Mailing List Archive Mailing List Archive
> From: "A.Appleyard" <A.APPLEYARD@fs*.mt*.um*.ac*.uk*> > To: techdiver@terra.net > Date sent: Mon, 27 Nov 1995 09:54:18 GMT > Subject: Reaching your own cylinder valves > Priority: normal > Jason Rogers <gasdive@sy*.DI*.oz*.au*> wrote:- > > ... Surely it is harder to loosen the crotch strap, lift the set, and open > > the valve than it is to just change regs, (which can be done no hands if > > need be). ... a diver who practiced opening the isolation valve in shallow > > water before setting out on a big dive. (sensible precaution!) ... [he > > needed to start another cylinder deep, but because his wings were fully > > inflated to offset depth squeeze of the gas bubbles in his wetsuit] he > > couldn't reach his valve! ... He didn't die because there was someone there > > Reaching one's own cylinder valves over the shoulder is a contortionist job at > best and often impossible. I could about manage it when I started diving, with > a long thin 5.5" Submarine Products (Hexham in England) diameter cylinder > strapped straight to my back without a backpack shell. Now, with a backpack > shell, and a thicker cylinder, and more muscle bulk round my shoulders, I > can't reach my own valves any more than I can reach Mars or Cybertron. Why the > #%$& don't they make air scuba with the valves at the bottom and a long high > or medium pressure tube running up to the top of the cylinder(s), like in many > industrial compressed air breathing sets!? I can reach the bottom of my > cylinder easily while wearing it. In the 1960's there was a make of aqualung > called Normalair that had the valves at the bottom (made at Yeovil in > England). (It came with a fullface mask, about the first set I saw that had > its 2nd-stage at the mouth and not on the cylinder valve.) I have even heard > of people achieving this by mounting the cylinder in the stab upside down, > with a superlong hose to the 2nd-stage to reach the mouth. > -- Well, I'm considered a little weird by most of my diving buddies for wearinh my bottles the right way up (i.e. upside down to most other divers), but for the reasons that the valves are easier to reach, they sit flat on your back, and the valves are out of the way of the roof in a cave. Of course one must be careful sitting down when out of the water. By the way, I belong to a club named after the old Normalair set! > Send mail for the `techdiver' mailing list to `techdiver@terra.net'. > Send subscription/archive requests to `techdiver-request@terra.net'. > Greetings Prof JG van der Walt Head: Dept. Physiology Veterinary Science University of Pretoria Onderstepoort 0110 Republic of South Africa Tel # + 27 12 529-8025 Fax # + 27 12 529-8305
Navigate by Author:
[Previous]
[Next]
[Author Search Index]
Navigate by Subject:
[Previous]
[Next]
[Subject Search Index]
[Send Reply] [Send Message with New Topic]
[Search Selection] [Mailing List Home] [Home]