank. When I do it is because I have done a second dive on the tank. ( usually to rehook a dock line, quil check for something etc)...I always plan to end a dive at worse case 500#, but usually hit the boat or shore with 1000# +...My own personal safety facture........

 

[seahunter]

Now that's a good diver!!

I just completed an Equipment Course and we discussed the old 'J and R' valves with reserves. I asked the class how we knew in the early days that our buddy was an experienced diver. The answer is that an experienced diver in the 60's regularly checked his reserve lever to ensure it had not been pulled down accidentally - that it was still up and ready for use.

One thing that has not changed in scuba is that you must not run out of air!! Even bad air is better than no air! Sort of like bad breath is better than no breath!
I don't want to get off topic but even all the current training in handling out-of-air emergencies won't save a diver who runs out of air.