O2 + CO analyzer choices.

[RJP]

Uh-huh. Please explain just what you chose the word "disruptive" to mean when you used it.

Or, in the URL you posted "disruptive" innovation will "disrupt current market behavior by transforming value propositions, rendering current products/services obsolete". So alternatively please explain which current market behaviour a CO analyzer will disrupt in that fashion.

Which one WILL the cootwo disrupt... or which one COULD it disrupt?

Further down in the linked article:

Additionally the “render current solution obsolete” part doesn't even necessarily require a “current product/service” to exist. Some of the most disruptive innovations create such a dramatically new offering that it renders “do nothing” or “not having the ability to ________” obsolete. TV, for example, was clearly a disruptive innovation. But TV did not render radio obsolete. It rendered the concept that “you can’t watch the news/sports/entertainment” obsolete.

What is the current market behavior when it comes to analyzing scuba tanks for CO?

What is the current market behavior when it comes to analyzing O2 percentage?

It's not hard to envision how a product that analyzes both gases at the same time might have the opportunity to change those current market behaviors.

 

[dmaziuk]

What is the current market behavior when it comes to analyzing scuba tanks for CO?

What is the current market behavior when it comes to analyzing O2 percentage?

From my (very limited) observations:

- people mostly don't check CO if they trust the shop. Just because I have a CO analyzer isn't going to change that.

- People do check nitrox. Often the shop would have the analyzer right there next to the pile of cylinders. Of course, there's still the trust: that shop's analyzer is working properly.

It's not hard to envision how a product that analyzes both gases at the same time might have the opportunity to change those current market behaviors.

Which market? For end users the 2-in-1 would

- let nitrox divers who are checking their gas already also see the CO percentage.

- Get air divers who aren't normally checking their gas rush to buy the device and start checking every tank everywhere? I'm sure there are places where you'd want to do that, but the basic assumption is that ops have a vested interest in not killing their customers. So for them filling the cylinders with contaminated air would be counter-productive and not their "normal" behaviour. For me, trusting them to run a clean shop is the norm, so you want to change that to distrust and paranoia?

Similarly for the ops whose normal market behaviour is to run a clean shop, it's gonna change to what, then?

Don't get me wrong, it's a handy little device and I expect I'll buy one at some point. Calling it a disruptive innovation if only it was marketed properly is pipe dream of a used car salesman. I mean, at least if they could sell it for fifty bucks there'd be no excuse not to buy one. With a price tag above that of a last year's "lite tek" DC: meh.

 

[RJP]

From my (very limited) observations:

- people mostly don't check CO if they trust the shop. Just because I have a CO analyzer isn't going to change that.

Checking CO or not is a diving behavior, not a market behavior.

(Hint: As long as you have purchased the analyzer... the marketing department doesn't much care if you ever use it.)

---------- Post added July 12th, 2015 at 12:51 PM ----------

Calling it a disruptive innovation if only it was marketed properly is pipe dream of a used car salesman. I mean, at least if they could sell it for fifty bucks there'd be no excuse not to buy one. With a price tag above that of a last year's "lite tek" DC: meh.

Whether or not something is a disruptive innovation can really only be done in retrospective analysis, as the definition is based on market-impact, not on technology.

PS - keep in mind that price is a marketing variable, so it's funny that you say that how the product is marketed makes no difference... and then highlight that a marketing variable is the only thing that will make a difference to you.

 

[dmaziuk]

Checking CO or not is a diving behavior, not a market behavior.

(Hint: As long as you have purchased the analyzer... the marketing department doesn't much care if you ever use it.)

Market is not marketing. Only in marketing the market will hurry to purchase the analyzer because the divers don't normally use it. (Note that it isn't because other analyzers don't exist -- very much unlike the first TV vs. radio).

Whether or not something is a disruptive innovation can really only be done in retrospective analysis, as the definition is based on market-impact, not on technology.

PS - keep in mind that price is a marketing variable, so it's funny that you say that how the product is marketed makes no difference... and then highlight that a marketing variable is the only thing that will make a difference to you.

I didn't say it's the only thing. If I go diving with some shoddy op ran out of a dilapidated chop shop in a fifth-world country, I'll bring an O2 analyzer: with all those stolen cars around, who knows what may get into compressor intake. I have no plans to do that, nor get a nitrox cert in the immediate future, though, so at the moment it's something I don't really need for the "marketing variable" directly convertible into a sixpack of a decent malt scotch.

 

[Seymour Fisch]

Let me jump in and give RJP a break from pushing the marketing angles.

Personally, I'm rather conflicted, as on one hand, I'm an obsessive-compulsive safety freak, but on the other hand, I'm very much a go-with-the-flow, don't-rock-the-boat kind of guy. So, I bought a CO analyzer when they became cheap enough, specifically for a trip to an off-the-grid dive location, yet I ended up not using it, as it seemed a bit too much of a hassle, and not part of the "normal" procedures that everyone expects. (And I feel like an idiot for having behaved that way...) I think my internal conflict is what the overall market is facing, too: analyzers have become cheap enough that it seems silly not to analyze every tank, but very few people are doing it yet, so it still feels annoying and abnormal.

I was recently flipping through the Spring 2015 issue of Alert Diver, and there's an incident report of a very serious CO poisoning, quite nearly fatal. The article is full of praise for the excellent pre-trip training and planning, resulting in prompt rescue, appropriate first-aid, and eventual full recovery for both victims. But in the incident, no one had a CO analyzer, no one analyzed anything, and in the recommendations, they give very weak advice, to "Ask the dive shop when their air was last evaluated" and only "Consider [emphasis mine] learning to use and bringing air test kits with you".

Now, imagine an identical incident report, except that two misfilled nitrox tanks resulted in two divers in convulsions with oxygen toxicity. But thanks to their well-trained and quick-thinking colleagues, they are quickly brought to the surface and resuscitated, with a full recovery. But no one on the expedition had brought an oxygen analyzer, no one had analyzed any tanks. Would the equivalent article be unreserved with praise? Would it say only, "Consider learning to use an oxygen analyzer and analyzing your nitrox tanks before diving them"?

Why the double standard? I'm guessing that this is just a historical glitch. If/when people realize that CO analysis is cheap and easy and portable, then it will start becoming the standard, expected behavior. You could even imagine OW certification courses teaching students to analyze EVERY tank for CO, just as current nitrox certification courses say to personally analyze every tank of nitrox. THAT would be disruptive market behavior, as it would create a huge (by Scuba standards) market for CO analyzers, where there's only a tiny one right now.

So, how do you get people to realize that CO analysis is cheap and easy and portable? I guess you could build a great analyzer that's cheap and easy and portable. Beyond that, how you get people to become aware of a product, or even that they want/need a new product category, or change attitudes and expectations, I have no idea whatsoever. I wonder if it's related to this "marketing" stuff that RJP keeps trying to sell...

 

[descent]

... how you get people to become aware of a product, or even that they want/need a new product category, or change attitudes and expectations, I have no idea whatsoever. I wonder if it's related to this "marketing" stuff that RJP keeps trying to sell...

When I was a fresh-faced, starry-eyed outsider, and the Macintosh was new, I could count them on one hand and recite their bios.

Now I am old and jaded. Their jargon, their cant and their astroturfed social proof blackens the earth across Silicon Valley, like a biblical plague.

Nazgul? No.

Technology evangelists.

 

[dmaziuk]

If/when people realize that CO analysis is cheap and easy and portable, then it will start becoming the standard, expected behavior. You could even imagine OW certification courses teaching students to analyze EVERY tank for CO, just as current nitrox certification courses say to personally analyze every tank of nitrox. THAT would be disruptive market behavior, as it would create a huge (by Scuba standards) market for CO analyzers, where there's only a tiny one right now.

I think you're kinda glossing over a couple of little points, the more obvious being that coo2 isn't actually cheap. It's affordable. As I said upthread, if it were cheap there'd be no excuse not to have one.

The other one is you need to program your O2 percent into your DC in order to get its toxicity calculations right, so you want to know exactly what's in the tank. That's normal procedure. CO poisoning, OTOH, is not normal procedure: it's accidental on the order of "stuff happens".

I would say, take the proportion of CO poisonings to cases of DCS/LOO, and the courses should pay the proportional amount of attention to each. I suspect my OW instructor got it about right: we were told about CO, how it gets there, etc.

 

[DiveNav]

......Is it valid to calibrate in free open air, then read O2 level in flowing air? ......

I suspect that lots of people do it because free open air is easily available.

..... I have no idea if the sample gas flowing makes any difference to the sensor....

Oxygen sensors (that are chemical devices) are affected by pressure, temperature and humidity. Most of them have some kind of analog temperature compensation built-in.
Some divers use a flow reducer connected to the BCD low pressure inflator hose to minimize the effects of pressure.
cootwo has a built-in digital pressure and temperature sensor and compensation algorithm.

If you calibrate an Oxygen analyzer in free open air and then measure a gas content of a tank, most likely all 3 (temperature, pressure and humidity) will change and the result will be less accurate.
Based on our tests, for likely humidity conditions, the variation could be in the fractions of percentage (as an example a 38.0% gas could be 38.4% or 37.6%)

Keep in mind that in most recreational dive computer FO2 can only be programmed in whole numbers (37%, 38% or 39%).

..... Then, it has to stay on and the calibration valid long enough to get onto the boat and take a reading of the gas there..

Define long enough

 

[marcushall]

If you calibrate an Oxygen analyzer in free open air and then measure a gas content of a tank, most likely all 3 (temperature, pressure and humidity) will change and the result will be less accurate.
Based on our tests, for likely humidity conditions, the variation could be in the fractions of percentage (as an example a 38.0% gas could be 38.4% or 37.6%)

Keep in mind that in most recreational dive computer FO2 can only be programmed in whole numbers (37%, 38% or 39%).

OK, so probably not too far off, but sub-optimal.. 1% error certainly isn't significant in itself, but if too many of them start adding up all the same way, it can get to be significant..

Define long enough

This was originally in the context of calibrating the unit with my phone, then leaving the phone in the car, heading down to the boat, getting on board and settled in, then calibrating the Nitrox cylinders already on the boat. I'd guess an upper bound of 30 minutes or so.. Does the cootwo put itself to sleep by then if left on? Does that require re-calibration after waking up? Probably do-able, but I'm still bummed that it can't self calibrate (without a smart phone for help). The BUD does a lot with a single button...

 

[JohnN]

OK, so probably not too far off, but sub-optimal.. 1% error certainly isn't significant in itself, but if too many of them start adding up all the same way, it can get to be significant..

Measure with a micrometer, mark with chalk, cut with an ax. . .

The nitrogen loading algorithms were never written on clay (or golden) tablets, nor is the 1.4 PO2 level currently accepted as "safe", nor the NOAA OxTox levels (even though you'll never hit them with recreational diving profiles).

DiveNav gave a spread of plus/minus 0.4% More than 'close-enough'