Optima ExtendAir Duration Experiences?

Tienuts

It's not a matter me being cheap. All I am saying is I have, under some relatively easy or controlled diving conditions, pushed the limits of the scrubber to determine my own personal limits on the unit. Isn't that why some dive CCR? To push limits? If not, why not stay on OC? I might find myself in a circumstance where knowing this information can be useful.

And for the record, when in doubt, or when doing a more advanced dive, I use a new EAC.

jiseson

then don't dive!

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Jonathan D Iseson

jkaterenchuk

Ummmm....I guess I was to stupid to consider that as an option....thanks for pointing it out to me.

diverreb

The issue with trying to figure out your own personal limits by pushing the times on an EAC and the length of time between uses is that what works one time won't necessarily work the next.

Metabolism of O2 can change on any given day. An EAC that has been partially used, and sits in a bag for weeks, can loose efficiency at differing rates, depending on humidity.

CO2 hits aren't dependent on if you are deep or shallow, controlled and easy or pushing the limits.

I'm certainly not trying to tell you how to dive, but simply that it really isn't all that important to know if you can get five or six hours on an EAC.

I really don't think I'd like to be known as the guy who bought it trying to find the limits of his EAC.

Just be careful out there.

Richie

silent running

No, I quoted somebody who claimed that the expense of consumables should not an be an issue for anybody spending 10K on a CCR. I then pointed out that due to the number of EACs necessary for a 2 week trip to a remote destination, travel with EACs was unfeasable and that somebody contemplating buying an Optima would be in for a shock if they were considering travel to say, Papua New Guinea or Indonesia and expected to either find EACs for sale there, or bring enough with them on the plane. At some very real point in trip planning, the expense of consumables IS a legitimate concern for most people. I don't have the time, money or energy to plan out the logistics of getting EACs to say, Alor Indonesia, where I'm going in 3 weeks. If the customs duty on EACs is the same as sorb, it will double the unit cost and that's before we get to the cost of shipping 12 EACs around the world, or the hassel of making sure they get there and in usable condition. It's hard enough as it is to plan a trip to a remote location-making sure there's enough O2, finding an friendly operator, international and local airline weight restrictions, etc...

I can bring enough sorb- 2 tubs-for a month of diving in my checked bags before going over the US 70lb allowance per bag. If there is a cost effective and easy way to travel to remote places with all other CCR designs, why would somebody choose the Optima? Don't get me wrong- the Optima has many things to recommend it, but the lack of a granular scrubber isn't one of them.

And BTW, 6 hrs on Prism scrubber in warm-over 70F-water IS the mnf rating for air diluent. The 4 hr rating is for 4C water and a continuous flow of 1.35 LPM of CO2. And the 6hrs in warm water is still very, very conservative considering the 344 liters of CO2 the Prism scrubber can absorb until reaching the surface equivalent of .05% CO2 passing through...

silent running

That's very DIR of you, Jonathan.

Seeing as you how started diving CCR in 2007, you probably know that the O2 sensors in your unit weren't originally designed for diving applications and are notorious for unexpectedly failing in CCRs. And you have also elected to dive a unit that depends on a CPU and high current powered displays under many PSI of water to compute your PO2. Sounds a little risky to me. So I guess you have decided to manage the risks associated with such dangerous propositions and are maybe not so different from the rest of us daredevils... -Andy

jiseson

the airplane i owned had a manufacturers stated range of 1225 nm. so i guess on this line of thought on a warm day with a nice breeze i could get away with 1224.5 nm and still have a safety margin to land! -no matter how many years of experience-have been diving for 30- i will feel the same. i do i DIJ btw

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Jonathan D Iseson

JCdesign97

Guys, can we please put our d!cks away???

Andy, with all due respect because I think you add a lot to the board in general, the intent of this thread is for Optima OWNERS to discuss their experiences and what kind of duration they are getting out of their current use of EACs. This isn't one of the myriad general discussions about which is better - sorb or EACs.


If we acknowledge that we're not nearly as intelligent as you are, that we made a poor buying decision and that your Prism is way better than anything else out there, can we poor, unenlightened, soon-to-be-extinct Optima owners get back to discussing the topic at hand? Pretty please??

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Cheers,

John Cogan

silent running

Jonathan, who here is arguing for pushing limits to 99.9% of capacity/range?

silent running

Didn't know I had it out, must have been way drunker last night than I thought.



Thanks for the compliment? With all due respect to you JC, nowhere did I say sorb was "better" in some ultimate, overarching sense than EACs, that's not why I piped up. Things were being said which were not true and I pointed out that not everybody who goes beyond the mnf recommendations is a suicidal cheapskate who should be purged from CCR diving. The glaring omission of a granular scrubber option for the Optima means that for most of us, it's not feasible to use an Optima in most remote locations, where some of the best diving is. So, duration is obviously important to people who travel to dive and this was not being taken fully into account in the discussion. Instead we get people quoting mnf specs, making uniformed judgments about other's motivations and posting stuff that's not accurate.

And last time I checked, you don't have to be an Optima "OWNER" to post on any thread. Things would become very boring and cliquish around here if that were the case. There have been many uninvited comments on Prism threads and I don't recall anybody trying to chase them out with anything more than logic.

I've said many times that the Optima is a good unit and that EACs have some very good features and I would like to have more CCR divers available to dive with in the beautiful remote parts of the world, not less. Maybe the Optima designers will finally get the granular scrubber out if more people complain about this blatant limitation, that's my beef, simple as that... -Andy