Light Monkey heated undergarment

[manni-yunk]

Does anyone have feedback or experience on the new light monkey heated top? Ive been holding off getting heated undergarments for a few years and this may be the year.

 

[tbone1004]

I would get the heated motorcycle vest from Exo2 long before I'd get the Light Monkey. Anything using wires to heat is going to put you at a risk for shorting and the Exo2 uses a proprietary carbon impregnated panel that you can stab with a knife and it won't short or diminish the heating capability

 

[Rainer]

I would get the heated motorcycle vest from Exo2 long before I'd get the Light Monkey. Anything using wires to heat is going to put you at a risk for shorting and the Exo2 uses a proprietary carbon impregnated panel that you can stab with a knife and it won't short or diminish the heating capability

"Two thermal pads, each drawing 20W of power, for a combined 40W of unparalleled efficiency. Unlike traditional heater vests, these thermal pads use a silicone-insulated, carbon fiber heating element instead of wire, so they won't bend and short out over time. The thermal pads plug into your heater bulkhead using an o-ring sealed push-locking connector; this keeps the connection to your battery source locked and secure while diving."

Light Monkey

 

[tbone1004]

@Rainer I saw that but i'm not sure what the actual material is. Either way it's $400 vs. $200 for the Exo2 vest on Amazon so I'd just as soon save the $200 and go that route...

 

[Schwob]

I would get the heated motorcycle vest from Exo2 long before I'd get the Light Monkey. Anything using wires to heat is going to put you at a risk for shorting and the Exo2 uses a proprietary carbon impregnated panel that you can stab with a knife and it won't short or diminish the heating capability

Are you diving that vest?
How many dives did it hold up so far?
How much actual heating time do you get out of a charge?

 

[tbone1004]

Are you diving that vest?
How many dives did it hold up so far?
How much actual heating time do you get out of a charge?

i have one however it does not have hardly any dive time on it since i don't have much of a need for it. When I was doing development work with them for some other projects in a prior life we found the panels tested with about a 10x durability factor vs. traditional solutions for thermal insulation and these were going in some much more aggressive projects *about as much as I can say is heated soft bladder fuel cells for the military*.
Number of dives is not something I know, however I do know some divers that use them regularly with over 500 dives on them with no issues

heating time depends on your controller and battery. If you use it with the UWLD controller you have 0-20-40-60--80-100% control with it that will not change over the burn of the battery *battery voltage is higher than vest voltage*. On low with the big battery it will last 22 hours, on high it will go for about 4.5hrs. If you use the Light Monkey controller, you will have a progressive decline in heat over the same heat setting since the heat output is directly tied to the voltage. The LM batteries are the same nominal voltage as the vest so you lose heat as the battery dies. With the Pitkin controller you get 30/60/80/100 control over it however the 100 on a half battery will start to blur with the 80 on a full battery and the jump from 0-30 and 30-60 is pretty aggressive. At 100% the vest goes up to like 125F or something ridiculous which is quite hot for a long period of time.

If you get one of these, I would argue that you need a heat controller of some sort. The safety concerns of going from cold to instantly 125F on your skin are very real, the hassle of switching on and off to cycle is very real, and if you leave it on with something like a LM or most other brands batteries *DUI Blue Heat, Halcyon etc* who are using nominal 12v batteries, the heat drops down over time which is the opposite of what you want from a DCS perspective

 

[Schwob]

@tbone1004
Whoa... some digesting to do.
And more looking to do... more based on want than need. And no hurry. Was not even sure yet what that vest you mentioned from Amazon comes with (with or w/o battery / controler), because I have not really searched for it (there seem several versions under that brand).
Just was wondering about first hand experience. So much stuff gets recommended that was not even used by who is recommending...
Mental note 1: not by tbone1004, he knows his sh..
Mental note 2: Have the decency to do a little more homework prior to asking.

Anyway, this is good stuff and not depending on wires that fail seems like a good idea. The whole regulator thing: need to look into it ... and in the end pricing for the whole all of it...

Now for the crowning dumb question:
This would be drysuit use able only, right?

 

[tbone1004]

@Schwaeble no worries, this is part of what I do for a living.

as of right now that system is for drysuit use only. If in fresh water, UTD sells a "waterproof" backwrap that uses the same technology however I'm not entirely sure of the durability of their waterproofing solution *i.e. I wouldn't use it day in and day out in salt water with a wetsuit, but in fresh it's probably fine*

 

[decompression]

Kosta has one of the compact dive series heated shirts from Thermulation......have to admit I'm curious.

 

[decompression]

I know Jeff S used the UTD wetsuit heater and was toasty in a 3 mil full in 50 deg SoCal waters. I cant believe Exo2 is selling the drysuit system for $229! its $899 on the UTD website. I'm thinking its just for the pad itself. If not, wow.