Argon bottle regulator. How simple is too simple?

[burak]

Hello,

I have done a few dives with my small argon bottle already. I used to use my apeks ds4 as a regulator because I had one extra.

Now I'm gonna use the ds4 as a stage regulator.

While I was looking at the argon regulators at the market I noticed that they are all unbalanced piston regs. I have a scubapro MK2 plus first stage which is also an unbalanced piston reg. I'm guessing MK2 and the argon regs are basically the same.
I wouldn't use it as a stage regulator in cold water 35 to 45 F and I'm not sure now to use it as drysuit inflation reg.

What are you guys thinking of using piston regs in such a cold water?

If you need drysuit and argon then it is cold water. So having such a regulator for the coldest dives while not having it as stage or main regulators seems like a paradox for me.
If it's ok to use such regulator because of characteristics of argon or just because you have much less gas flow?

thanks.
Burak

 

[Jim Lapenta]

My own thoughts as someone who uses a suit bottle for ice diving and other cold water dives is that I want a sealed reg. I have an older argon reg that I think is by OMS. There are no markings on it and it has one LP port and an OPV. It is sealed though as far as I can tell. Even still I'll be replacing it with a reg I know is sealed. Not worth the risk. For while ideally you should be adding gas to the suit in small controlled bursts, stuff happens. And it's not worth risking a runaway ascent if you bump the inflator or it gets pressed accidentally.

 

[burak]

so, you are against all the so called "argon regulators" with unseald piston design.

Is there anyone who took such a reg to ice diving or really cold water and had problems?

Does anyone know if there a significant difference in these regulators to my MK2?

 

[elan]

so, you are against all the so called "argon regulators" with unseald piston design.

Is there anyone who took such a reg to ice diving or really cold water and had problems?

Does anyone know if there a significant difference in these regulators to my MK2?

I use one of those reg every winter in 37f water. I never had it frozen.

 

[fdog]

I use a cheap argon regulator, and it's been quite reliable. However, just in case it fails, I have a length of LP inflation hose on my 70' bottle.

It hasn't happened to me, but a friend spent weeks setting up a once-in-a-lifetime dive to ~250' on a Destroyer. His argon reg imploded on the way down, and the suit squeeze was too much for him, so he aborted the dive. Was pissed off as can be. Having the extra inflation hose would have saved the dive.


All the best, James