What gear malfunctions have you ever had?

[Eric Sedletzky]

I'm just curious to know what sort of gear problems people have had while diving or gearing up for a dive.
Anything from a broken fin or mask strap, to a bad zipper on a wetsuit, to a flooded drysuit or ripped seal, to a full on reg malfunction.
Anything.
And what did you do to cure it? or change it so it wouldn't happen again?
New divers can learn from this thread.

For me, when I used to use Mares fins those stupid strap latches would come undone EVERY TIME I used them. I finally replaced them with home made bungees.
I've had multiple knife sheaths break that have a plastic clip to hold the knife and losing the knife. I've probably lost half a dozen knifes in my career. I finally came up with a little bungee loop that goes over the handle so the knife can't come out unless I want it to come out.
I've had a drysuit zipper go out, it's still in a box waiting for a new zipper.
I've had a pair of freediving fins break. I learned not to giant stride straight into the water feet first with them. Instead, I plop in backwards off the boat butt first with feet up.

 

[3D diver]

From the top of my head:

Monestery beach sand stuck in BC inflator valve => free ascent from 30 feet. Not enough hands to dump the BC and dry suit at the same time.

High pressure hose burst on surface.

Assorted dry suit wrist seal, neck seal & hood failures + a couple of zippers.

Recently had my weight belt fall off at depth. Grabbed some kelp, dragged myself down, recovered belt and buddy helped me get it back on.

Dive lights flooded.

A couple of Nikonos V floods---most minor, one a complete loss.

A couple of leaky cases in modern "action cams"---replaced under warrantee.

 

[MaxBottomtime]

Two blown hoses, one upon surfacing from a deep dive, and one at six feet.
Several camera housing leaks.
Broken drysuit zipper and a few torn seals.
Nothing life threatening.

 

[Eric Sedletzky]

I've never had a drysuit failure underwater myself or a drysuit gearing up failure, but I've had buddies who have.
Everything from ripped seals when donning, to splashing off my boat and suddenly realizing the butt was full of holes and the suit rapidly flooding with 47 degree water.
I've had more dives ruined from buddy drysuit failures that any other reason a dive goes bad.

 

[Doc]

Returned to moored dive boat after 1hr BT and found the island's newest wreck dive.

 

[Eric Sedletzky]

I had a buddy blow a HP hose in a parking lot up in Ft. Bragg once and it was so load that the sheriff was there in a matter of minutes thinking someone got shot.

 

[Nemrod]

My brain.

N

 

[diver 86]

Frame broke on mask, leaving it with the rigidity of a jellyfish. Stuck it on my face and went anyway. Made two good dives and got to buy a new mask when we got back to the dock.

 

[Dr. Lecter]

A blown 6" HP hose's swivel fitting on a deco bottle, caught and fixed during pre dive check.

Slice in a can light cord that flooded the lid and switch, noticed it at the start of dive #2 when the light wouldn't turn back on. Had two backups and the wreck in question wasn't overly complex or siltly, and I know it well. Pressed on.

Flooded a Cobalt in a spectacular manner (looking at the screen was like looking into a silty aquarium) during a 200' wreck dive, only noticed it when I went to see if it was calling for a 120' first stop rather than the 110' first stop my Petrel wanted, as I expected the RGBM would. Thankfully it was just a backup to my Petrel and tables/watch/depth gage. Called Atomic, they gave me a new one. Lesson learned: do not store a backup computer somewhere you cannot see it. Had I known it had failed earlier, I would have aborted the dive; instead, I went on without knowing I was running only one computer and my tables.

Had a BCD with an inflator hose fitting that absolutely refused to thread correctly no matter what I did or what combo of new elbow and/or orings I tried. Finally superglued the ing thing in place and threw it away after the day's diving was over. Was not happy about that particular Zeagle bladder

Just the other day I dropped a Salvo 400' reel and apparently it landed just right, causing the line guide piece of delin to snap clean off, leaving a side-handled reel with no line guide. Need to ask LM if they'll sell me a replacement side handle, but it just reenforces my preference for the H aluminum design even though the Salvo/LM reel is smoother in operation.

 

[oldschool]

Free flow caused by ice crystal forming in the first stage
flooded dive light
flooded computer
bc power inflator inflating on its own (Sherwood Avid). Luckily this occurred before submerging.