Sherwood , Zeagle or Aqualung

[ams511]

some one just perched zeagle and atomic reg comp. may have good close out prices on the aqualung apex clones that zeagle was selling

You may want to use spell check and proof read your posts. I am not a spelling Nazi and make plenty of mistakes but your grammar and spelling make you sound like a 3 year-old.

Huish Outdoors purchased Atomic Aquatics in 2011 and Zeagle in 2012. Neither of these acquisitions could be considered recent. Also the company is Apeks not Apex and it was not always a part of Aqualung. They were an independent company until they ran into financial problems and were purchased by Air Liquide, Aqualung's parent company, in the late 90s or early 00s. Zeagle had a contract to distribute Apeks regulators in the US and Canada, this distribution ended in about 2000 or so. Apeks are now distributed by SeaQuest and Zeagle sells regulators of their own design built in the USA. They are not Apeks clones.

 

[needmynitrogenfix]

Zeagle is my choice! i've been using their reg and bcd for many years, servicing myself, no problems. if you are not going to be diving cold water dont bother with the enviromentaly sealed overly complicated regs.

 

[buddhasummer]

Zeagle is my choice! i've been using their reg and bcd for many years, servicing myself, no problems. if you are not going to be diving cold water dont bother with the enviromentaly sealed overly complicated regs.

What do you mean "overly complicated"? I own both and do not find them any harder to service nor would consider them overly complicated it's a pretty simple design. Having said that I do own Apeks and maybe Zeagle is different. Cheers.

 

[Centrals]

if you are not going to be diving cold water dont bother with the enviromentaly sealed overly complicated regs.

"Overly complicated regs"!
I don't think an additional Environmental End Cap, Hydrostatic Diaphragm and a Hydrostatic Transmitter could be described as complicated for Apeks regs.

 

[needmynitrogenfix]

"Overly complicated regs"!
I don't think an additional Environmental End Cap, Hydrostatic Diaphragm and a Hydrostatic Transmitter could be described as complicated for Apeks regs.

clearly if something has more parts than needed it is overly complicated. for example: environmental end cap, hydrostatic diaphram and hydrostatic transmitter - if you are only diving in warm water then those thing are completely useless and make servicing the reg slightly more expensive and take slightly longer not to mention the reg costs more.
but i dont even know if he is diving only warm water so dont get too excited!

 

[buddhasummer]

More parts does not necessarily equate to more complicated nor overly complicated. Regs are pretty simple by design. Perhaps it's semantics but complicated generally gives the impression of difficulty and an enviro sealed diaphragm reg IMO is no more difficult to service than an unsealed one. YMMV.

---------- Post added March 4th, 2014 at 11:10 PM ----------

I'm not sure why it would make it more expensive to service. As far as time goes it might add a couple of minutes to the process, well on Apeks anyway.

 

[Centrals]

clearly if something has more parts than needed it is overly complicated. for example: environmental end cap, hydrostatic diaphram and hydrostatic transmitter - if you are only diving in warm water then those thing are completely useless and make servicing the reg slightly more expensive and take slightly longer not to mention the reg costs more.
but i dont even know if he is diving only warm water so dont get too excited!

Those things are NOT completely useless even diving in warm water!!! If you have seen all those rubbish being built up inside the chamber and clogged up the spring!
If you know how to service a Apeks reg then you know your statement is far from the true. Same 1st stage kit and putting those three parts together at the end would not take more than a minute or two. Well, unless the technician is charging by the sec instead of hr!!

 

[Luis H]

clearly if something has more parts than needed it is overly complicated. for example: environmental end cap, hydrostatic diaphram and hydrostatic transmitter - if you are only diving in warm water then those thing are completely useless and make servicing the reg slightly more expensive and take slightly longer not to mention the reg costs more.
but i dont even know if he is diving only warm water so dont get too excited!

I find that having a dry environmentally sealed regulator takes a lot less time to service since there is a lot less corrosion to clean. The dry environmental chamber keeps the spring and the chamber clean with no corrosion or salt deposits. The most time consuming portion of servicing a regulator is cleaning corrosion not disassembling something so simple.

I have converted all my diaphragm single hose regulators (Conshelf and Titans) to dry chambers just to keep that section clean. I soak my regulators, but by adding the environmental chamber I can extend the time between service by many more years (easily over 10 years).

The only regulators that I have not converted are those that never see any water: utility regulators for inflating tires or clean shop air for blow drying.

 

[kradatzke]

Hello All

Thank you all for the information you have been able to give.

As far as environmentally sealed goes I will be in some cold water here on the West Coast of Canada. I am taking the drysuit course here and they say the water will be around 6 degrees C. To me it also makes sense to keep the parts sealed from salt water which I would think would keep corrosion down.

After reading a few reviews on the Sherwood SR1 I think I will stay away from the SR2 until there is more feedback on it. As for the Aqualung the shop has quoted me $550 ( cdn) for the Legend with a Titan octo , if I decide to go with the Aqualung I will likely make them an offer. One downside is the shop does not sell any BCD's that I am interested in.

The shop with the Zeagle also has BCD's that I like ( Zeagle Ranger) , they have indicated they can give me package pricing on the reg's and BCD. I am waiting to get clarity on the Zeagle parts for life here in Canada , but will see what they can do for a package. I bought a new Suunto gauge console on Ebay over the weekend so I am good there. I expect I will likely dive 25-30 times a year, It's not the number of dives I will be making but the time between servicing. I am thinking that if I can take reg's in every two years and only pay for labor I would be happy with that and give me peace of mind while diving.

Are there any Canadians that know what Zeagles criteria is for the parts for life? The shop has said they do have parts for life but has not found out if to qualify you can go 2 years between or if it has to be an annual service. If an annual service is required to keep in the program I see no value in it. The Aqualung is every two years to stay in the parts for life.

A few people have indicated the reg's I am looking at are likely more than I really need, and they are likely right. I have read a lot of good things on both the Legend and the Flathead. I expect I will have these for quite some time and don't want to be thinking in a year or two I wished I had spent a bit more and got a nicer breathing reg. That extra $150 or $200 now only works out to $10-15 a year over the next 15 years.

Thank you all

 

[Jim Lapenta]

You have to remember that you are paying for the "parts for life". You're just doing it up front. No reason either of those regs with proper care and the amount of dives you plan to do can't easily go more than two years between servicing. Solid, reliable, and proven. Unless they get screwed up somehow a $35-$50 inspection/cleaning once in a while may keep you going for several years without a rebuild.

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