Are AI transmitters as accurate as SPG's?

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I don't think this was the issue...changing the cap for a new one was always part of the instructions for changing the battery/removing the cover. I purchased an official Suunto battery kit with new cover about 3 months before the recall just to have as a backup. My transmitter battery was going strong so I had not use the kit yet when the opportunity came to send the transmitter in for the recall inspection. The transmitter cover in my battery kit does not have the white "O" printed on it. I called Suunto about using the non-"O" cover in the future and they said there were no issues with the cover specifically. They did not get into specifics but eluded to a the fast increase in pressure within the transmitter when opening the cylinder valve. I believe when they realized they should have had pressure reducers installed from the start they decided to recall, inspetc, and provide the pressure reducers upon return...for the hassle they also changed the battery, cover, and o-ring at no cost to the owner. I believe it was a recognition that their product had the potential to be dangerous and that by recalling, inspecting, and returning with the additional pieces they substantially lowered the chances of an issue from occurring and substantially reduced their potential liability.

That is just my thoughts/belief...I have no concrete data to back my notion up.

-Z
The Suunto transmitter recall included an inspection of the interior for any corrosion caused by leaks from past sloppy battery changes. That corrosion was part of the failure issue on not one, but two units owned by the same diver, that started the whole thing going. So it was inspect, pressure test, change battery; oring; & cap, and add the flow restrictor. That plus a more formal battery change procedure including dealer training is what you received with the recall.
 
Egads man! You could have, AT LEAST, put on a pair of proper trousers.......I am flabbergasted.....and, a little confused.

haha, I was fully clothed, promise. Was in college at the time so was definitely wearing basketball shorts and realize that picture looks a bit strange
 
What? No long hose/short hose jokes yet?
 
It’s not the length of the hose, but how you use the transmitter.
 
I just compared readings from 9 analog pressure gauges. 7 read within 1% of each other at 3,000psi. One read about 5% high. One read almost 10% low. 3 of the gauges were 1990's vintage or older. 3 were probably less than 5 years old. I did not have any transmitters available to test.

In industry, I have seen pressure transducers fail about 15 times. Probably 2/3 of the time the failures were complete, with no noticeable change in calibration before the failure. Vibration seems to aggravate the sudden failures. About 1/3 of the time, a noticeable change in accuracy was the reason for changing them out. The 15 or so failures were across a couple of hundred pieces of machinery, which each probably average 2 sensors per machine. The timeline of the sample referenced was several years. That's less than a 1% failure rate on an annual basis, under mostly constant use industrial conditions. These were not dive transmitters, but I suspect that the same underlying Wheatstone bridge technology is probably present in them as well.

Based on this, I would consider it prudent to check the readings of a transducer or SPG against another periodically, just to make sure that nothing looks substantially different. Making that check is as simple as screwing your buddy's regulator onto your tank, so doing it once every few months would not seem onerous to me.
 

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