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Re: LA dive shops not filling tanks made of 6531 Aluminum alloy. Questions


Scuba Diving on the Great Escape Southern California Live-Aboard Dive Boat


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Posted by jh on January 19, 2007 at 14:22:18:

In Reply to: LA dive shops not filling tanks made of 6531 Aluminum alloy. Questions posted by Andy S on January 19, 2007 at 12:20:03:

Andy most shops and boats that I know of in socal have stopped filling the pre-1988 luxfer cylinders. Most of this has to do with the new DOT regs. To do a VIP on these tanks now, you have to buy another very expensive machine (which you will never get your money back, just like the $1500.00 eddy wave machine that most of us were fools to buy 10 years ago). A question for you, why should a shop send the money to buy another machine to VIP some very old cylinders, cylinders that Luxfer had a semi-recall on, cylinders that have cracked, and ruptured? Given the history of these tanks, it doesn't make any sense to continue to fill them.
Here's what I did with the 35 tanks I had at the store, I let the air out, took the values out, pop off the boot, and I took them all to nearest recycling yard, they were paying .40 a pound.
Or you can go buy a compressor (one of the smaller ones that would work on your boat cost about $3000.00+(they take about 30 minutes to fill an al78), a bigger one like the last one I bought for the store was about$15,000, another $4000.00 for a booster, another $3500 for fill station and filters and another $2500 for fill bottles.
I think it's cheaper to go and buy some new steel tanks.



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