Posted by Kevin on June 20, 2001 at 19:31:11:
In Reply to: All are junk . . . posted by Kevin on June 20, 2001 at 16:56:42:
I should clarify something.
I donīt mean to offend anyone if I inferred their tanks were of low quality. I belive tanks are a vital piece of life support equipment and therefor should be of the highest quality possible. There are some tanks that arenīt.
I used to run a few dive shops in the old days and I did my fair share of hydros and visuals, like a lot, like a whole bunch. I saw the same cylinders year after year.
Some cylinders were owned by clients, some by friends, and some were my own. And I am the person who hydroed them and who visualed them and who filled them. Both on boats ( which can be splatter wet very fast fills) and in the shop (which were very slow dry fills. )
I also was privy to which cylinders were always filled to the rated pressure and which were overfilled and which were frigginī bombs we did not keep out in the sun on a hot day. ( Does 4 g ring a bell anyone ?? )
I started to notice which cylinders stood up to the test of time, and which did not.
Its a simple fact. Domestically produced steel cylinders exhibited far less elastic contraction on the hydros than the Europeans, and domestic cylinders needed tumbles far more often, due to less resistance to corrosion. I owned and dove American Steel right next to Italian steel and Austrian steel cylinders and the American counterparts do not hold up.
Think about it. I have an American Steel 95 that is rated to 2640, and gets filled to 2640. I also have a Austrian steel " 95 " ( lets not get into how we Europeans measure cylinder volume because it even hurts my brain ) that is rated domestically by the DOT to 2640, and gets filled to 2640, but in the country its produced can get rated to 3500 psi.
If the cost is the same, which cylinder would you rather buy ?
No flaming about overfilling because I am not advocating it but it does get done, especially in the technical diving circles.
Kevin