How long can I wait before rinsing?

How long can I wait after finishing dives for the day before rinsing my gear?

I live a two hour drive from where we dive. We usually drop off tanks on the way home, and maybe they would let us rinse there, but then I would be using a communal rinse pail (ewwwww...) and I would be putting soaking wet gear back in the car.

When we get home I usually rinse the same day. Sometimes we've both been too tired and we manage to "justify" waiting until the next day. We soak our regs and wings and computers (not just rinse). The rest of the stuff we just rinse.

I just read a post where someone's inflator stuck open, and it reminded me just how many problems could occur. We really don't want to have gear failures if we can help it!

Thanks,

Bill

Obviously ideally you want to wash as soon as possible - the risk in delaying exists mainly if you allow the gear to dry before washing etc. Salt water forms crystals as it evaporates and these crystals do two things. Firstly they can build up in regulators and inflators and dump valves and cause them to 'stick' mainly because they block the free action - either make them sticky, or cause them to sit partly open and leak.

Secondly the crystals are sharp edged and can cause abrasion to suits and so on - this is also why if you don't rinse yourself off after a dive in the sea you get sore patches in certain areas !

I usually have a drive of an hour or so after from my usual dive site, with high temperatures (30-40 degrees c regularly) so what I often do is put my dive gear in a air tight gear bag so they are not going to dry out, then I soak them and rinse them off as soon as I get back to my hotel. I have never yet had a problem with salt build up.

If you let the gear dry you cannot guarantee that the salt crystals will dissolve when you rinse it later, and very often they don't.

If you pool dive there is a different problem - the chemicals in the water can cause some substances to perish and I have heard it can affect the bladders in some BCDs (but I have no evidence to back this up). If I pool dive for training I want to thoroughly wash my gear as soon as I can and not leave it.

Dive safely - Phil

Yeah what Phil_C said. I often drive hours to get home, but the gear doesn't dry out. Obviously keep it out of the sun, even up here. Then I just rinse thoroughly at home first thing I do, including BCD with water & baby shampoo. (never have soaked). I do empty as much salt water from the BC at the dive site. Same used gear 8 years, no real problems. I use shop stuff at the pool except my own shorty, but that's still good as well.

If there's water available at the dive site a quick rinse is a good idea, otherwise ASAP. A couple hour delay isn't the end of the world.

Lobos has hoses (you know this, I know). Does anyone know what's up with the showers at the breakwater? They were shut off earlier this year and I don't know why or whether they'll come back.

The biggest problem for beach dives, at least around here, is sand. For that it really does not matter if you rinse right after the dive or the next day. If you take 5 gallons of fresh water (a plastic gas can from the autoparts store works nicely) and a bucket you can do a preliminary rinse at the dive site. That prevents getting a lot of sand in your car and gets the majority of the salt off as well. For night dives I'll often wait until the next day to rinse so I have some daylight to work with. I would not worry about waiting until the next day.

BTW I've had a few leaking inflator valves and the culprit was sand each time. Early or long soaking is not going to remove sand. The solution was to take the valve apart, clean and re-lube. Or you can just buy a new valve since they are not very expensive.

I bring a 1 gallon bottle of water from the house and quickly rinse my regs (1st and 2nd), manifold/tanks, inflators, lights, and cutting tools before packing up for the day. The rest usually gets rinsed at home.

I have been on projects with limited water supplies (no water maker) that lasted over three weeks. No dive gear was rinsed and there were no regulator or power inflator failures. It is desirable, no. Is it something to stress over if you can't... apparently not. A day or two is nothing to worry about.

The best way to treat any dive gear is never let it dry out

Agree with the above though, ideally it would get rinsed asap but a few hours or more isn't the end of the world. I just give mine a good soak to dissolve any salt crystals that may have started to form. Bit of baby shampoo in the rinse tub can't hurt either.

3D diver:

If there's water available at the dive site a quick rinse is a good idea, otherwise ASAP. A couple hour delay isn't the end of the world.

Does anyone know what's up with the showers at the breakwater? They were shut off earlier this year and I don't know why or whether they'll come back.

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On 12/5/13 There was a notice on the entrance to the restroom near the Breakwall parking lot saying that the showers were turned off because a part was broken from vandalism. Didn't say when they hope to get them back up and running.

I also bring bottles of water at times for the reg. if my stuff must overnight in the car. Also agree sand is your worst enemy. If I can't gear up away from all sand or walk from the car geared up it takes an awful lot to convince me to do the dive.