Deep wreck expedition

WBA

The thing about the Sport Kiss is that it needs a thorough shake-down dive (or set of dives). In our group of seven a few of the units had leaks here and there but were mostly all fixed after about 3 hours in the pool. It's surprising for them to still be leaking if these guys had been diving the units for more than a few dives.

decoweenie

I thought so, but just want to make sure (PH and BA).

That must have been BA who made the same for his MK-15. I heard about it, but have never seen.

User error there. The instructor should have shown them how to make the velcro taps on top stronger if they were going to jump from high places.

Now, that'd be interesting since we have some discussions on the KISS list about the rating of these glands. At what depths when the leaks started, do you know ?

I will inform Gordon on that also since they do leak-test, but not to the depth that you guys have been.

Easy, answer = PHI box. It was done to completely protected the red pods for wreck penetrations.

IMHO, it is partly the users and partly because they didn't do the necessary steps to prep their units propoerly to protect them.

decoweenie

I had one that he did for the MK-15. Looks very home-made with off-the-shelf parts...

Pelagian

Wow, Sound like a phenomenal trip.

Stu if you book a wreck hunting trip to Indo on the Empress count me in.

Cheers

Seb

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'Because... I was Inverted!'

Jamie B

I am out there in December. Long way off, can't wait, but I do promise a trip report!

JamieB

schford

Dr.mike has sent me all the info and it is somethign we are activly looking at.

Stuart

Pelagian

We just had Gordon and Kim Smith here and I completed my instructor crossover to the SPORT kiss with Tom.

We all agreed that while the unit knocks spots of the Dolphin for shallow(<40m) diving, it lacks some essential saftey features for deeper stuff.

The good thing is that it's modular design allows it to be upgradeable.

Bruce Partridge designed the Shearwater controllers and solenoid for the unit, to give you a back up to setpoint control if you get distracted at deeper depths where the constant flow orofice on the Kiss has trouble keeping up.

I understand from Gordon that this is being binned in favour of something new he's working on.

They're also working on some Split over the shoulder counterlungs with a dump valve in the bottom so that you have a greater chance to recover from a flood and stay on the loop, which is much more of a concern for long deep decompressions when bailing out OC has carries some serious penalties.

Finally they're working on a bigger scrubber canister that'll help to solve some of the scrubber ineffecience's encountered at depth with the 4.4lbs that is currently avaialble, especially since the design was around 408 mesh, and using 812 produces some fairly vicious inhalation breathing resistance if your trim is completely horizontal.

I think these upgrades will make the sport KISS much more suitable for deep stuff.

Cheers

Seb

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'Because... I was Inverted!'

Andrew Goldby

I've been asked by one of the other expedition members to post a response to Dr Mike's original exped. report (since they are not a member of this forum).

Please bear in mind that the views are those of the Author and not my own

Here's a more accurate account. Let's see if Mike can let go of the euphoria of the deep & recall ;-)



The only rig that sustained major injury was Mike Gadd's Mk15. He cracked the dome of his center section, a potential complete loop failure event. This injury was matched by that to Mike's own head: He smacked into a wreck's overhang while riding his scooter at full-tilt in zero visibility. This was not his only equipment failure: Apart from his memory ;-) Mike also killed a bottom timer, a dive computer and his own laptop. And his scooter wasn't looking too well at the end of the trip.



When it became apparent that four of the divers would have no influence on the itinerary and that (perhaps) one dive a day would be made in conditions so bad that even Mike said he had never seen the like before, we decided to try and salvage something from the trip. (And I don't mean drop once on an unresearched wreck and smash and grab. Salvage?) Note that *all* of the wreck pictures and the safe came from the only wreck we dived that had more than 1m of visibility. True, we were told that the "viz on the 103m depth wreck was great", a dive I did not attempt for personal safety constraints (I don't like very short dives with long deco hangs or to dive without a bailout plan I can accomplish), but even Mike still emerged with his customary "it was all a blur".



What Mike describes as a "nightmare" was in fact our standard routine of testing stuff until it breaks. After 49 years of diving and 10 years on "expedition" rebreathers (I own 8 and have been a crash-test dummy for many), I want a CCR I can carry anywhere in the world on light aircraft. (Think Bikini) We have greatly modified our SK rigs and so the answers to the questions below are specific to ours and should not be generalized.

Finally, I am very rigorous about testing equipment that's going to support my life and do not measure CCR maintenance in the number of beers consumed between dives. Perhaps this kind of evaluation is a nightmare to some.



So, questions we answered (all or in part) were:



Can you dive a compensated O2 first stage to depth?
Does the plugged O2 first stage actually stop working suddenly or slowly?
Which make of O2 sensor holds up best to the temperature swings of calibration on deck (39C) and diving to <20C?
Does the sensor calibration hold linearly in the important range of 0.9 to 1.4 bar over ten days of use - as measured by a pressure pot and the varying gasses you will actually dive?
What is the in-use performance of the sensors and do they match and/or need recalibration at what interval? Again - - as measured by a pressure pot.
What happens to the linearity of O2 sensor response when you add high helium mixtures?
Will the KISS valve hold a high loop setpoint on deco and at various depths?
What's the performance of different scrubber change times?
Do the O2 meters match and stay in calibration over time and temp?
Does an integrated Vr3 match the sensors over time, depth, temp?
How can you best match an unintegrated Vr3 with a sensor-integrated Vr3 on the same dive/diver?
Will a solenoid O2 controller give better control than a carefully adjusted KISS valve and an experienced hand on the add button?
What happens to a DESO at depth on an uncompensated reg?
Can I over breathe the rig at depth, in a current?
How quickly will CO2 levels return to acceptable, in the event of a build-up?
What are the best positions to hold on deco for static loop volume?
etc, etc.


Problems?

Apart from traveling half-way round the world and listening to Mike repeat endlessly - "You're on the wrong trip"? Don't I know it! I might as well have been diving a pile of junk at the end of a rope. What bothered us most was the fact that little or no attention was paid to what the four KISS/OC divers wanted to dive. There was supposed to be some "compromise" that never transpired. The viz was uniformly bad below 70m. Vidar claimed 400 sites, many shallower than 70m. When we four asked to dive these sites, or even the sites we were already on more than once - to allow us to orient ourselves a bit on the wreck - we were told that we needed to "move on". In general, this was about the least interesting trip I have even been on.


1. The Velcro holding the counter lungs failed when we jumped from the boat, loaded with stages into a modest current. This happened once on this trip and was easily remedied by reinforcing the Velcro with tie-wraps.


2. A positive pressure test revealed some bubbling from the pod/counter lung connections to the scrubber. There was never any evidence of ingress of water. I added a pair of O-rings to mine; my dive buddy RTV cemented his in place.



I recommend you always perform both a positive and negative pressure test prior to every dive. Also do a bubble check at modest depth 3-10m, on any CCR unit you dive.



The nightmares I had were not with my equipment, but due to watching people take significant risks and wondering how they would survive a loop failure and being lost on a wreck.

schford

Andrew,

Please share with us the author of this report.

Stuart

Mdemon

Looks like you had a great trip Mike!

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