8 More hours on the Hammer Head

Mark Chase · 9th July 2006, 14:18

8 more hours on the HH

So after crimping the threads and spending £30 on silver conducting grease, I set up the HH for the three planned dives. All in the region of 60m all in the region of 140min run time.

Calibration was carried out in a bag and then the head was striped and reassembled. In doing so one of the wires broke at the banana plug connection. A bugger to strip the end without breaking one of the fine wires but a simple enough job to re-solder. The streight connection, the telephone wire and the cell plate crushing the cables when you screw it down is a bad combination. Note to self take soldering iron on holiday with you.

So after recalibrating I had a solid 1.00 and a reasonable bunch of .21 .20 .19 readings in air.

The sea was flat and it wasn’t raining on the long trip out so I had no problems with the hand sets switching on. Once in the water on my auto switch set point of 1.3 I found trying to keep up with Simon on decent spiked the PP02 to 1.78. A quick squirt of 15/50 sorted that out.

The dive went well, no problems except the usual HUD only showing red. About 25mins in to the bottom time I noted a drop in set point on the master to 0.7?? I checked the run time and deco info and all seemed OK and I reset it to 1.3. A strange situation as normally a reboot will result in a lost set point but it will also reset the deco which didn’t happen this time.

Deco went OK but I find I have to inject extra 02 manually to maintain set point. I have been told to increase the pressure on the 02 to 9 bar but I am a bit reluctant to do this so Id rather put up with the manual add. On the bottom during deco and especially on the 6m stop it was noted that the cell readings were ranging from 1.3 on cell 1 down to 1.19 on cell 3.

Run time was about 145mins

I struggled to get the master to switch off despite drying it with kitchen towel and the baking sun it took about 20mins to shut down.

Dive two was much the same 60ish M 140min run time. The dive was on the same two AA alkaline batteries as dive 1. Again the cell readings were not brilliant but on this dive there was no loss of set point.

On the 6m stop I dropped to 10m on 02 and got 1.8 on cell 1, 1.65 on cell 2 and 1.35 on cell 3. Cell 3 brand new about 5 weeks ago was current limited. Cell 2 also 5 weeks old was acting strangely. And cell 1 was not too bad and 10 months old.

Back on board I could not get the master to switch off. I dried it with kitchen towel again but it made no odds so I turned the solenoid down to off and left it alone. The batteries died at about 7pm

Back home I striped the head and binned cell3 in favour of a new cell with a presale test mv of 10.3 in air. New batteries and then calibration went well and I got a solid 1.0 in the bag and 21 across the board in air.

During reassembly of the head cell two died completely. I took the head apart and checked the wires and connections but it came back to life. This happened almost immediately as I lifted the head off so I never traced the fault.

Dive three 62m 120 mins ish went better. The new cell meant there wasn’t the big variation on cell readings as dive 1&2 . 1.3 1.25 1.25 was about the average. A drop to 8m on 02 got me 1.75 on cell 1 and 1.69 on two and three.

No blips no shutdowns but again after the dive the master hand set refused to switch off. Back home and I got this:

Cell 2 on the slave is showing 0.1* and on the master its showing 0.21

This means the master and the slave are reading the cells slightly differently. Unfortunately due to the * indicating it’s been voted out I cant tell by how much.

In the end the batteries on the master just died. I am guessing the pressure sensor or the wet switch is keeping the unit on due to water trapped under the face plate.

Soooooo

It looks like the crimping of the threads and the silver grease work in preventing erroneous shut downs and re boots. This is very encouraging; the only bad things now are the inability to shut down the master and the strange behaviour of the cells. Try as I might I couldn’t get the unit up to 1.6 on the 6m stop I have no problem doing this on the classic head but I could get cell 1 up to 1.5 and 2,3 up to about 1.45. That’s with several good 02 flushes. The question is, is it the cells or is it the hand set? I will take the cells out and put them in the classic and dive it next week for comparison. That seems to be about the only way to see what’s what.

I will also be taking wet notes with me on the next trip to note the cell outputs at several points during the dive.

ATB

Mark Chase

**JPJones** · 9th July 2006, 19:11

Quote: (Originally Posted by Mark Chase)

8 more hours on the HH

So after crimping the threads and spending £30 on silver conducting grease, I set up the HH for the three planned dives. All in the region of 60m all in the region of 140min run time.

Calibration was carried out in a bag and then the head was striped and reassembled. In doing so one of the wires broke at the banana plug connection. A bugger to strip the end without breaking one of the fine wires but a simple enough job to re-solder. The streight connection, the telephone wire and the cell plate crushing the cables when you screw it down is a bad combination. Note to self take soldering iron on holiday with you.

So after recalibrating I had a solid 1.00 and a reasonable bunch of .21 .20 .19 readings in air.

The sea was flat and it wasn’t raining on the long trip out so I had no problems with the hand sets switching on. Once in the water on my auto switch set point of 1.3 I found trying to keep up with Simon on decent spiked the PP02 to 1.78. A quick squirt of 15/50 sorted that out.

The dive went well, no problems except the usual HUD only showing red. About 25mins in to the bottom time I noted a drop in set point on the master to 0.7?? I checked the run time and deco info and all seemed OK and I reset it to 1.3. A strange situation as normally a reboot will result in a lost set point but it will also reset the deco which didn’t happen this time.

Deco went OK but I find I have to inject extra 02 manually to maintain set point. I have been told to increase the pressure on the 02 to 9 bar but I am a bit reluctant to do this so Id rather put up with the manual add. On the bottom during deco and especially on the 6m stop it was noted that the cell readings were ranging from 1.3 on cell 1 down to 1.19 on cell 3.

Run time was about 145mins

I struggled to get the master to switch off despite drying it with kitchen towel and the baking sun it took about 20mins to shut down.

Dive two was much the same 60ish M 140min run time. The dive was on the same two AA alkaline batteries as dive 1. Again the cell readings were not brilliant but on this dive there was no loss of set point.

On the 6m stop I dropped to 10m on 02 and got 1.8 on cell 1, 1.65 on cell 2 and 1.35 on cell 3. Cell 3 brand new about 5 weeks ago was current limited. Cell 2 also 5 weeks old was acting strangely. And cell 1 was not too bad and 10 months old.

Back on board I could not get the master to switch off. I dried it with kitchen towel again but it made no odds so I turned the solenoid down to off and left it alone. The batteries died at about 7pm

Back home I striped the head and binned cell3 in favour of a new cell with a presale test mv of 10.3 in air. New batteries and then calibration went well and I got a solid 1.0 in the bag and 21 across the board in air.

During reassembly of the head cell two died completely. I took the head apart and checked the wires and connections but it came back to life. This happened almost immediately as I lifted the head off so I never traced the fault.

Dive three 62m 120 mins ish went better. The new cell meant there wasn’t the big variation on cell readings as dive 1&2 . 1.3 1.25 1.25 was about the average. A drop to 8m on 02 got me 1.75 on cell 1 and 1.69 on two and three.

No blips no shutdowns but again after the dive the master hand set refused to switch off. Back home and I got this:

Cell 2 on the slave is showing 0.1* and on the master its showing 0.21

This means the master and the slave are reading the cells slightly differently. Unfortunately due to the * indicating it’s been voted out I cant tell by how much.

In the end the batteries on the master just died. I am guessing the pressure sensor or the wet switch is keeping the unit on due to water trapped under the face plate.

Soooooo

It looks like the crimping of the threads and the silver grease work in preventing erroneous shut downs and re boots. This is very encouraging; the only bad things now are the inability to shut down the master and the strange behaviour of the cells. Try as I might I couldn’t get the unit up to 1.6 on the 6m stop I have no problem doing this on the classic head but I could get cell 1 up to 1.5 and 2,3 up to about 1.45. That’s with several good 02 flushes. The question is, is it the cells or is it the hand set? I will take the cells out and put them in the classic and dive it next week for comparison. That seems to be about the only way to see what’s what.

I will also be taking wet notes with me on the next trip to note the cell outputs at several points during the dive.

ATB

Mark Chase

The two sets are very independent and since not calibrated at exactly the same time can be a little different.

Glad to hear that it's not rebooting on you, I have found that cleaning the threads at every batterery change with contact cleaner and a Q-tip works for me so far.

Cheers and good diving

***ScubaDadMiami*** · 9th July 2006, 19:34

I just completed six dives over the course of about three weeks on my handsets since having them changed over the new cases. Everything went well except for one thing. I had a problem, after the last dive, with getting the main handset to go to sleep.

I made sure to rinse the sets on the dive boat after every dive. I also made sure to spray with Salt-X and to soak in water after the return from every trip (though the sets did sit for a number of hours between dives and traveling back from the site, etc.).

I was not using silicone in the depth sensor hole on these dives after being cautioned that the bubbles in the silicone might cause the reading to be off after applied. On a prior set, I used the silicone, and everything worked fine.

Anyway, I again soaked the sets in water for a few hours, and this took care of the problem. So, I am guessing it was either salt crystals or some sediment that worked its way in.

Upon return home from my trip, I then soaked again in Salt-X solution and then finished with another fresh water soak. I have re-started and put the handset to sleep several times without issue since doing this.

I think that I will go back to using the silicone again from now on.

I never had the problem with the sets re-booting. However, I am now also using the carbon based contact lubricant on the threads and inside the cap.

paulraymaekers · 9th July 2006, 20:03

since i cleaned the tread very good, greasing the two O-rings well, and tightening the cap solidly (I made a small tool for that), I never had any problem anymore with batterie-contact or rebooting:

(I even did not yet apply any conductive grease, nor did I quench the treads..)

regards

paul

***Decodiver*** · 9th July 2006, 22:37

I really do not understand you guys.

You have paid for a piece of kit, that needs tweaking, reboots underwater and is not particularly reliable, but yet you persist?

Now my YBOD, never rebooted underwater (all 3 of them), nor my Evolution (1 of them), nor my Ouroboros (1 of them) nor my Megalodon (2 of them).

I would have smashed the thing with an axe by now, my diving is about diving, not about DIYing.

Also Mark, I seem to remember you a few years ago saying how you wanted something that enabled you to not have to look at your handsets all the time.

Well you've clearly got the exact opposite of that now, buddy.

The Hammerhead was good in theory, but that is where it stayed for me and why I cancelled my order, especially just after Bob Howell got his, I was round his house and he said that he wouldn't dive it anywhere other than his sofa!

Good luck guys you are going to need it.

Cheers,

Dave Cooper.

diverklondike · 9th July 2006, 22:44