Oxygen Cleaning your O2 bottle?

[Jimmer]

Hi guys,

I'm going through all my regs and tanks over the winter, and I had a question pop into my head. I know the recommendation is to O2 clean your bottles every year with your VIP, but what about an O2 Bottle that spends it's life full of O2?

I doubt that industrial welding bottles get cleaned every year, and they probably get emptied completely and refilled, as opposed to tech divers having their O2 bottles topped off regularly. It seems to me that if it is just O2 going in, how can they get contaminated?

So what is the general consensus on O2 cleaning an O2 bottle?

Jim

[fdog]

I am a believer in the concept of cleaning according to probability of accumulated contaminants: clean after lots of pure gas, or, after a little dirty gas.

However, I step aside from this when it comes to my 20 foot bottles and regs. The cylinders are cleaned, valves disassembled/O2 cleaned/overhauled, and regs dissembled/O2 cleaned/overhauled annually (and occasionally sooner).


All the best, James

[ajduplessis]

I am a believer in the concept of cleaning according to probability of accumulated contaminants: clean after lots of pure gas, or, after a little dirty gas.

However, I step aside from this when it comes to my 20 foot bottles and regs. The cylinders are cleaned, valves disassembled/O2 cleaned/overhauled, and regs dissembled/O2 cleaned/overhauled annually (and occasionally sooner).


All the best, James

Agreed 200%

[saxplayer1004]

How hard is it really to O2 clean the bottle? Swish some simple green inside, rinse it out, blow it out. Takes half an hour... With Rick's accident and what not, it should be a nice pinch to remind us all to not get complacent. Talked to him earlier this week and he told me not to be as stupid as he was...
Came home and made sure all of my bottles are secured to the wall or laying down now. They don't get scrimped on their yearly maintenance, but for the few cents of Simple Green and half an hour to an hour of your time to clean the bottle and valve, it's not all that big of a deal...

[Jimmer]

I never said it was a big deal to clean a bottle, I was only musing about how likely contamination is in a bottle that never gets emptied and never sees anything other than O2.

[fdog]

I'm sure that a bottle that only sees oxygen is likely to be pretty uncontaminated.


Maybe.


I can think of lots of possible sources; hence I am quite paranoid about 100%, and clean annually. The risks for being wrong are too high for my comfort level.

All the best, James

[saxplayer1004]

It's highly unlikely that anything would get in there. Medical O2 bottles aren't cleaned any more often and they are used a LOT more than our deco bottles are... Even if the Med bottles were cleaned every 4-6 months they'd still have more fills than ours do in probably 2 years. I think the yearly thing is just to keep a schedule. We're seeing on reg maintenance every year or 200 dives, or every 2 years or 200 dives, etc. Tanks probably won't end up with that since it's a much larger industry.

[rjack321]

Industrial bottles are filled from dedicated whips into unique valves which are actually rated for 100% service.

Scuba valves suck for O2. They are fast opening and have a nice fuel source which screws up and down on an orifice. O2 rushes out and slams into regs which isn't great either. They are also generally filled from whips which have all sorts of other gases pumped through them.

The tank you can probably delay cleaning more often than annual (most years, until it goes bang). The valve should not be ignored, they get dirty from whips and regs for sure.

[JDostal]

Clean it every year. Oxygen hackers handbook is great.

Posted from my phone.

[Vassilis Vlachopoulos]

.... rinse it out, blow it out. Takes half an hour...

Any suggestions for effective blow out ? How can we ensure that all hymidity will go away ?

[JDostal]

We have a homebuilt rack. We have a vertical tube with a lot of holes drilled in it that is built into a stand. The stand is made of pipe and we can just feed a hair dryer (set to low..... ) into it. Dries tanks nice and quick. Steel can be a PITA w/ flash rust but it works stellar for AL.

[UCFKnightDiver]

Take a low pressure hose hooked up to your 1st stage with no 2nd stage regulator on it and blow out the tank, probably want to make sure you have some o2 clean air you're using.

[rjack321]

Any suggestions for effective blow out ? How can we ensure that all hymidity will go away ?

Rinse well with HOT water upside down. Blow dry while still warm with clean air or if you really want to be fancy to minimize flash rust, bottled nitrogen.

If you don't understand what's involved and someone else is actually filling this tank the moral thing to do is let the filler O2 clean it.

[Rainer]

I've also had good luck with *hot* water and then blowing out the tank with "O2-clean" air (LP hose off a first stage). We build a stand out of wood that holds the cylinder upside down to make this easier. Be careful, the cylinder itself will be extremely warm.

[Superlyte27]

ask this same question on a different bored. This information sucks today.

or send me a pm.