Looking to Buy a Rebreather

[macado]

I'm probably ordering a Petrel 3 in August. I really wanted haptic feedback and almost bought the Divesoft computer because it has it. I think it's a really good safety feature that Shearwater was just slow to adopt.

Is haptic feedback the panacea that some people think it is? Absolutely not.

My opinion is if you can ignore a HUD flashing in your face AND a computer vibrating on your wrist you should not be diving a rebreather, period. Personally you shouldn't be diving a rebreather if you ignore any of those things but people can and do. To be blunt it's why some people are no longer alive. A little more feedback to alert the diver is not necessarily a bad thing.

I'm a big proponent of two monitors. For a long time I ran my SF2 with 2 Shearwaters (no HUD). I'm not anti-HUD by any means as I have HUDs on my rEvo and Defender but I just found I got more "mileage" by running two Shearwaters on my SF2. My opinion is I'd feel safer running without a HUD if I had a vibrating handset in lieu of a HUD but I'd rather have both hence why I am upgrading to a Petrel 3.

I have seen lots of people simply zone out HUDs. It does happen. Either the HUD is not adjusted properly, slightly out of their peripheral vision, or not bright enough.

 

[Marie13]

The Teric has had it since that came out a couple years ago. Shearwater also now recommends only lithium energizer batteries, and the haptics wont work with alkaline cells. The motor is very strong and must require a relatively large amount of power. That may have limited the practically before.

Teric can’t be plugged into a rebreather.

 

[davehicks]

how do you know we/they haven't been?
Shearwater is very hush hush about their developments and while I'm obviously not connected to Shearwater, doing an update to the Petrel was clearly very low on their priority list. It should have been the very bottom though, it worked and it was very small in terms of their growth potential compared to the Peregrine, Perdix, and Teric. They're running like a "real" company now and they have to with new ownership so no one will fault them on it. It's also been fairly low of a priority for the manufacturers because they've had the NERD and blinky HUD's as options. KISS is really the only significant manufacturer that isn't using DiveCAN or their own electronics *yes I am aware of guys like Fathom, Triton, etc. but they're insignificant in terms of size*, and they have always had the Freedom as an option which also brings the benefit of being able to manually vote out cells. I actually firmly believe that a single handset with haptics is MUCH more reliable and safer than using any of the cell splitters to have dual outputs. If you want to do that with a NERD then that's perfectly fine and arguably better than the wrist units since it puts it in your face, but either are still much more reliable than splitters and that makes them safer IMO.

The Perel 3 update may just be part of simplifying the manufacturing and rationalizing costs. They updated both the Perfix and Perel, but the case design did not change. They reduced 4 models to 2 by dropping the non-AI option and raised the average msrp at the same time.

 

[Marie13]

From the posts I’ve seen online, I’m of the opinion more people are probably excited about the Petrel 3 due to AI than the haptic alarms.

 

[davehicks]

Teric can’t be plugged into a rebreather.

Yes, but the haptic alarms work for more than ppo2. They added the feature there first was my only point, so it is something they have worked for a long time now.

 

[davehicks]

From the posts I’ve seen online, I’m of the opinion more people are probably excited about the Petrel 3 due to AI than the haptic alarms.

Then it is good marketing. Something for everyone. Haptics sold me, AI sells it for someone else.

 

[tbone1004]

The Perel 3 update may just be part of simplifying the manufacturing and rationalizing costs. They updated both the Perfix and Perel, but the case design did not change. They reduced 4 models to 2 by dropping the non-AI option and raised the average msrp at the same time.

The Perdix was actually released because they needed an injection molded body instead of a CNC machined body due to capacity constraints as the recreational market was starting to buy the Petrel. The Petrel 3 is still going to have a custom board on it in at least 2 variants to be able to handle the ADC of the sensors for analog monitors and the DiveCAN integration. It could be an add-on board to the Perdix board, but I bet it's 3 different board designs.
The Petrel 2 was getting very long in the tooth and was overdue for an upgrade. With a lot more CCR divers adopting WAI for sidemount it makes sense to add it into the Petrel for monitoring the O2/Dil bottles and the haptics is something divers have been asking for over the years but as said above, it does use a good bit of power so the battery selection may have an issue in getting it out. The computers that have used haptics in the past/currently do are all powered by lithium batteries

 

[broncobowsher]

Didn't Poseidon have haptic built into the BOV?
...This is only off memory from a LONG time ago.

 

[rddvet]

I don't like a HUD. As a photographer, and a mCCR user I've felt that a HUD is more nuisance than benefit. A well trained mCCR diver is always checking their ppo2 and gets a feel for how and when it degrades or spikes.

It could very very easily be argued that a hud should be almost standard equipment for photographers on mCCRs. I love my mccr because I like being in control. But when you throw something like a camera or other intensive work into the mix, we know that complacency can easily creep in.

 

[tbone1004]

Didn't Poseidon have haptic built into the BOV?
...This is only off memory from a LONG time ago.

The Se7en's HUD vibrates and was developed by Jeurgensen who made the Hammerhead