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I had a disk go in my shop at 4am on a brand new valve. The tank completely emptied in the roughly 40 seconds it took to jump out of bed and get downstairs. No fire - No high pressure - correct disk - just gave up the ghost out of the clear blue. Upon inspection I found the edge of the hole in the plug had rough uneven edges which made irregular dimples in a circular pattern around the disk. It was obviously hanging on by a thread the whole time. This was a manufacturing defect that could exist on any new valve and the reason I suggested in an earlier post that anyone buying a new tank or valve replace the disk when you buy it if you intend to use it in a technical application (preferably with a "no pop" or stacked disks - plug the hole ! ). With manifolded doubles you will be loosing gas from both cylinders if this happens at a rate of about 1500 psi per 40 seconds. Even if you get your isolator shut down fast you will loose all the gas in one tank and a damn lot in the other. Solo overhead divers take note ! This is not an excuse for using independents - it is a reason to get the hell rid of the standard birst disk configuration from the start. Cheep insurance ! I am sure there must be some slow corrosion of these brass disks in a salt water environment. Do you deliberately force water into these plug holes when rincing gear off? Might not be a bad idea to check older valves on some of these 72's and 38's for a problem here as well. Plane crashes are rare but this means nothing to the guy going down in one ! Chuck
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