Has Anyone Spun The Valves Off Russian Cylinders Before?

Yankee Rebel

the cylinder for my Kip-8 was empty when i got it awhile back, approximately 2 years ago, and i have no idea how long it had been empty before it reached my hands, or how it was kept.

my adapters should be on the way from Germany.. a phone call to straighten out my screw up with Watersafety last night saw to that hopefully.... but i want to ensure that my cylinder is safe to use before i go cracking the valve to fill it up. BTW just to reiterate, the mistake was my fault not theirs, and they were incredibly helpful in correcting it. next time ill call my order in since they speak English VERY well.

i remember reading somewhere that the LAR cylinders had problems with the valves breaking or being damaged when spun off, and before i go trying to remove the valve on the Kip-8 cylinder, i just wanted to make sure that the valves would handle it, and there wouldnt be any issues as a result.

anyone removed their valves on their Russian cylinders before?

thankyou for your help and advice

jaap

Oh yes!

These can be really tight...

I imported 5 KIP-8's (date of mfg 1971-91) and some other Russian Rebreather some years ago for me and a few friends (partly sort of a mistake, the KIP-8 is too much work for the 200$ a piece we payed)

That paste the Russians use to seal these valves can be really hard to get lose. I broke pieces of brass off one valve removing it thinking they would go like ordinary tape sealed valves of the same thread. This was using a vise that was not holding it from slipping a bit and and big adjustable wrench.

I'm no expert but I had sucess removing other valves w/o apparent damage by firmly strapping the cylinder to a strong support by either strapping it to a square pole using a sturdy metal hoseclamp and a sheet of rubber or putting it in a vise making a sort of cylindrical grip. Anyway it needs to be anchored very well.

I then used the right spanner (don't remember which and if it was metric o imperial, have acsess to sets of both). If the spanner does not fit exactly right brass will most likely break off. The thing is it was sealed so hard I had to add a 2 ft arm made from some aluminium profile I found laying around to make it go.

There is pobably a better way of removing these valves... Ordinary (taped sealed) Russian or Swedish valves of the same taper are not this tight.

Anway, judging form the cast and thickness of these cylinders they look like they are either overly thick walled and "rustic" in their design (seems very typical of old Russian gear...) for their WP or perhaps made of an inferior alloy...


I also had a very scary moment with one of the KIP-8 valves. After re-sealing it on the bottle using teflontape I tested the seal using air to ~230 bar. I know its a 150 bar cylinder but given that our O2-fills are from 200 bar cylinders I figured it was best to test if it would hold anyway... Being a chicken I stood around a wall doing it.

It held, but there was a trickle of gas from the regulator outlet of the valve. So I gently thightened the valve wheel taking care knowing that overthightening a valve seat can damage it. What followed was a sudden failure of the valve seat decompressing the bottle in about 3-4s...pretty fast.

I was happy it was only filled with air. It left me wondering what could have happened if it was 100% 02 given my hand was on the valve...

Anyway inside there is a hollow brass looking cone shaped male plunger that seals against a bakelite looking typ of feamale plastic seat. If overly thighten the plastic seat will perhaps shatter...

After this I'm very skeptical of old Russian cylinder valves. Given the Russian O2-connector is the same as the Swedish, for me its very easy to stay safer and opt for valves I know...

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fireman

Yeah I stapped it to a bench, and used a stap wrench and a cresent wrench on the valve. I destroyed one valve completely. I would plan on tumbling them also, I did and got a bunch of metal shavings out. I heard from an unnamed source the best way to hold them is put them up against a curb and park a truck tire on the cylinder...

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Yankee Rebel

thanks for the replies guys!

hmmm so im left with the choices of either take the valve off like im planning and have a 50/50 chance of breaking it, visually inspecting the inside of the cylinder and tumbling it to be safe, then re-O2 cleaning it.... oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooor leave it be and takes my chances....

welllllllllllllll anyone know what a replacement valve will set me back, and a source for them?

hehehe i like the truck tire trick! never considered it. hmmmm im going to have to take a picture of that... 88 F250 extended cab Diesel 4wd with 35" tires and a 6" lift parked on a Kip-8 bottle... just kinda makes me at the thought.

Dave Sutton

Don't remove the valves. Just forget it. Nobody is going to hydro them, so why bother? They were filled with dry 02, and even if they leaked down they were not exposed to salt water internally and will not be rusted. Just move on to the next subject and fill 'em.

If you REALLY want to remove them:

(1): Go to a place that services fire extinguishers. They will have a chain vise welded to an I-Beam set in concrete into the floow (just like the one I *used* to have in the dive shop before we lost the lease and had to move.. ..)

(2): Provide them the information that the valves have been historically difficult to remove, and make SURE they have the right wrench.


Let them remove it.


Plan B:

(1): Place the cylinder in the corner of a concrete or stone curb at the side of the road. Drive a car (light truck works well) towards the curb until the tire is "almost" climbing up the curb, trapping the cylinder, and then try. If it's a smaller cylinder, make up wood blocks to position the cylinder.

USE THE RIGHT WRENCH.

Add a piece of pipe to the wrench handle to increase the leverage.

Use GENTLE heat at the cylinder neck with a torch. Note the word GENTLE.



We have:

(1) Marred the valves beyond re-use

and

(2) Have broken them off flush with the top of the cylinder.


For that reason I simply don't bother any longer to work hard on these. I try to remove them with the truck and wrench method, and if they don't respond I forget them and move on. I would NEVER remove a valve for inspection, only to re-valve it with DIN if I *really* needed to. Best just leave good enough alone.


Dave

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jaap

New standard valves for these cylinders (Lillkonisk in Swedish or in German Kleinkonisch) with either an O2 or DIN-Air connector cost about 50€ here in Sweden.

Note that the German O2-connector is not the same as the Russian so don't try and buy a regular new kleinkonisch O2-valve from Germany.

This place sells new valves of this typ for DIN-Air:
Aircon® G5/8" Luft Ventil kleinkonisch - W+S Water Safety Europe GmbH - Online Shop - Seit 1999

This sort of air valves in various conditions can also sometimes be found for a few Euros on some of the European ebay-sites, like eBay Deutschland – Der weltweite Online-Marktplatz

I can help you get some new or used for either O2 or air from Sweden but I suspect you can find them more easily and cheaper in the US, perhaps from the LDSOH...

Nice tire trick Dave!

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