Tried the Pelagian....

Buck-O-Five · 15th May 2008, 15:55

Andy stopped by San Diego with his unit for a couple days. Yesterday I got to dive the unit, I like it! The needle valve is a very neat tool, and the size on the unit is stunning. Great job Andy!

Tyler S. · 15th May 2008, 15:56

stupid friend left his name logged in on my computer, I got to got to try the Pelagian, not Brandon

Marvintpa · 15th May 2008, 16:03

Any details?
WOB?
What you liked? Didn't?
Trim?

Tyler S. · 15th May 2008, 16:06

The WOB was very good, trim was perfect. The unit wasnt exactly configured for me (6'3" 205 lbs), Andy is a bit smaller than me

. One thing that took some getting used to was the over the shoulder counter lungs. The lungs on the pelagian I think are much better than on some of the other "OTS" units out there, they are built to match the curve of the harness they dont bulge way out in front of you. Also the unit is very light and very travel friendly.

DRE · 15th May 2008, 16:12

Quote: (Originally Posted by Tyler S.)

The WOB was very good, trim was perfect. The unit wasnt exactly configured for me (6'3" 205 lbs), Andy is a bit smaller than me

. One thing that took some getting used to was the over the shoulder counter lungs. The lungs on the pelagian I think are much better than on some of the other "OTS" units out there, they are but to match the curve of the harness they dont bulge way out in front of you. Also the unit is very light and very travel friendly.

Quick question: did you find these OTS Cl's to interfere with access to shoulder d-rings on the harness or not?
How is build quality on this unit compared to CK?

Thanks,
David

Tyler S. · 15th May 2008, 16:20

The OTS lungs are "in the way" of the d rings per say but I wouldnt really call it a hinderance its easy to just move them to the side. I would say the build quality is very, very good.

**Gill Envy** · 16th May 2008, 17:30

Tyler, how did you find using the needle valve and manual add button. I'm thinking of adding them to my copis meg, though the lightness of the Pelagian and the OTS all make me envious and wondering about just getting the whole thing down the line. Though I love the beefy build quality of the Meg it's a trade off though because it makes the meg huge and heavy and that is one of the only downsides to traveling with it.

I like the scrubber configuration on the Copis better than the Pelagian, I like being able to remove the can, any thoughts there?

I would like to know if the pelagian can take any of the radial scrubbers on the market as from what i've seen from witnessing two extended trips now with a prism diver, a radial scrubber reduces sorb requirements significantly, allowing one to travel with less sorb (like 30% less) which is where you really get screwed by overage fees. a radial scrubber would be a good addition to the pelagian, making it even more travel friendly and even more fit for deep and long duration dives. any info on compatibility would be great.

the pelagian seems more readily designed for deeper diving out of the shoot (not a depth limited mCCR) due to the needle valve and depth compinsating first stages, though it does requires the addition of a secondary po2/deco monitor to meet my needs just as the stock Copis.

One thing I"m noticing about an MFO is that it's harder to deal with the rising po2 on decent for deeper diving since, at the time when you want to be adding dilluent, the MFO is still adding O2. I'm basically forced into tolerating po2 of 1.5-1.6 initially on deeper dives or blowing a whole lot of dill and o2. I've noticed that turning off the o2 on decent is potentially problematic with an MFO as well, since the MFO would allow the high pressure line to depressurize completely, possibly increasing the chance of water ingress into the first stage and even the threads backing out on the line (something I've actually had happen) due to a lack of the usual "locking" pressure or whatever you want to call the pressure that usually keeps the "O" ring seated in the Din part of the first stage.

with the needle valve, it seems that you'd have more control of o2 flow on decent, ultimately having the ability to turn it off at this time when you don't want additional o2 added to the loop. I"m curious if Andy and anyone else can speak to the advantages of a needle valve on rapid, deep ascents, as i'm leery of the po2 spikes i'm getting with an MFO. That said, I do hear that high po2 spikes are pretty common even with eCCR's when ascending... I've heard of people routinely tolerating short term exposures over 2.0 on descent on 100M+ dives.

Tyler S. · 16th May 2008, 19:51

Gill I dont understand your po2 issues on deep dives. I dont have any problem on descent, what dil are you using? The dil should be doing its job by diluting the o2 thats being bled in, you should never have to turn your o2 off, unless you are at 200' on air dil

. I dont know about the Pelagian scrubber as I didnt see it torn apart. The needle valve kicks arse

PnL · 17th May 2008, 06:51

Andy would be the best person to answer your questions Gill, but I may be able to fill in some of the details in my review below as I had a chance to set up the unit, tear it down and dive it. As far as diving the Pelagian, several of us had the opportunity to try the Pelagian in San Diego and we all liked it. My impressions of the unit are as follows:

Size of The Pelagian.

The unit is VERY light and VERY compact. I had a nice long dive with it and it trimmed out very nicely - I guess all those reports I read about its trim weren't exaggerated

. It is very streamlined and has a very narrow profile, although this depends on the tanks you decide to use.

Scrubber.

The Pelagian doesn't use a separate scrubber canister and is designed to be very compact. It holds about 2.8 kg of 4-8 mesh sorb and filling it is more involved than on the rEvo, but is not a difficult chore. Andy does have a longer scrubber that has an eight hour duration and still has the same diameter scrubber, which is small! The ability to use tanks up to 7.25" in diameter (Al80) makes using the longer duration canister an easy task.

Gill - adding a radial scrubber canister would result in reduced sorb capacity due to the small size of the scrubber tube. I'm not sure how much benefit you could get with a lower capacity radial scrubber than a standard Pelagian scrubber.

Needle Valve.

I had reservations about the needle valve and how well it would work, but after having dived it I found it easy to adjust the flow to match my metabolic rate. I thought it was actually easier to dive the Pelagian because once you set the flow you don't have to manually add as often. The fact that it doesn't have a blocked first stage means you can take this deep without modifications. For those who still fear the needle valve - just don't use it and add O2 as you would any mCCR - its no different. But adjusting it on the fly is very simple and effective.

Turning the needle valve completely down does not shut off the O2 flow, on the unit I tried, the flow at the lowest setting was about 0.1 lpm. Andy tests the flow with a flow meter to show this and also so you can know what your metabolic rate it. Its very easy to determine your metabolic rate at different work loads with this unit, just measure the flow coming out of the valve after setting it.

Counterlungs.

The front mounted counterlungs follow the shoulder straps of your harness (standard hogarthian routing) so they are to the side. I didn't find any issues with slinging an Al40, but access to the D-rings is diminished since the counterlungs are on top of the harness webbing. I'm not sure what it would be like slinging multiple bottles. I think side-mounting would be a good solution, but I did not try this. I did not find the counterlungs to be intrusive and the WOB was pretty good - no complaints here.

There are two things the Pelagian counterlungs can do that I can't on my rEvo. First is the ability to remove water from the loop and the second thing is that you can do a positive test on the rig, something I am not able to do with the rEvo.

Pelagian Display.

I am used to the HUD on the rEvo, but diving without one was not a problem. The Pelagian display is quite small and light and was easy to see and keep out of the way. I was able to keep setpoint easily, especially after reaching my depth and adjusting the needle valve. I also liked that the Pelagian display uses a reed switch to turn on the display. The cable is also very durable and the display can hang off it without much worry ... although I'm sure this would not be recommended ... its much tougher than the audio cables used in other display applications.

Head.

The head of the Pelagian is very compact. It holds three cells, which need to be modified in order to fit the compact head, and to allow for the Instant Cell Validation. I had reservations about this as well. But it is VERY simple to do and will tell you how well your cells are working very quickly. However - you will have to do some math to know what the PPO2 should be at the depth you test your cells at, but its standard math that every diver has gone through many multiple times in courses

ADV.

I was not able to reach the ADV to manually activate it. But in the scenarios we discussed there were multiple options for flushing the loop. The ADV is sensitive in certain positions so the user must be aware of this - but you can take advantage of this to do a quick power flush of your entire loop. The ADV worked well in standard positions, but was more sensitive in a head-up position and face-up position.

Position of Valves.

I like having the valves up top. I find them to be much easier to reach then behind my back, especially with my wing inflated. It also puts more weight on top, which is one of the reasons for the great trim.

CONCLUSION.

I had the opportunity to not only dive the Pelagian, but went through preliminary Pelagian training with Andy. This gave me a great opportunity to learn a lot about the unit and Andy's philosophies. I think the Pelagian is a very solid unit with great characteristics. I would need more dives on it before I can make any final conclusions, but I truly do believe it is a great tool for diving. I'm hoping to be able to dive it more in the near future to see how well it fits into the diving I do. One thing that I can conclude is that Andy was able to dispel the reservations I had on the Pelagian.

My only comparison is to the rEvo, which is a great rebreather. The Pelagian does have some things I like better, but the rEvo has things I like better than the Pelagian. So for now, the jury is out until more dives are done on the Pelagian.

Also, I have to say that it was great to have Andy here in San Diego. He met most of the gang down here, had a chance to watch a local band, drink local beer, and eat good ol' American food

Paul

(BTW - I have some pictures of Tyler modeling the Pelagian ... I'll post those later this week)

depth · 17th May 2008, 07:58

Quote: (Originally Posted by PnL)

Scrubber.

The Pelagian doesn't use a separate scrubber canister and is designed to be very compact. It holds about 2.8 kg of 4-8 mesh sorb and filling it is more involved than on the rEvo, but is not a difficult chore. Andy does have a longer scrubber that has an eight hour duration and still has the same diameter scrubber, which is small! The ability to use tanks up to 7.25" in diameter (Al80) makes using the longer duration canister an easy task.

Gill - adding a radial scrubber canister would result in reduced sorb capacity due to the small size of the scrubber tube. I'm not sure how much benefit you could get with a lower capacity radial scrubber than a standard Pelagian scrubber.

Hi

Since I almost entirely dive cold Scandinavian waters, I have a question regarding the scrubber.

I am currently using a meg, here the scrubber is a seperate unit from the can. This means that there is air between the aluminium can and the scrubber plexi glas. This isolates the scrubber from the cold aluminium can.

I know that heat is an important factor for the scrubber duration. The Peagian does not have this feature. Does this mean that the scrubber duration is effected to a larger degree when diving in cold water?

I like the thought of a smaller Rebreather, but not if it effects scrubber time considerably!

/Christian

15th May 2008, 15:55	#1 (permalink)
Buck-O-Five CK #287 Pursuit & HUD Current Rebreather/s: Classic Kiss Other Rebreather/s: Join Date: Aug 2007 Location: San Diego, California Posts: 211	Tried the Pelagian.... Andy stopped by San Diego with his unit for a couple days. Yesterday I got to dive the unit, I like it! The needle valve is a very neat tool, and the size on the unit is stunning. Great job Andy! __________________ "The Brandon" www.sdtechdiving.com
(Offline)

15th May 2008, 15:56	#2 (permalink)
Tyler S. rEject Current Rebreather/s: rEvo Other Rebreather/s: rEvo Join Date: Nov 2005 Location: San Diego Posts: 173	Re: Tried the Pelagian.... stupid friend left his name logged in on my computer, I got to got to try the Pelagian, not Brandon
(Offline)

15th May 2008, 16:03	#3 (permalink)
Marvintpa Bad knees, matching brain Current Rebreather/s: Classic Kiss Other Rebreather/s: Join Date: Mar 2005 Location: Ontario, Canada Posts: 233	Re: Tried the Pelagian.... Any details? WOB? What you liked? Didn't? Trim?
(Offline)

15th May 2008, 16:06	#4 (permalink)
Tyler S. rEject Current Rebreather/s: rEvo Other Rebreather/s: rEvo Join Date: Nov 2005 Location: San Diego Posts: 173	Re: Tried the Pelagian.... The WOB was very good, trim was perfect. The unit wasnt exactly configured for me (6'3" 205 lbs), Andy is a bit smaller than me . One thing that took some getting used to was the over the shoulder counter lungs. The lungs on the pelagian I think are much better than on some of the other "OTS" units out there, they are built to match the curve of the harness they dont bulge way out in front of you. Also the unit is very light and very travel friendly. Last edited by Tyler S. : 15th May 2008 at 16:22.
(Offline)

15th May 2008, 16:12	#5 (permalink)
DRE New Member Current Rebreather/s: Not Bought Yet Other Rebreather/s: Not Bought Yet Join Date: Mar 2006 Location: Freeport, NY Posts: 3	Re: Tried the Pelagian.... Quote: (Originally Posted by Tyler S.) The WOB was very good, trim was perfect. The unit wasnt exactly configured for me (6'3" 205 lbs), Andy is a bit smaller than me . One thing that took some getting used to was the over the shoulder counter lungs. The lungs on the pelagian I think are much better than on some of the other "OTS" units out there, they are but to match the curve of the harness they dont bulge way out in front of you. Also the unit is very light and very travel friendly. Quick question: did you find these OTS Cl's to interfere with access to shoulder d-rings on the harness or not? How is build quality on this unit compared to CK? Thanks, David
(Offline)

15th May 2008, 16:20	#6 (permalink)
Tyler S. rEject Current Rebreather/s: rEvo Other Rebreather/s: rEvo Join Date: Nov 2005 Location: San Diego Posts: 173	Re: Tried the Pelagian.... The OTS lungs are "in the way" of the d rings per say but I wouldnt really call it a hinderance its easy to just move them to the side. I would say the build quality is very, very good.
(Offline)

16th May 2008, 17:30	#7 (permalink)
Gill Envy Shearwater Copis Diver Current Rebreather/s: Other CCR Other Rebreather/s: Evolution Other CCR Join Date: Nov 2005 Location: seattle Posts: 1,250	Re: Tried the Pelagian.... Tyler, how did you find using the needle valve and manual add button. I'm thinking of adding them to my copis meg, though the lightness of the Pelagian and the OTS all make me envious and wondering about just getting the whole thing down the line. Though I love the beefy build quality of the Meg it's a trade off though because it makes the meg huge and heavy and that is one of the only downsides to traveling with it. I like the scrubber configuration on the Copis better than the Pelagian, I like being able to remove the can, any thoughts there? I would like to know if the pelagian can take any of the radial scrubbers on the market as from what i've seen from witnessing two extended trips now with a prism diver, a radial scrubber reduces sorb requirements significantly, allowing one to travel with less sorb (like 30% less) which is where you really get screwed by overage fees. a radial scrubber would be a good addition to the pelagian, making it even more travel friendly and even more fit for deep and long duration dives. any info on compatibility would be great. the pelagian seems more readily designed for deeper diving out of the shoot (not a depth limited mCCR) due to the needle valve and depth compinsating first stages, though it does requires the addition of a secondary po2/deco monitor to meet my needs just as the stock Copis. One thing I"m noticing about an MFO is that it's harder to deal with the rising po2 on decent for deeper diving since, at the time when you want to be adding dilluent, the MFO is still adding O2. I'm basically forced into tolerating po2 of 1.5-1.6 initially on deeper dives or blowing a whole lot of dill and o2. I've noticed that turning off the o2 on decent is potentially problematic with an MFO as well, since the MFO would allow the high pressure line to depressurize completely, possibly increasing the chance of water ingress into the first stage and even the threads backing out on the line (something I've actually had happen) due to a lack of the usual "locking" pressure or whatever you want to call the pressure that usually keeps the "O" ring seated in the Din part of the first stage. with the needle valve, it seems that you'd have more control of o2 flow on decent, ultimately having the ability to turn it off at this time when you don't want additional o2 added to the loop. I"m curious if Andy and anyone else can speak to the advantages of a needle valve on rapid, deep ascents, as i'm leery of the po2 spikes i'm getting with an MFO. That said, I do hear that high po2 spikes are pretty common even with eCCR's when ascending... I've heard of people routinely tolerating short term exposures over 2.0 on descent on 100M+ dives. __________________ Gill Envy ...Because I wasn't born with gills! ><(°>><(°>><(°>><(°>><(°>><(°>><(°>><(°>
(Offline)

16th May 2008, 19:51	#8 (permalink)
Tyler S. rEject Current Rebreather/s: rEvo Other Rebreather/s: rEvo Join Date: Nov 2005 Location: San Diego Posts: 173	Re: Tried the Pelagian.... Gill I dont understand your po2 issues on deep dives. I dont have any problem on descent, what dil are you using? The dil should be doing its job by diluting the o2 thats being bled in, you should never have to turn your o2 off, unless you are at 200' on air dil . I dont know about the Pelagian scrubber as I didnt see it torn apart. The needle valve kicks arse
(Offline)

17th May 2008, 06:51	#9 (permalink)
PnL Custom Title Allowed! Current Rebreather/s: rEvo Other Rebreather/s: rEvo Join Date: Mar 2007 Location: San Diego, CA Posts: 169	Re: Tried the Pelagian.... Andy would be the best person to answer your questions Gill, but I may be able to fill in some of the details in my review below as I had a chance to set up the unit, tear it down and dive it. As far as diving the Pelagian, several of us had the opportunity to try the Pelagian in San Diego and we all liked it. My impressions of the unit are as follows: Size of The Pelagian. The unit is VERY light and VERY compact. I had a nice long dive with it and it trimmed out very nicely - I guess all those reports I read about its trim weren't exaggerated . It is very streamlined and has a very narrow profile, although this depends on the tanks you decide to use. Scrubber. The Pelagian doesn't use a separate scrubber canister and is designed to be very compact. It holds about 2.8 kg of 4-8 mesh sorb and filling it is more involved than on the rEvo, but is not a difficult chore. Andy does have a longer scrubber that has an eight hour duration and still has the same diameter scrubber, which is small! The ability to use tanks up to 7.25" in diameter (Al80) makes using the longer duration canister an easy task. Gill - adding a radial scrubber canister would result in reduced sorb capacity due to the small size of the scrubber tube. I'm not sure how much benefit you could get with a lower capacity radial scrubber than a standard Pelagian scrubber. Needle Valve. I had reservations about the needle valve and how well it would work, but after having dived it I found it easy to adjust the flow to match my metabolic rate. I thought it was actually easier to dive the Pelagian because once you set the flow you don't have to manually add as often. The fact that it doesn't have a blocked first stage means you can take this deep without modifications. For those who still fear the needle valve - just don't use it and add O2 as you would any mCCR - its no different. But adjusting it on the fly is very simple and effective. Turning the needle valve completely down does not shut off the O2 flow, on the unit I tried, the flow at the lowest setting was about 0.1 lpm. Andy tests the flow with a flow meter to show this and also so you can know what your metabolic rate it. Its very easy to determine your metabolic rate at different work loads with this unit, just measure the flow coming out of the valve after setting it. Counterlungs. The front mounted counterlungs follow the shoulder straps of your harness (standard hogarthian routing) so they are to the side. I didn't find any issues with slinging an Al40, but access to the D-rings is diminished since the counterlungs are on top of the harness webbing. I'm not sure what it would be like slinging multiple bottles. I think side-mounting would be a good solution, but I did not try this. I did not find the counterlungs to be intrusive and the WOB was pretty good - no complaints here. There are two things the Pelagian counterlungs can do that I can't on my rEvo. First is the ability to remove water from the loop and the second thing is that you can do a positive test on the rig, something I am not able to do with the rEvo. Pelagian Display. I am used to the HUD on the rEvo, but diving without one was not a problem. The Pelagian display is quite small and light and was easy to see and keep out of the way. I was able to keep setpoint easily, especially after reaching my depth and adjusting the needle valve. I also liked that the Pelagian display uses a reed switch to turn on the display. The cable is also very durable and the display can hang off it without much worry ... although I'm sure this would not be recommended ... its much tougher than the audio cables used in other display applications. Head. The head of the Pelagian is very compact. It holds three cells, which need to be modified in order to fit the compact head, and to allow for the Instant Cell Validation. I had reservations about this as well. But it is VERY simple to do and will tell you how well your cells are working very quickly. However - you will have to do some math to know what the PPO2 should be at the depth you test your cells at, but its standard math that every diver has gone through many multiple times in courses ADV. I was not able to reach the ADV to manually activate it. But in the scenarios we discussed there were multiple options for flushing the loop. The ADV is sensitive in certain positions so the user must be aware of this - but you can take advantage of this to do a quick power flush of your entire loop. The ADV worked well in standard positions, but was more sensitive in a head-up position and face-up position. Position of Valves. I like having the valves up top. I find them to be much easier to reach then behind my back, especially with my wing inflated. It also puts more weight on top, which is one of the reasons for the great trim. CONCLUSION. I had the opportunity to not only dive the Pelagian, but went through preliminary Pelagian training with Andy. This gave me a great opportunity to learn a lot about the unit and Andy's philosophies. I think the Pelagian is a very solid unit with great characteristics. I would need more dives on it before I can make any final conclusions, but I truly do believe it is a great tool for diving. I'm hoping to be able to dive it more in the near future to see how well it fits into the diving I do. One thing that I can conclude is that Andy was able to dispel the reservations I had on the Pelagian. My only comparison is to the rEvo, which is a great rebreather. The Pelagian does have some things I like better, but the rEvo has things I like better than the Pelagian. So for now, the jury is out until more dives are done on the Pelagian. Also, I have to say that it was great to have Andy here in San Diego. He met most of the gang down here, had a chance to watch a local band, drink local beer, and eat good ol' American food Paul (BTW - I have some pictures of Tyler modeling the Pelagian ... I'll post those later this week) __________________ SDTechDiving.com - A San Diego Technical Diving Community
(Offline)

17th May 2008, 07:58	#10 (permalink)
depth Custom Title Allowed! Current Rebreather/s: Megalodon Other Rebreather/s: Join Date: Aug 2006 Location: Denmark Posts: 147	Re: Tried the Pelagian.... Quote: (Originally Posted by PnL) Scrubber. The Pelagian doesn't use a separate scrubber canister and is designed to be very compact. It holds about 2.8 kg of 4-8 mesh sorb and filling it is more involved than on the rEvo, but is not a difficult chore. Andy does have a longer scrubber that has an eight hour duration and still has the same diameter scrubber, which is small! The ability to use tanks up to 7.25" in diameter (Al80) makes using the longer duration canister an easy task. Gill - adding a radial scrubber canister would result in reduced sorb capacity due to the small size of the scrubber tube. I'm not sure how much benefit you could get with a lower capacity radial scrubber than a standard Pelagian scrubber. Hi Since I almost entirely dive cold Scandinavian waters, I have a question regarding the scrubber. I am currently using a meg, here the scrubber is a seperate unit from the can. This means that there is air between the aluminium can and the scrubber plexi glas. This isolates the scrubber from the cold aluminium can. I know that heat is an important factor for the scrubber duration. The Peagian does not have this feature. Does this mean that the scrubber duration is effected to a larger degree when diving in cold water? I like the thought of a smaller Rebreather, but not if it effects scrubber time considerably! /Christian __________________ I am not qualified to make my own meg batteries!!! I am not qualified to make my own meg batteries!!! I am not qualified to make my own meg batteries!!! I am not qualified to make my own meg batteries!!! I am not.............
(Offline)

Thread Tools
Show Printable Version Email this Page
Display Modes
Linear Mode Switch to Hybrid Mode Switch to Threaded Mode