[CeeBee]

Will the last one out turn the lights off please?

[Sponge-Bob]

Quote: (Originally Posted by Genesis)

My question is simple - is it smoke and mirrors like the Marine Engine folks, or is it real?

If its real then its worth a very significant premium in the marketplace in terms of cost. But if its smoke and mirrors, well, then you're really just paying for bragging rights, aren't you?

You're not.

Genesis, I think you should know that this unit was entered into a nation wide competition run by the Scottish Executive, the prize for the developement of this unit was significant. This project WON that prize and the Directors of the company we presented with the award by the first Minister of Scotland. This was no 'Prom Queen' award, this was serious stuff! Alex is one of the countries leading technologist & inventors, granted he cab be a little excentric at times. However, he has worked on life critical systems in the Nuclear power industry. Would the kind of failures we see in diving equipment, namely rebreathers be acceptable in a reactor? Or even a car!

The unit is very real and has taken years of work, money and developement. Perhaps you think he should have tested it on the public long before it was ready?

What colour whould you like? Yellow perhaps!

Pass me another diver......I've killed this one!

[Genesis]

Yes, and not all that long ago we had people ringing accolades and awarding prizes for accomplishing cold fusion - a true miracle and breakthrough if it had been true.

Unfortunately, in the fullness of time, the truth came out.

All the arm waving and awards are very nice and make for great wallpaper. But we are talking about human lives here, and to the extent that someone is abusing the public trust by crowing over such "accomplishments" if they are not true they deserve scorn and derision, not praise.

The trouble here is that it is not possible to know which is the case. At least not now. And, I might add, not even when or if this device sees release to the recreational diving public - at least not for a while. Suspicion is further raised when Alex uses this "accomplishment" to bash every similar device he can find (even those who are not competing with him), going so far as to making the statement that they are being sold contrary to legal requirements. Never mind the allegation that the manufacturer of sensors that just about every unit specifies and uses (Teledyne) is producing a device that is unfit for the purpose sold and dangerous besides.

Yet Alex either cannot or will not produce the evidence behind his charges, and none of these other firms has been forced to pull their products, recall and refund user's money, or come into compliance.

Now I am willing to give Alex the benefit of the doubt on his claims, provided that DeepLife is willing to back its bravado, FMECAs and public pronouncements with its corporate 'nads.

Simply publish a statement on corporate letterhead that the DeepLife rebreather, with a better than one billion hour MTBCF, has an expected failure rate so low that there is no need to dive with bailout, as your risk of being struck by lightning exceeds the risk of the unit failing at an inappropriate time in a way that could lead to your demise.

If they really believe what they're saying, then why not do it officially, in public, on corporate letterhead - staking the company on their claims and opening themselves up to ruinous lawsuits if it is later proved they are incorrect.

If DeepLife is unwilling to do that, then why should anyone take their design seriously? Before you can ask me to trust your device, shouldn't you be willing to back up the bravado with your corporate life? After all, you're asking me to bet my real life through the act of believing you!

[Tino de Rijk]

"won an award a few years back"..... so what happened in these "few years"..? nothing to show as yet. Just big words, and lots of slagging off.

"Many of the ideas of Alex are now part of other companies upgrades"..... Care to mention me a few, very specifically please...? The CCR manufacturers I know (quite personally) avoid Alex like the plague. All the innovation I see going on with other, REAL, BUYABLE rebreathers are done without any help or contribution of Alex. Back up your statement with FACTS, please.

If Alex is indeed to save lifes remains largely to be seen - not in the last place because of an as yet total lack of an independant verifiable working unit, in real-life circumstances (i.e. outside the lab or CAD/CAM drawing board). So far I see in fact a very dangerous trend that IMHO will actually KILL people: Alex suggests his unit is perfect & foolproof, which is the best receipe to die.
Start trusting your diving equipment blindly, expect it to spot all and cover all, and you're on your way to your coffin.

The sad fact is that the vast majority of accidents could have been prevented by less complacent divers & better trained. Most of the criticism on supposed failure modes of e.g. the Inspiration that Alex vents are in fact very easy spottable & solvable (as in:find a safe way out, either OC or manual CC). Could it be better? Yes, always. Ask the guys as NASA, about their spaceshuttle.... and god knows how many engineers, MTBF calculations etc. went into that one. As to Alex experience in nuclear industry: dare I mention 3-Mile Island or Chernobyl...? also build by capable engineers, I assume. The last one being Russian design....

Perfection does not exist, and never will. My simple mantra: mistrust it, spot it & solve it.

Ciao,


Tino.

Quote: (Originally Posted by Sponge-Bob)

Hi guys,

I'm new to the forum but have been lurking a while and following this thread with great interest.

Alex has done a great deal of work on the Deep Life rebreather it won a Smart Scotland award a few years back for design, technology and innovation.

Many of Alex's idea's are now part of other companies upgrades (that many divers have paid extra for) that Alex provided to companies 'free gratis'. Most companies would have done a re-call! When it comes to electronics he knows his stuff.

Testing your product on a consumer is bad form. Why is it acceptable that a unit should kill you?

Testing the electronics of a unit by leaving it turned on for 24 hours then stamping and shipping all those that are still working in the morning as tested was the way it used to be in the bad old days before Alex.

Love him or loathe him the guy is try to do some good and save lives. Lots of positive input and lively debate with lots of fresh ideas will hopefully make the Deep Life rebreather a reality.

Cheers

[AD_ward9]

Tino De Rijk:
What happened in a few years? Just have a look at the gallery and the stuff we have been testing in the flesh (not CAD). We did a lot and continue to do so. On is complete publication of the hardware and verification. This gives you all the ammo you need to point out our errors.

On the other points, just have a look and you will find the answers.

As regards nuclear experience, British reactors have not had the accidents so far that befell some others, but they could in future, because at the end of the day, apart from the Canadian CANDU design, reactors adopt designs intended to create military material when required rather than safety first, even when they are civil reactors. This makes them inherently more dangerous. The incidents in New York State and Chernobyl 1986 are good examples of when safety systems are incomplete, allowing operators to do dangerous practices, including switching the safety system off. Processing plants have more accidents than the reactor itself.

The safest reactor is the Canadian CANDU design, but even then one of the first four of these, Pickering A, had an accident in 1994. The safety systems were then reviewed and installed to meet SIL 4 objectives, including a control, signalling and management as well as a system that can shut down the entire reactor in 2 seconds: there has not been an accident since on that reactor design.

You mention "slagging off". Please find the fault in the designs we have published, and the test plans we are publishing. Then please point out the error. I have pointed out serious safety deficiencies publically, only after a manufacturer has let years go by after being advised in writing of these and done nothing. I promise you, if you find errors or weaknesses in any design we do, not a week will go by without response and action.

Alex

Quote: (Originally Posted by Tino de Rijk)

"won an award a few years back"..... so what happened in these "few years"..? nothing to show as yet. Just big words, and lots of slagging off.

[AD_ward9]

Genesis: On your question on confidence limits.

MTBF figures are published for 60% confidence with an application temperature generally of 55°C. Where the test is accelerated, then the manufacturer provides traceability back to a non-accelerated number. We do not accept unsupported accelerated figures.

Manufacturers publish the numbers of components used in their the test, so one can calculate where the 90% confidence limit quite easily - see the foot of Quality - Reliability Programs for example. The numbers of components in the tests are high, but the failure rate is so low that companies generally give the 60% MTBF figure based on the duration of their test, and with no failures. That is, if 1000 components are tested for 1000 hours, then the manufacture will claim a 60% MTBF of 1 million hours (put roughly and in simple terms). Of course, it could be higher than that. Getting 80% confidence generally means twice as many hours, 90% twice as many again, etc.

The documents indexed by Quality - Metrics: Reliability gives the background to how a typical component is tested. The detailed component reports provide the data over time, that is the test ran every 8 weeks, so one then has a larger population still to work with. Using that data, the 90% limits are close to the 60% limits.

The electronics MTBCF is 2.9 billion hours, with 60% confidence. It is still well over 1 billion hours with 90% confidence. With the twin scrubber unit, the number is squared.

On your point regarding the front of the bathtub curve, the units are soaked in, and the manufacturer has a 10 year record of 0 ppm failures except for 1 year, with 1ppm, which was traced and rectified. This is on millions of populated circuit boards a year, used in temperatures from -40C to +120C (automotive - the latter is how hot cars get left in a dessert).

In addition to the manufacturer's testing, all components are tested by us for suitability. The next few months should see some of the reports on that published.

On the mechanics, we are doing a lot of testing at the moment and will publish those figures later. The biggest challenge is the hoses.

Alex

[Tino de Rijk]

Dear Alex,

At the risk of ending up in yet another very lengthy and boring THEORETICAL discussion with you, I'll simply point you out what my problem is. You are pointing it finely out yourself. All you have as proof is paper & designs & some maybe working demo-kit. I stress "maybe working", because no indenpendant divers (i.e. guys not belonging to your fanclub) have been able to test in REAL LIFe if it REALLY works as designed. Foto's are cheap, and always work. you keep stressing: point to errors in the design. I say: that is what the guys at NASA said about their spaceshuttle, and still two of them blew up. As you may know, all theories about independant design by two different companies had been applied there, and still...

There is only one real proof it will in fact work, and that is stress-testing in the flesh. I don't care about "proof" on paper. That is a classical engineering error: starting to belief blindly in your design. It is called being blinkered. As I pointed out in another post, this is why Boeing still does thousands of flying hours, by expereinced pilots, AFTER they were "sure" there design was perfect - and in that period they find that many assumptions were wrong, at least in details, or that real-life circumstances can throw many situations at you that you didn't anticipate during your design. And even after that, the airplanes being already sold on the market, they keep finding errors in the category of "wow! I didn't anticipate on that!".

In your case that can be silly things like an O-ring that is too thin, of not anticipating that a normal user opens or closes an element of your system in another way that you anticipated. In my professional life (I'm a senior IT infrastructure architect for a big bank) I have seen far too many situations were the designers and developers said "whow! the user is not supposed to do that...!". Microsoft applies things like modelbench-testing, automated design verifiers and 4-eyes-principles/sign-off, and still their stuff keeps showing weak spots in the field - even despite rigorous and broad alpha and beta testing by many "experts" in the field. That is what you do as well: exposing your designs, asking people to go through it & report back to you. Good approach, but doesn't garantee AT ALL that all problems get picked out. Real life is more creative & harsh.

Your following defense about nuclear reactors again proves my point: you declare two that failed as being wrongly designed (probably you are correct there; I'm not an expert), and next decalre another one, the CANDU, as safe - because nothing went wrong for 13 years. Thu!?!?! Nothing went wrong for a long time in 3 Miles island and Chernobyl as well, and nothing still doesn't go wrong in many reactors worldwide that you probably still deem unsafe. Probaly pure luck, something with MTBF (I won't go there: I don't know shit about MTBF, but you are seemingly the expert there, although Genesis disagrees).

Last point: you say: "I have pointed out serious safety deficiencies publically, only after a manufacturer has let years go by after being advised in writing of these and done nothing." Again very arrogant: you assume that only because you pointed out what YOU consider errors, will blindly be followed up by that manufacturer. This assumes in the first place that that manufacturer (AP Valves in this case; let's cut the secrecy) agrees with everything you pointed out. I can tell you firsthand that they did not. Will you in the future BLINDLY change anything in your ORB when a user "proves" there is something wrong with it, even if you don't agree? do you have a reply back from APD that says:" Dear mr. Deas, we agree with all your findings, they were all correct, and we confirm these are all indeed errors"..?

I'll leave the discussion here, as it is already boring enough. I'll return to my first lines, and also prime subject of my previous mail: I'm only interested in a real, working rebreather, testing by multiple independent divers not related to DeepLife, as proof that is REALLY works. Before that, any paper stuff and ideas are at best interesting (and I mean that seriously: some of your thoughts are indeed interesting, but some others scare the living hell out of me, because I can see many of your mechanical designparts easy fail in harsh real-life conditions; the stepper-motors in your BOV mouthpiece design to mention one) - but not more than that.

Parting note: APD realised also that there is a limit to the amount of paper and computer design & testing you can do. So a few years ago they invested for a fortune in what is still the world's biggest and best live CCR testing rig: a custom-made ANSTI rig where a complete working CCR unit can be taken to 200 meters, in real water, cold & salt, in any position, at any breathing rate, with measurement at the mouthpiece. I've seen you do some "proof" on an Inspiration scrubber canister, about breaktrough, on a workbench, with some analysers attached. It made we very sad, and shows exactly my problem with your sort of "proof".
For those who want to see the testing rig I am talking about, go see the Ambient Pressure Diving website, follow the links to technology, R&D and "tour the ANSTI testing facility".

And still the Vision is not perfect, although pretty good. It probably never will be perfect, as yours will never be perfect. Perfect doesn't exist, no matter how much we would like to. You should start acknowledging that you will not find out what your ORB is really worth, untill many divers will be diving it. Reach that phase, and we'll talk further. Before that time, I consider slagging off the competition (and only a very selective part of the competition; why..?) as just pre-emptively leveling the playing field for if & when your unit shows up. It's called marketing in normal words.

Ciao,

Tino.

Quote: (Originally Posted by AD_ward9)

Tino De Rijk:
What happened in a few years? Just have a look at the gallery and the stuff we have been testing in the flesh (not CAD). We did a lot and continue to do so. On is complete publication of the hardware and verification. This gives you all the ammo you need to point out our errors.

On the other points, just have a look and you will find the answers.

As regards nuclear experience, British reactors have not had the accidents so far that befell some others, but they could in future, because at the end of the day, apart from the Canadian CANDU design, reactors adopt designs intended to create military material when required rather than safety first, even when they are civil reactors. This makes them inherently more dangerous. The incidents in New York State and Chernobyl 1986 are good examples of when safety systems are incomplete, allowing operators to do dangerous practices, including switching the safety system off. Processing plants have more accidents than the reactor itself.

The safest reactor is the Canadian CANDU design, but even then one of the first four of these, Pickering A, had an accident in 1994. The safety systems were then reviewed and installed to meet SIL 4 objectives, including a control, signalling and management as well as a system that can shut down the entire reactor in 2 seconds: there has not been an accident since on that reactor design.

You mention "slagging off". Please find the fault in the designs we have published, and the test plans we are publishing. Then please point out the error. I have pointed out serious safety deficiencies publically, only after a manufacturer has let years go by after being advised in writing of these and done nothing. I promise you, if you find errors or weaknesses in any design we do, not a week will go by without response and action.

Alex

[MarkZ]

Alex,

The incident at Three Mile Island was caused by a faulty valve leading to a series of events that up to that point in history was never seen before or anticipated. Regardless of the speculation after it happened not one person on earth provided input to anybody in any country as to the possibility beforehand. The most remarkable thing is beyond the incident it is probably the only major event in this country that was not followed by scores of conspiricy theories afterward. The greatest minds in the world felt these plants were as safe as they reasonably could be.

At this point and I believe I can speak for many, after countless postings, criticism, pointing out of faults of others etc., it is time to produce a unit. I welcome innovation but simply want to see it in action instead of constantly reading about it. No manufacturer puts out units that they know will fail and cause injury. It isn't a civil liability issue it would be a criminal one where in this country could result in the death penalty. Nobody will argue that everything is perfect and that there is not room for improvements. Despite the nickname and your rambling AP has not once been shown to be at fault in their design in any kind of legal proceedings. That being said and all things considered as they say on this side of the pond, "Put up or Shut up".

[Genesis]

Quote: (Originally Posted by MarkZ)

Alex,

The incident at Three Mile Island was caused by a faulty valve leading to a series of events that up to that point in history was never seen before or anticipated. Regardless of the speculation after it happened not one person on earth provided input to anybody in any country as to the possibility beforehand. The most remarkable thing is beyond the incident it is probably the only major event in this country that was not followed by scores of conspiricy theories afterward. The greatest minds in the world felt these plants were as safe as they reasonably could be.

To add to this, Fermi I (my next door neighbor at the time was a physicist at the plant) nearly blew its stack as a consequence of a design change which was made to guard against a potential failure that could have led to a failure of the containment under very unlikely, but possible, circumstances.

Unfortunately, that act of "anticipating" a potential risk and attempting to mitigate it (via these very same sorts of formal FMECA procedures) introduced a second risk which was not anticipated, and what's worse, detecting that this second fault HAD occurred was missed due to an omission in the design that was ONLY significant with the first unanticipated risk in the system. NOBODY anticipated that second potential failure or its impact, and it was thus not modelled or controlled for.

The only reason this second fault was caught and disaster averted was the keen eye of a physicist on duty at the time who noted a reading that was out of the ordinary compared to what he had seen before. It was not a reading that was in and of itself dangerous, but he didn't understand what he was seeing. He initiated a scram.

Had he not done so when he did Monroe to Detroit (including my home, natch) would have been blanketed in a nice covering of radioactivity, and it is very likely that I (along with a whole lot of other people) would not be here.

You think Chernobyl was bad? You have no idea.....

[AD_ward9]

Quote: (Originally Posted by Tino de Rijk)

There is only one real proof it will in fact work, and that is stress-testing in the flesh. <snip>
Parting note: APD realised also that there is a limit to the amount of paper and computer design & testing you can do. So a few years ago they invested for a fortune in what is still the world's biggest and best live CCR testing rig: a custom-made ANSTI rig where a complete working CCR unit can be taken to 200 meters, in real water, cold & salt, in any position, at any breathing rate, with measurement at the mouthpiece. I've seen you do some "proof" on an Inspiration scrubber canister, about breaktrough, on a workbench, with some analysers attached. It made we very sad, and shows exactly my problem with your sort of "proof".

First point you make: the units are being tested very thoroughly in the flesh right now. We have been testing parts for a considerable time (not CAD, actual parts). .

On the APD rig, it is neither the world's largest nor has the greatest capability. Our own rigs, which are by no means the largest or the deepest either, go to 1400msw, any position, using sea water at breathing rates to 90lpm. The figures I published are from actual tests, not CAD. What is your issue?

Units were at DEMA 2006. Between 1st Jan and DEMA 2007, there are 17 verification reports to publish (most in Q1 2007), giving detailed results of testing every subsystems, and their most recent changes.

On the unexpected failure issue raised by Genesis, I agree that is the most important issue here. It is why we publish our Test Plans and do such thorough testing of every part, as well as formal verification of the design. On the faulty valve type accidents, that is exactly the sort of thing that formal verification picks up. Reactor designs do not have 100% formal verification.

Alex