Wing Cleaning

[Jasoncassanova]

I'm not sure if you guys are familiar with this but two months ago we stayed at this resort in Puerto Galera here in the Philippines. The service and hospitality was amazing that they even offer their service of cleaning your gear after each dive without any charge. Anyway, when I was cleaning my wing, this guy from the resort approached me and he taught something new, he connected my reg back in the tank connected the inflator hose back to the wing, placed water in the wing, shook it a couple of times and he pressed the inflate button, all the water came bursting out of the OPV, he did this twice. I saw the advantage of this technique/style of cleaning your wing, no water would be trapped and the procedure would be faster, but my question is, does it damage the bladder? does the procedure strain the material of the bladder in some way?

[Chugwhump]

:popcorn:

[saxplayer1004]

We put water in it and orally inflater. Get the dump valve on the bottom-most point and crack it there. I bet the break pressure of the dump valve is a lot less than the pressure the wing can handle... I'm not an expert in such matters, but I doubt it's going to hurt it in the long run

[Kilili]

Which resort?

[Jasoncassanova]

Which resort?

::: Club Mabuhay ::: (http://www.clubmabuhaysabang.com)

[Bubbletrubble]

Answering the following two questions should help:

What does "OPV" stand for?
What is the function of the OPV?

[DevonDiver]

Over-Pressure Valve

[TSandM]

I don't understand why he would do that -- although the bag has to be built to tolerate that much pressure (or rather, the OPV has to be designed to open at a pressure below the bursting pressure of the bag), it's quite easy to put water in the wing, slosh it around, and vent it through the OPV by pulling the string. Or you can vent it through the inflator hose, by inverting the wing and pushing the deflate button. In ANY method, you have to have the orifice through which the water is exiting as the lowest point in the wing, or water will remain inside it. Pressurizing the wing isn't going to blow water out of the portion that is below the valve.

[Bubbletrubble]

...but my question is, does it damage the bladder? does the procedure strain the material of the bladder in some way?
This was what the OP asked.
Assuming that the OPV is working properly, it should not hurt the bladder at all.
I test my OPV before every dive. It is one of the pre-dive checks that I perform religiously. The fact that the OP asked those questions implies that he doesn't do similar checks. I would highly recommend that he change that practice. That's just my opinion...

[DwayneJ]

Basically thats how I clean my wings. Fill with fresh water, inflate them and pull the OPV at the lowesr point to empty the water. No need to over inflate until the OPV operates but thats not a big deal.

[DevonDiver]

Does it strain the OPV? Yes. But the OPV is designed for this function.

Will it break the OPV? No, but theoretically the extra use might marginally decrease the lifespan.

Is it necessary? No, it offers absolutely no benefits over the 'manual' method of oral inflation, adding water, sloshing, rinsing and releasing water via manual release of the OPV.

Does it have any benefits? None.... unless your lungs are too weak to orally inflate a BCD (in which case you shouldn't be diving).

[fnfalman]

The guy works at a dive resort and has to clean gears five hundred times a day, 365 days a year. He couldn't give a damn about the best methods for cleaning gears. Quickness is the name of the game at that point.

[DevonDiver]

yeah...and he doesn't own the gear he is cleaning ;)