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Anthony, In a message dated 98-01-09 13:45:26 EST, you write: << > > I met a guy with a exploded bondage wing yesterday. He had a freeze up on > > the inflator during a cold water dive. It resulted in a uncontrolled > > filling of the wing. He went ballistic and could not dump air due to the > > over pressure thing failed. Can you imagine the sound when a twin cell > > bondage wing explode:-) > > > > The guy did not hurt him self but is no longer looking for a new bondage wing! The runaway inflator would have only been filling one of the two air cells, so it probably didn't sound too much different than a single wing would have. However, the people who advertise this stuff tell you that the other air cell gives you redundancy in case one fails, but there's a chance the second cell would be compromised by the first one blowing up in this type of incident, depending on whether it blew toward or away from its mate. There's also the chance that even intact, the second cell would extrude through a split in the outer jacket and cause some really interesting bouyancy issues. -- Anthony DeBoer <adb@on*.ca*> >> --------------------------------------------------------------------- This was apparently simply a stuck inflator valve coupled with ice in the dump valves. Could have happened to any poorly maintained and/or operated buoyancy device. Not the fault of the bondage wings ! The only way I can see cold conditions causing a failed dump valve is if he let ice form on them on the surface and it held them shut . Since the report says the diver was unhurt the incident probably happened near the start of the dive before the ice could melt in the water. Diver Error ! ! ! I have known divers to drill out the inflator orifice so they could inflate faster and it turns out that if the inflator sticks open they will inflate faster than you can possibly dump them and there is no time to do anything about it before you are doing the poseidon missile imitation. Stupid move ! Most BCD's inflate slowly for this very reason. The bondage wings are designed for a fast dump in any position anywhere in the known universe because there is always positive pressure on the contained gas. This same factor will cause it to fill more slowly than normal wings so that cooling with gas expansion in the inflator would actually be less likely to cause ice than with unbound wings. So, what we have here is a diver who now fears the consequences of a stuck inflator valve refusing to buy the only set of wings designed specifically to accommodate that exact situation if used properly because he blames the wings for what appears from the report to be his own failing. I doubt that the secondary bladder would be damaged by a rupture of the primary unless there were some edgy objects on the rig close to it or parts of it were not completely free to move. There is one situation that could cause damage to the second bladder by over inflation of the primary bladder (or normal inflation for that matter) ; In ocean caves and possibly some wrecks small sharp pieces of various stuff (coral and possibly iron slivers freed by corrosion) can fall from the ceiling and lodge between your wings and tanks. Holes can be punched in the bladders when pressed against these . The old inner tube inside the shell trick should help with this. The secondary bladder slipping out of the shell could be interesting, as you suggest but it probably wont get completely away from you with all the connections involved and the fact that it passes through a hole in the shell. You could probably pull it down and hug it or loop it under an arm till you got your act together. Definitely a time for a cool head and careful moves. You'll probably be at or near the surface by that time anyway, or pinned against an overhead. Chuck Boone -- Send mail for the `techdiver' mailing list to `techdiver@aquanaut.com'. Send subscribe/unsubscribe requests to `techdiver-request@aquanaut.com'.
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