Drysuits are necessary for Scuba diving here in Southern California; the water is cold, usually about 55 degrees. Drysuits however are not cheap, $2000 to $3000, and require annual maintenance to keep them in tip top shape. The majority of this maintenance is the sealing surfaces around your neck and wrist. The current seals are made of latex, they work but  are easily ripped and once exposed to sunlight or ozone, they start to deteriorate. It can cost as much as $100 to $200 to replace the neck and/or wrist seals.

Silicone apparently is the proposed answer from a Swedish company called Waterproof.

Super stretchable, impervious to sunlight and strong. I’ll let the video speak for itself, the looks nice and they have the added benefit of not needing any talc or lubricate to don.

Here is a video where a representative from Waterproof shows them off.

I just hope I can get some for my DUI drysuit eventually.

This wreck/artificial reef was used as a missile tower test platform for submarine based warfare. They would load a missle into it, sink it underwater and launch the missile. Of course, when the Navy was finished with it, the ceremoniously dumped it into the ocean as an artificial reef, very close to the Mexican Border.

Here is a still photograph that I shot last year.

I thought long/hard about it and I really wanted to keep the modifications to a minimum and not add any complexity or potentially compromise the stock design of the unit. I’ve seen Curt McNamee’s valve, both online and in-person, a few friends have them and are very happy with them. But it’s a nice piece of kit but overkill for me and it cost almost $600!

Additionally, I wanted the ability to unplug the oxygen and still be able to plug in any off board gas if needed and still be able to use the stock button on the bottom at all times. And it needed to be as simple as possible.

Here is what I came up with:

revo-final-product

Parts required:
Off-board gas button.
18 inch miflex BC hose
37.5 inch miflex BC hose, this the stock one for the rEvo
New low-profile 1st-stage over-pressure relief valve.

Time required:
10 mins

Here is a side view:
- Bottom hose goes to the exhale lung
- Top hose is from the oxygen first stage.

Right shoulder hose routing:
- Right hose goes to the exhale lung
- Left is from the oxygen first stage.

Shows the gas addition inlet port, which injects the gas into the exhale lung:

New hose routing on the back case:

Hose coming out of the first stage regulator:

New over pressure relief valve placement on first stage:

New over pressure relief valve:

I haven’t tested it in the water yet but I’m hopeful that it will address my needs. The only thing I’m concerned about is access to the right front chest d-ring, the way it’s setup is going to make it a bit tight to clip anything on.

Thoughts?

Bill Reals, during decompression

On the weekend of April 30th, a group of 24 divers dove the a Fletcher Class WW2 Destroyer, USS Burns (tentative ID) off San Clemente Island in California. Over the course of the weekend, 50+ man-dives were completed on the wreck at a max depth of 280 fsw. We had an awesome group of divers and were able to execute this dive without incident.

Our dive site

Gear, lots and lots of it

Lots and lots of scuba tanks

Almost everyone had a DPV

Andrew Ainslie’s vid of the wreck is not to be missed.
http://asainslie.com/videos/destroyerapril10.wmv

This is one of the best wrecks on the West Coast. Call Tyler @ Deepoutdoors for more information

Tyler Statler, male prostitue

Check out that underwater housing that Bruce Mozert made back in the 1930s, which at the time was one of few in existance. For the next few decades he used it to take some amazing underwater pictures in Silver Springs Florida. Check out the Smithsonian’s site for a collection of them.

Here is an article about his life.

The name of the species is Opistognathus Rosenblatti. There is a wikipedia article on jawfishies and here is as still photograph of this species, you can really see where it gets it’s name from.

Introduced at the beginning of the year, this Liquid Image underwater mask with built-in digital camera is now available in Japan for approx $120. No idea if or when this might be coming to other countries.

It features a 3 or 5 Mp CMOS sensor, LCD screen, 16MB of memory, MicroSD card slot (up to 2GB), a USB port, takes 2560×1920 resolution images, and records VGA resolution video at 25fps.

Here is a video of it in action:

Works to a rated depth of 30 meters or 100 feet.

Here is the Google Translated Product page

I just saw this on Rebreather World and it’s called the Open Revolution rebreather. Typically, rebreathers range from $5,000 to as much as $20,000, it’s a niche market with boutique manufactures. However, the Open Revolution is looking to upend that model and come to market with a manual closed circuit rebreather (mCCR) that will retail for approx $1500 USD.

For your $1500 you get an injection-molded mCCR with back-mounted counter-lungs, integrated diver alarm system in a heads up display (HUD), integrated carry handle, harness and first-stage regulators.

The catch? It’s not on the market, it’s unproven, currently has no CE rating and is being manufactured by a 3rd party company.

Link to RBW

Rinspeed sQuba concept car

It’s just a concept car, there is no plans to produce this vehicle. But this is pretty cool. The regulators are Scuba Pro G250s which means that they didn’t skimp on the details. Its  brainchild of concept car designer, Founder and CEO of Rinspeed Inc

The petrol engine with three electric motors, one to power the rear wheels and two for the specially designed propellers. They are capable of taking it to 75mph on land, a more sedate 4mph while cruising in “boat” mode and a positively tranquil 2mph while underwater.

Once under water, its occupants breath air coming from an integrated tank of compressed air similar to that used by scuba divers. The vehicle can stay under water “until you run out of air or battery power,” which is about two hours.

scuba-diving-cat

It’s an ad for HowStuffWorks.com. The cat looks miserable but then again that’s how most cats look most of the time, so who knows. I’d really like to see how they got the cat into that contraption.