BSAC avoids annual VIP

[W W Meixner]

Just for consideration, you get the "oily" fill. Wouldn't the most dangerous PP fill be the next one?

BRT...

Unfortunately...you never know when and where the bad fill came from as you're not inspecting your tanks after each fill...not inspecting your tanks for five years who knows how much hydrocarbon may have been introduced...sometimes during inspection the odor is detectable...sometimes it isn't...

Shops doing a lot of exotic gas fills usually have a ''hyper filtration'' system installed to help prevent this...

Some shops are now abandoning PP fills in favor of ''fill blend stick'' systems...and are not requiring the tanks to be O2 cleaned unless the NITROX fills are over 40%...

The more often your tank is inspected...and thoroughly cleaned...the cleaner it will be...both inside...and out...

Frequent inspection is also important for steel tanks in the event moisture...mostly resulting from condensation is introduced into the cylinder...

Condensation in steel tanks here in Canada is a concern as a lot of divers store their tanks in unheated boat houses...that are often -20 in the winter...interior condensation drips to the tank bottoms causing rust pitting...leaving a debris plugged tank boot on for five years without reasonable frequency tank bottom inspection is another problem...as is corrosion building up behind tank stickers...

There is science and reasoning behind annual inspection of scuba cylinders...and there are pros and cons to extending service frequency...if this standard is adopted in North America...which may be unlikely...I can see a lot of shops failing cylinders for detected problems that have deteriorated beyond acceptable levels because the cylinders haven't been inspected for five years...and you know individual tank owners are not going to do much ''preventative maintenance''..

Dive Safe...

Warren

 

[BRT]

BRT...

Unfortunately...you never know when and where the bad fill came from as you're not inspecting your tanks after each fill...not inspecting your tanks for five years who knows how much hydrocarbon may have been introduced...sometimes during inspection the odor is detectable...sometimes it isn't...

Shops doing a lot of exotic gas fills usually have a ''hyper filtration'' system installed to help prevent this...

Some shops are now abandoning PP fills in favor of ''fill blend stick'' systems...and are not requiring the tanks to be O2 cleaned unless the NITROX fills are over 40%...

The more often your tank is inspected...and thoroughly cleaned...the cleaner it will be...both inside...and out...

Frequent inspection is also important for steel tanks in the event moisture...mostly resulting from condensation is introduced into the cylinder...

Condensation in steel tanks here in Canada is a concern as a lot of divers store their tanks in unheated boat houses...that are often -20 in the winter...interior condensation drips to the tank bottoms causing rust pitting...leaving a debris plugged tank boot on for five years without reasonable frequency tank bottom inspection is another problem...as is corrosion building up behind tank stickers...

There is science and reasoning behind annual inspection of scuba cylinders...and there are pros and cons to extending service frequency...if this standard is adopted in North America...which may be unlikely...I can see a lot of shops failing cylinders for detected problems that have deteriorated beyond acceptable levels because the cylinders haven't been inspected for five years...and you know individual tank owners are not going to do much ''preventative maintenance''..

Dive Safe...

Warren

My point exactly. To be safe we need a visual before each fill.

 

[NAM001]

Well and of course the change in newer VIP inspector certs now having to be renewed every three years, sooner even than any regular drivers license I ever heard of, is all driven by sound safety thinking and not driven by greed at all.. Sure! ... And that's not just PCI... my TDI VIP cert. is demanding renewal in three years at well.
Edit:
Want to bet that renewal will also cost more than renewing a driver's license? And will not be done by passing a test and mybe demonstrate an inspection... but be done by spending hours listening to the same class with next to nothing new all over again before doing some mock inspection and the test?
...
And how comfortable should I feel about the person doing the VIP now being aparrently considered to forget it all in 3 years time and misplace their book and are incapable to reaquaint themselves with something the've been doing for 3 years now... ...
... It's just another real annoying racket that ... imho only of course.
...
If I were to bring a tank in for VIP to the place I'd trust a little more with it and don't want to cut into weekend days, I'd have to drive 1.5 hours after work to drop off, an hour back and then do it again to pick up... DIY makes sense just because of that and at least then I know what I observed...
...
I don't know about a 5 minute VI. I do mine carefully ... But on a fairly new, always dry, clean and shiny smooth AL tank with wonderful thread... , yeah, cleaning the previous year's sticker residue off may take longer than the actual VI... even for a guy like me who just VI's very few tanks.

It is my under standing that the vis is not under the 3 year mandated retraining., It is the hasmat portion that that requires 3 year update training.

 

[scubafanatic]

I can already hear this one coming.
Shop: We’re losing money doing this for you.
Diver: Great, so then you’ll support the BSAC stance and only lose money 1/5th as often?
Shop: Whaaat? How are we going to survive doing that?

As Steve Martin said: “We make it up on volume!”

I guess I could blackmail my LDS(s) by threatening to make them hydro/VIS my 26 tanks unless they give me BIG discounts every time I shop there!

 

[NAM001]

BRT...

Unfortunately...you never know when and where the bad fill came from as you're not inspecting your tanks after each fill...not inspecting your tanks for five years who knows how much hydrocarbon may have been introduced...sometimes during inspection the odor is detectable...sometimes it isn't...

Shops doing a lot of exotic gas fills usually have a ''hyper filtration'' system installed to help prevent this...

Some shops are now abandoning PP fills in favor of ''fill blend stick'' systems...and are not requiring the tanks to be O2 cleaned unless the NITROX fills are over 40%...

The more often your tank is inspected...and thoroughly cleaned...the cleaner it will be...both inside...and out...

Frequent inspection is also important for steel tanks in the event moisture...mostly resulting from condensation is introduced into the cylinder...

Condensation in steel tanks here in Canada is a concern as a lot of divers store their tanks in unheated boat houses...that are often -20 in the winter...interior condensation drips to the tank bottoms causing rust pitting...leaving a debris plugged tank boot on for five years without reasonable frequency tank bottom inspection is another problem...as is corrosion building up behind tank stickers...

There is science and reasoning behind annual inspection of scuba cylinders...and there are pros and cons to extending service frequency...if this standard is adopted in North America...which may be unlikely...I can see a lot of shops failing cylinders for detected problems that have deteriorated beyond acceptable levels because the cylinders haven't been inspected for five years...and you know individual tank owners are not going to do much ''preventative maintenance''..

Dive Safe...

Warren

When I put my valve on i presureize it to 1500 adn drain refill to 1500 and drain. any humidity in it from atmosphere when the valve is put on is reduced everytime you fill with dry air. if you had atmospheric air with rh60% and you fill to 1500 dnavent to 100 you now have 6% RH at 1 ATM do it again and you have .6% atmfill it again and it dont matter anymore because the fill to 30 will tru to make it around .03% rh at 1atm ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, that is a low dew point probably well under -200f. The only thing that can mess it up is a wet fill from bad filtering.

 

[NAM001]

In the UK testing is by an IDEST registered test facility. Any other test is simply not recognised (this is not law it is universal dive shop policy). The PCI style self testing cannot happen as the IDEST will not recognise the test. Tanks must be stamped with an IDEST stamp and you can only get one if you pay IDEST and agree to their terms and go on their training schemes. You cannot buy O2 clean stickers - they have to be a dive shop sticker. If you self clean then you will not get a fill from any shop that PP fills. Continuous flow up to 40EAN is OK and doesn't need a sticker, but very very few shops have that kind of compressor.

I have a blenders ticket and O2 cleaning ticket, but I cannot buy O2 stickers. A shop can O2 clean and the cleaner doesn't need an O2 ticket.

As I posted earlier the annual visual is no big deal if it could be done by a club (or someone with a PCI certification) but the industry isn't going to allow that.

My local facility somehow or another "always" finds rust and so always charges for a shot blast. The last time I took a tank in they also replaced the black valve knobs and fitted green ones "because you must have green for nitrox". (It was a H valve so two of them - and I didn't get the old ones back). Although I paid and took my tank I was extremely rude to the shop owner and have never gone back and taken every chance to put off anyone else from ever going there. I now get them done somewhere else. Despite this dishonest rip off and dreadful service I am sorry to say the facility is still in business.

When you are a PSI PCI inspector you are 2 people the end user and a professional inspector. I understand the concerns of self inspection. But it is silly to say that you can inspect others tanks and not your own so long as you stick with standards. The self inspectors you ar actually talking about are the joe blows that buy stickers and stick them to their tanks to avoid paying the 15 bucks to get it done by a so called trainied person. In THE US PCI PSI inspectors are certified trained inspectors. When you see a psi sticker all you need to figure out is if it is an original sticker or a copied sticker. joe blows dive shop is not a qualified tank inspector and most likely not a qualified tank filler either. Ifr you want to know if they are qualified to do the work .....Ask for the shops training book and it will show who has complied with 3 yr has mat training . who is trained on the installed filing system and more.

 

[NAM001]

BRT...

Unfortunately...you never know when and where the bad fill came from as you're not inspecting your tanks after each fill...not inspecting your tanks for five years who knows how much hydrocarbon may have been introduced...sometimes during inspection the odor is detectable...sometimes it isn't...

Shops doing a lot of exotic gas fills usually have a ''hyper filtration'' system installed to help prevent this...

Some shops are now abandoning PP fills in favor of ''fill blend stick'' systems...and are not requiring the tanks to be O2 cleaned unless the NITROX fills are over 40%...

The more often your tank is inspected...and thoroughly cleaned...the cleaner it will be...both inside...and out...

Frequent inspection is also important for steel tanks in the event moisture...mostly resulting from condensation is introduced into the cylinder...

Condensation in steel tanks here in Canada is a concern as a lot of divers store their tanks in unheated boat houses...that are often -20 in the winter...interior condensation drips to the tank bottoms causing rust pitting...leaving a debris plugged tank boot on for five years without reasonable frequency tank bottom inspection is another problem...as is corrosion building up behind tank stickers...

There is science and reasoning behind annual inspection of scuba cylinders...and there are pros and cons to extending service frequency...if this standard is adopted in North America...which may be unlikely...I can see a lot of shops failing cylinders for detected problems that have deteriorated beyond acceptable levels because the cylinders haven't been inspected for five years...and you know individual tank owners are not going to do much ''preventative maintenance''..

Dive Safe...

Warren

the majority of cylindars are not getting properly inspected as it is. You ar ehard pressed to fnd a shop that has pit picks let alone a record of inspections. The reality is do a bogus inspection every year or do a bogus inspection every 2-3-4-5 years.

 

[BRT]

When I put my valve on i presureize it to 1500 adn drain refill to 1500 and drain. any humidity in it from atmosphere when the valve is put on is reduced everytime you fill with dry air. if you had atmospheric air with rh60% and you fill to 1500 dnavent to 100 you now have 6% RH at 1 ATM do it again and you have .6% atmfill it again and it dont matter anymore because the fill to 30 will tru to make it around .03% rh at 1atm ,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, that is a low dew point probably well under -200f. The only thing that can mess it up is a wet fill from bad filtering.

I'm going to disagree. I don't think you will get a dewpoint with scuba air down to -200F. Am I wrong?

 

[JackD342]

the majority of cylindars are not getting properly inspected as it is. You ar ehard pressed to fnd a shop that has pit picks let alone a record of inspections. The reality is do a bogus inspection every year or do a bogus inspection every 2-3-4-5 years.

Would you mind providing your records from your survey of shops to determine their lack of pit picks and record keeping? And just how big was your survey sample to be able to state "the majority of cylinders are not getting properly inspected"?

Just curious....
(and a little tired and a little hangry today)

 

[NAM001]

I'm going to disagree. I don't think you will get a dewpoint with scuba air down to -200F. Am I wrong?

its measured down there or maybe its greater than -100 instead of -200 ... Either way you can purge the atmosphere humidity in the tank when putting on the valve by a couple of fill and vents.

just checked its lower than -100 not -200. .02% rh at 70F is right at -100 dewpoint I want to say the min for some filters components is -50 higher than that thngs like the monoxicon and carbon is not going to function right. so high pressure on the back pressure reg fo the moisture separater adn a good desicant is critical to get that.