a list of LA County boats with Nitrox?

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wxyz

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my review of californiadiveboats.com makes me conclude that the sand dollar is the only LA-based (not Ventura or S.D.) boat pumping nitrox. is this true?

any additional information would be appreciated!
 
wxyz:
my review of californiadiveboats.com makes me conclude that the sand dollar is the only LA-based (not Ventura or S.D.) boat pumping nitrox. is this true?

any additional information would be appreciated!

Pacific Star, Second Stage and I believe Psalty V also pump nitrox.
 
IceDiverInCA:
Pacific Star, Second Stage and I believe Psalty V also pump nitrox.

But I boycott them because of their lame site.

When WILL dive shops and dive boats learn that invasive, cheezy "Undah Dah Sea" throbbing at me at 110 db isn't fresh, and has me lunging for the back arrow.

May be a cool boat - I'll never know.

K
 
IceDiverInCA:
Pacific Star, Second Stage and I believe Psalty V also pump nitrox.

The Psalty and Second Stage both have clean air compatible with partial pressure blending and O2 clean tanks. I'm not sure they offer EAN unless they're chartered by SSA, though.

The Pac Star does on all trips. So does the Sand $ (but don't expect high pressure there).

If you're in LA and want EAN, the Peace is not that far.

Why more boats don't have a membrane system is beyond me. I'm sure the Peace recouped their investment a long long time ago.
 
thanks for the replies.

hmmm. less than a handful of boats. :dissappointed:

my wife and i added nitrox to our certs while we were on vacation recently, but i never stopped to think then that we might not be able to make that much use of them here.

had not thought about driving down to San Diego just to use EAN on a boat, but now will probably plan a trip on the Lois Ann.

as far as the Peace, we're still waiting for the stars to line up appropriately (2 weekdays off work/each, Optiquatics charter, babysitter for 3.75 days, etc, etc).

i don't know if this has been discussed in detail before, but it begs the question, WHY is there such a paucity of EAN boats in such a populated dive area as ours?
 
wxyz:
...
i don't know if this has been discussed in detail before, but it begs the question, WHY is there such a paucity of EAN boats in such a populated dive area as ours?

Go to diver.net then ask that same question to Ken Kurtis.

That issue gets debated hotly there, from time to time.

He is a seasoned NAUI/PADI instructor, and he knows the answer to most questions about scuba. His store is in Beverly Hills.
 
Arnaud:
Why more boats don't have a membrane system is beyond me. I'm sure the Peace recouped their investment a long long time ago.
I had this conversation with a local boat captain a few weeks ago, and he thinks not. He said he can't see putting in a membrane system himself as it would take longer than 20 years to recoup the investment (at least this is my recollection of what he said). He thought the the benefit to the Peace would be more in the area of the diving crowd that it brought in.

It does get a little old to drag along 2 or 3 tanks to have an adequate supply of gas for the day!
 
I was told that a membrane with compressor was about 25K. At $8 a fill, that's 3,125 fills. Since most O2 junkies will do all of their 3 or 4 dives with EAN, that's about 1041 divers needed to recoup the investment. Obviously, this doesn't include the extra fuel cost to run the membrane or interest on the money. But I don't see how 20 years would be needed to recoup the investment, unless we're talking about a 6 pack.

Pre-banking some EAN32 is obviously a much easier and simpler solution that just requires a separate fill system.
 
Well, that would be an additional $25K investment, if that's what it costs, on top of what an owner already has in the boat for a gas some people might want some of the time...and given how parsimonious divers can be, I can see why it might not be the first thing on their minds, at least on local boats that do mainly day trips to sites where the benefits of nitrox may be marginal. There is kind of a chicken-or-egg thing going. Would demand be there if it were available? Or would availability create demand? It's easy for us to gamble when it's not our money.

Given the typical Wreck Alley dive profile, I see why it works in San Diego, though. I have used it there myself.
 
https://www.shearwater.com/products/swift/

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