Posted by seahunt on April 07, 2002 at 22:36:27:
Well, I usually figure dive gear is about broke in when it starts to rot., but this was a bit too much even for me. I happened to turn on Junk Yard Wars tonight and there were two guys competing in an Aquarium with home made, quickly made dive gear. It was something to see. It was easy to tell that the first rig was a former Sparkletts water bottle cut into a dive helmet. Talk about 360 degree super vision viewing. There was an air hose just coming in under the bottom edge, blowing in air. The other guy's rig was a bit more exotic. I think they were techies. I think it was an old propane bottle (like for a Bar B Que) as the helmet. Chained (and I do mean chained) to it seemed to be a big piece of plumbing, one exit of which was a piece of plexiglas. That rig was a leaker with air coming out of everywhere. Both rigs got air from big hand pumps that their teams pumped from the surface. Obviously, there were no regulators.
There were sharks and rays in the aquarium. I wonder what they paid to foul the tank? The objective was to find a key, unlock a "Treasure" box, get the treasure into a goody bag and send it to the surface on a lift bag. I don't think that these guys had made it even to their PADI basic class.
It was funny though and I liked that Sparkletts helmet.
Enjoy the diving, seahunt