Spare Air – The Best Item in Your Scuba Toolbox

[chrisch]

Spare air is a joke and the OP spam. Can we delete this thread please mods?

 

[lowviz]

Spare air is a joke and the OP spam. ...

Yep, and nope. The OP is marketing a junk (my opinion) product in an approved forum for a change. This isn't "Basic Discussions".

I'm still waiting for Spare Nitrous Oxide. -for when you screwed up and want to go out smiling...

 

[WarrenZ]

Does anyone want to buy my spare air? it is a great product you might not make it back to the surface with it but when it runs out of air you will be much closer.

 

[chrisch]

.. The OP is marketing a junk (my opinion) product in an approved forum for a change. ....

Fair point. Not "news" though.

 

[Bob DBF]

Yep, and nope. The OP is marketing a junk (my opinion) product in an approved forum for a change. This isn't "Basic Discussions".

I'm still waiting for Spare Nitrous Oxide. -for when you screwed up and want to go out smiling...

You have to understand that this will be hard for me to do as I am no great fan of Spare Air.

The product is not junk, the ad campaign is one of the best in SCUBA to mislead the buyer of it's attributes and into purchasing the product. Boulderjohn showed us how easy it is to figure out how much, or little, the air in one of those bottles can help in an emergency. Problem being that the OW diver today probably can not do the math when planning a dive, and Spare Air advertises to help the new diver with his biggest fear, OOA.

I picked up a SA back in '94 when I had some loose cash and it was pretty cheap. It was fun in the pool, however I had issues with it on north coast beach exits where it would pick up grit and have to be cleaned or it didn't operate properly. The cleaning was a PITA because it is smaller than a regular second and my hands were numb. This issue I don't blame on the SA but my diving, it would work fine on the first dive, the second if I cleaned it. Since I never used it for any "emergency", and just for goofing around, I quit carrying it unless I wanted to push someones buttons. After the SA I set up a pony bottle for redundancy when I need it, and it's not large enough for some either.



Bob
----------------------------------
There's A Sucker Born Every Minute.

 

[boulderjohn]

BTW, my calculations did not include the fact that the regulator on a cylinder--any cylinder--will be unable to deliver air as the pressure drops to near ambient. That means not all the air in the 1.7 cubic foot cylinder will be available to you in an emergency ascent. You will get the most out of it if there is a high quality, balanced regulator on the cylinder, but I somehow suspect that the one on the spare air is not of that variety.

 

[Doppler]

I notice that comments are closed on the original posting on Diver Wire. Pity.

 

[C Dub]

My favorite part is where she changes from the 3.0 to the 1.7cuft ........ahahahahahahaha.

 

[oldschoolto]

My favorite part is where she changes from the 3.0 to the 1.7cuft ........ahahahahahahaha.

It's to help her be more streamlined and reduce weight ... Silly

Jim....

 

[flots am]

BTW, my calculations did not include the fact that the regulator on a cylinder--any cylinder--will be unable to deliver air as the pressure drops to near ambient. That means not all the air in the 1.7 cubic foot cylinder will be available to you in an emergency ascent. You will get the most out of it if there is a high quality, balanced regulator on the cylinder, but I somehow suspect that the one on the spare air is not of that variety.

Negative numbers are bad, and indicate how much air you didn't have.

Assuming that the reg won't deliver below it's IP, a 3CF Spare Air has 2.7CF of usable gas. Even if you take no time to figure out what went wrong and no safety stop, and are only moderately stressed, the SA is still 0.8CF short.

Note that these are my numbers, valid for me.

DO NOT MAKE ANY DECISIONS REGARDING HOW MUCH GAS YOU NEED BASED ON THIS DATA.

DO YOUR OWN MATH.

No-Decompression Emergency Ascent Gas Requirement Calculator
Areas with a yellow background should be changed to match your personal gas consumption
Stress Level	Relaxed	Average	Stressed	Really Stressed	Wow!
RMV	0.40	CFM	0.60	CFM	0.90	CFM	1.35	CFM	2.03	CFM
Maximum Depth	60	Ft	60	Ft	60	Ft	60	Ft	60	Ft
Ascent Rate	30	ft/min	30	ft/min	30	ft/min	30	ft/min	30	ft/min
Stop/Think/Act Time	1	Minutes	1	Minutes	1	Minutes	1	Minutes	1	Minutes
Safety Stop Time	3	Minutes	3	Minutes	3	Minutes	3	Minutes	3	Minutes
Gas Used Stop/Think/Act (cu ft)	1.1	CuFt	1.7	CuFt	2.5	CuFt	3.8	CuFt	5.7	CuFt
Gas Used: Ascent to Safety Stop	1.3	CuFt	1.9	CuFt	2.9	CuFt	4.3	CuFt	6.5	CuFt
Gas Used: Safety Stop	1.7	CuFt	2.6	CuFt	3.9	CuFt	5.9	CuFt	8.9	CuFt
Gas Used: Safety Stop to Surface	0.2	CuFt	0.4	CuFt	0.6	CuFt	0.8	CuFt	1.2	CuFt
Total Gas Required (Cu Ft)	4.4	CuFt	6.6	CuFt	9.9	CuFt	14.9	CuFt	22.3	CuFt
Cylinder Selection
Positive numbers indicate the amount of gas remaining after ascent. Negative numbers indicate insufficient gas.
Stress Level	Relaxed	Average	Stressed	Really Stressed	Wow!
Spare Air 3cf	-1.7	CuFt	-3.9	CuFt	-7.2	CuFt	-12.2	CuFt	-19.6	CuFt
Luxfer 13	7.5	CuFt	5.3	CuFt	2.0	CuFt	-3.0	CuFt	-10.5	CuFt
Luxfer 19	13.5	CuFt	11.3	CuFt	8.0	CuFt	3.0	CuFt	-4.4	CuFt
Generic 30	22.6	CuFt	20.4	CuFt	17.1	CuFt	12.1	CuFt	4.7	CuFt
Luxfer 40	31.5	CuFt	29.3	CuFt	26.0	CuFt	21.0	CuFt	13.6	CuFt
OMS 45	36.4	CuFt	34.2	CuFt	30.8	CuFt	25.9	CuFt	18.4	CuFt
OMS 50	39.9	CuFt	37.7	CuFt	34.4	CuFt	29.4	CuFt	22.0	CuFt
Luxfer 80	65.2	CuFt	63.0	CuFt	59.7	CuFt	54.8	CuFt	47.3	CuFt
Faber 95	79.8	CuFt	77.6	CuFt	74.3	CuFt	69.3	CuFt	61.9	CuFt
Faber 108	94.9	CuFt	92.7	CuFt	89.3	CuFt	84.4	CuFt	76.9	CuFt
Distance to Safety Stop	45.00	ft	45.00	ft	45.00	ft	45.00	ft	45.00	ft
Ascent Time to Safety Stop	1.50	Minutes	1.50	Minutes	1.50	Minutes	1.50	Minutes	1.50	Minutes
Average ATA – Bottom → Safety Stop	2.14	ATA	2.14	ATA	2.14	ATA	2.14	ATA	2.14	ATA
ATA At Depth	2.82	ATA	2.82	ATA	2.82	ATA	2.82	ATA	2.82	ATA
ATA At Surface	1.00	ATA	1.00	ATA	1.00	ATA	1.00	ATA	1.00	ATA
Average ATA – Safety Stop → surface	1.23	ATA	1.23	ATA	1.23	ATA	1.23	ATA	1.23	ATA
Ascent Time to Surface	0.50	Minutes	0.50	Minutes	0.50	Minutes	0.50	Minutes	0.50	Minutes