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DIN Cover Fell Off During Fresh Water Rinse

Posted: Sat Aug 28, 2021 12:18 am
by Kensei
The subject sort of says it all. After the Kraken had been in the fresh water rinse bucket for about 5 minutes, another piece of gear knocked off the dust cap. The rinse bucket is big (like 35 gallons) so the water was not salty. I did the following:
1. Put the dust cap back on let it soak for another 20 minutes
2. Removed dust cap and tried to shake out any water
3. Removed hose loop from horns and shook out water from hoses
4. Let Kraken dry in cool, dark area with dust cap off and DIN opening pointing down. Hoses are also off of the horns.

This was on Thursday morning of this week (8/26). Is there anything else I should do in terms of cleaning and maintenance?

NOTE: I'm going to get a dust cap that screws on so this doesn't happen again

Re: DIN Cover Fell Off During Fresh Water Rinse

Posted: Sat Aug 28, 2021 7:35 am
by Herman
I would remove the HP hose, connect it to a tank and slowly pressurize it, allowing any water in it to be blown out, purge for 15 seconds or so. Install a plug in the HP port, remove the LP ports and repeat. Finally install all external plugs, install the octo if you are using one and purge it hard for at least 30 seconds and finally force a full freeflow on the primary second stage and allow it to flow for 30 seconds or so. The purpose of all this is to force any water inside the reg out with out damaging anything. The biggest issue is forcing water into the SPG and it's hose, fresh water will not really hurt anything inside the reg as long as it's not allowed to remain in there for long periods of time.
A good rebuild is not a bad idea, esp if it's been a while since it's been done.

Re: DIN Cover Fell Off During Fresh Water Rinse

Posted: Sat Aug 28, 2021 12:02 pm
by ScubaLawyer
Herman wrote:
Sat Aug 28, 2021 7:35 am
A good rebuild is not a bad idea, esp if it's been a while since it's been done.
Agree with Herman on the air flushing procedure; however, if it were my reg I'd take the whole thing apart and service it just to make sure no water remained. I doubt that is necessary but I tend to rebuild regulators on the flimsiest of excuses. :) Although my Kraken is 7 years old now, without a major overhaul, and locks up rock solid at 135psi IP and breathes fantastic so I am loathe to take it apart. I just took it on a dive last Tuesday and remain in awe of its easy breathing performance.

Hey Luis, what is the recommended service interval for your average Kraken?

M

Re: DIN Cover Fell Off During Fresh Water Rinse

Posted: Sat Aug 28, 2021 12:58 pm
by Kensei
Thanks! I'll do the procedure for blowing out water today. I'll also take it apart and have a look inside to ensure it's dry.

It has about 20 total dives.

jeff

Re: DIN Cover Fell Off During Fresh Water Rinse

Posted: Sat Aug 28, 2021 5:49 pm
by Herman
By apart, SL means disassembly as you would do for service. Unless you understand what you are doing, I suggest caution. The HP stage is under spring pressure and will pop across the room if you are not careful....believe me I know....and is a bear to get back together without the proper tools. Taking the cans apart is a different matter but I don't see that necessary unless you just want to, other than going easy on the screws there is nothing special about taking the cans apart.

Re: DIN Cover Fell Off During Fresh Water Rinse

Posted: Sat Aug 28, 2021 7:42 pm
by ScubaLawyer
Herman is again correct. By "apart" I meant "apart" and not merely "apart." Not to be confused with the regulator's various "parts," some of which also come apart. :)

Re: DIN Cover Fell Off During Fresh Water Rinse

Posted: Sat Aug 28, 2021 8:35 pm
by luis
ScubaLawyer wrote:
Sat Aug 28, 2021 12:02 pm
Herman wrote:
Sat Aug 28, 2021 7:35 am
A good rebuild is not a bad idea, esp if it's been a while since it's been done.
Agree with Herman on the air flushing procedure; however, if it were my reg I'd take the whole thing apart and service it just to make sure no water remained. I doubt that is necessary but I tend to rebuild regulators on the flimsiest of excuses. :) Although my Kraken is 7 years old now, without a major overhaul, and locks up rock solid at 135psi IP and breathes fantastic so I am loathe to take it apart. I just took it on a dive last Tuesday and remain in awe of its easy breathing performance.

Hey Luis, what is the recommended service interval for your average Kraken?

M

If it ain't broke, don't fix it.


If you don't allow any salt water intrusion into the first stage, I can see a Argonaut be good for close to a decade without concern. This comment is based on observation of several (if not many) used Conshelf first stages that I have purchased in working order that have not been rebuilt for decades (like 4 or 5 decades). Not knowing the regulator history I have always open them and rebuilt them. I will say that in a few cases there was a lot of corrosion and salt deposit inside and it still held perfect IP, but I was very glad to clean a rebuild.

If you allow salt water into the first stage (even a little)... then a rebuild and clean is probably a good idea, even if it is a new or just a freshly rebuilt regulator.


For fresh water intrusion, what Herman recommended is what I would do.

I consciously designed the Argonaut to avoid or minimize dead air spaces. Even the space in front of the high pressure diaphragm will flush fairly well when flushing the second stage. Even in a Conshelf, I have never seen that space have a corrosion issue, but I even tried to improve the gas flow near it.

Dry Scuba air will dry the inside of the regulator.

The only catch is how clean is your fresh water? Fresh water is not the same as saying distilled water or purified water. Not all fresh water is created equal... :roll: We had a shipbuilder claim that they flushed certain piping system in a ship with fresh water... :shock:

YMMV

Good luck.

Re: DIN Cover Fell Off During Fresh Water Rinse

Posted: Sun Aug 29, 2021 9:29 pm
by Kensei
So I did the procedure that Herman recommended. Below are the results:

1. About 1 drop of water came out of the HP port
2. About 1 drop of water came out of the low pressure ports
3. No water came out of the primary 2nd stage
4. I didn't see any water come out of the octo

Attached is a picture of the insides as far as I was able to disassemble

Finally, the can screws use phillips heads. Any thought to using Torx or Allen heads?

Re: DIN Cover Fell Off During Fresh Water Rinse

Posted: Mon Aug 30, 2021 2:38 pm
by luis
Kensei wrote:
Sun Aug 29, 2021 9:29 pm
So I did the procedure that Herman recommended. Below are the results:

1. About 1 drop of water came out of the HP port
2. About 1 drop of water came out of the low pressure ports
3. No water came out of the primary 2nd stage
4. I didn't see any water come out of the octo

Attached is a picture of the insides as far as I was able to disassemble

Finally, the can screws use phillips heads. Any thought to using Torx or Allen heads?

Yes, I am very partial at being able to service a regulator on the field without the need of specialty tools, often not readily available at dive destinations.

We actually had the issue in Cozumel someone forgot his small Allen wrenches and we had a hard time finding one in the resort.

Torx and Hex key (Allen head) screws have a number of useful advantages, one of them is keeping unauthorized users from getting into delicate machinery. The inside of the can is not delicate and the end users are not only authorized, they are encourage to occasionally open it an clean it and inspect it.

Also Torx heads and Hex Key heads are great for highly torqued screws... that is the total opposite to what is needed to close and seal the can.

You just need to snug tight those screws... do not over tighten them. About 6 inch pounds max., or finger tight... and I mean tip of the fingers... 8)

IMHO, you should never need more than a Swiss Army Knife to access portions of a regulator that can be service in the field... That include inspecting and cleaning the inside of the can.

Obviously, I recommend against the use of specialty screw heads... YMMV



I can't see the picture.


It is good that you only got a couple drops out of it.

Re: DIN Cover Fell Off During Fresh Water Rinse

Posted: Wed Sep 01, 2021 12:21 pm
by Kensei
I can't get the picture to post. It's a 1.2 meg jpg. I add the file using the "attachment" tab but when I hit "submit" the file is not posted.

jeff

Re: DIN Cover Fell Off During Fresh Water Rinse

Posted: Thu Sep 02, 2021 6:05 am
by Herman
Kensei wrote:
Wed Sep 01, 2021 12:21 pm
I can't get the picture to post. It's a 1.2 meg jpg. I add the file using the "attachment" tab but when I hit "submit" the file is not posted.

jeff
Most likely the file is too big. Reduce it to a smaller size.

Re: DIN Cover Fell Off During Fresh Water Rinse

Posted: Thu Sep 02, 2021 3:10 pm
by Kensei
Tried again with a 119KB file.... still didn't work. Even tried switching from Firefox to Edge and that didn't work either.
I'm also not getting any error messages.

jeff

Re: DIN Cover Fell Off During Fresh Water Rinse

Posted: Fri Sep 03, 2021 6:35 am
by Herman
I send you an PM with my email, try sending it to me via email and I'll see what I can do with it

Re: DIN Cover Fell Off During Fresh Water Rinse

Posted: Fri Sep 03, 2021 1:08 pm
by Herman
IMG_0236sm.JPG
Here you go

Re: DIN Cover Fell Off During Fresh Water Rinse

Posted: Wed Sep 15, 2021 11:03 am
by Nemrod
A DIN cover that can slip on and off is not sufficient for rinsing. The kind that thread on and have an O-ring in them can seal out water but the slip on type, not. If the rinse bucket had salty or contaminated water then I would disassemble the regulator and clean the internal parts completely. Not just pulling the top can off, that should be done after every dive trip or if a long trip even during.

I dipped my DD-6 once in Cozumel without the cover in the filthy rinse tank. It was a senior moment, I was distracted. So I gave it a pressure wash! I got some distilled water, put the regulator into the distilled water with all caps and ports open. Then removed it from the water and let it drain and then put it on a tank to blow out with pressure. I did this a couple of times. This probably took more time than if I had disassembled the regulator and cleaned it correctly. When I got home I took DD-6 fully apart for cleaning.

James