New Hammerhead Sets - Announcement

SkinAndScuba

I haven't used my HH in low temp water yet. All my dives around 12-16C. I use the LS1450 lithium batteries. The batteries last long. I don't even bother taking them out if I know I'm going to be diving withing a week of my previous dives. After 10 Hours of diving and 2 weeks in the HH the primary voltage has dropped 0.2-0.3 Volt. This is the new handsets.

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Kenneth Wessels #19799
Skin & Scuba
P.O. Box 264493
Three Rivers
1935
South Africa

adrenalin_junkie

I would be intresred to know how many hours (in total) diving you get from them before you have to bin them.

Thanks

heyydude

What I've told others who are interested (or concerned) about their particular battery life is to simply dump the Primary and Secondary into a bucket of water set to whatever temperature you are interested in learning about.

You could dump a bunch of ice in a 5 gallon bucket, pour water into it, load up whatever battery you are interested in testing, and then toss in the wrist units. Note the time, and come back every now and again to verify the set is still running.

Usually (for people in the "concerned" category), this allays any fears that the set won't last long enough in cold water for their particular dive. If you are on an Optima, you shouldn't exceed 4 hours anyway, and we've yet to see a set that won't last that long on a single AA Alkaline.

And you can get a AA Alkaline pretty much anywhere on Earth.

Take care,

Kevin Juergensen
Juergensen Marine, Inc.

adrenalin_junkie

Hi Kevin, for that to work would you not have to be breathing from the unit for the solenoid to fire as if you was on a dive and add some workload rather than just sitting on a chair breathing from the unit. would also need to switch on the backlit now and again if diving in the UK.....

JCdesign97

To try to give you somewhat of an answer to your original question, A_J, here where I dive in the northeastern US bottom temps are in the 10-15 degree C range in the warmer months; then from 10 down to 4 or so in the colder months. This is probably close to what you're accustomed to, no? I used the 3.6v lithium (Saft) batteries through one or two sets, but having the older metal HH handsets (sans battery life indicator) I didn't like not knowing when to bin the batteries. IIRC I ran the first set for 10-12 hours before I binned them ... and not because they started to die - just because I didn't feel comfortable not knowing when they would. I really don't know exactly how long the 3.6v lithiums last before they die.

Now I use regular AAs for just the reason everyone says - start with a fresh set every ocean dive, MAYBE use the same set again a second time if I'm just doing a quarry dive; but definitely new every time in the ocean. What I have found as far as temperature thus far is that the AIR temp. and how cold the handsets and batteries get before the dive has as much or more to do with how they perform. On cold mornings (even now, not even winter yet) when I've traveled to the dive site with the Rebreather in the back of my truck and the air chills the metal handsets, I've had batteries that should still be good not have enough juice to fire the solenoid. So now in addition to always using fresh ones if it's really cold I keep them in my pocket and don't put them in until I get there and do final checks, etc. This has worked perfectly since I had the one or two cold set issues. The water temp. doesn't seem to chill the handsets down as quickly or as cold, so I haven't had any problems in the water; but I also haven't used them at the coldest time of year yet, either. Long story short - two fresh, WARM (cheap!) AAs every time ... then use them for your TV remote, garage door opener, etc. until they die.

Hope this helps,

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Cheers,

John

heyydude

Nope. Just let the unit fire the Solenoid over and over. That'll give you a "worst-case" scenario for battery life. That's what we do here in the shop, anyway...



Kevin.

jkaterenchuk

I have been using the HH for about one year and regularily dive 60 mins at mostly 4C. The procedure that seems to work best for me is to put a new set of AA batteries in every 3 hours (when I change the sorb). I do not leave the batteries in the Handset overnight or multiple days. I do leave them in during the surface interval if doing a couple of dives but I am sure to check that the handsets have shutdown automatically and stay that way.

I use to use the SAFT batteries but I have the same issue as previously mentioned. I could never determine in advance of a dive if they needed to be changed or if this would be the dive that they fail.

John