Bro I just got into diving . I haven't had my first dive yet. I want to thank you because this last year I have been watching you from both of my tube accounts. Your video have been very helpful it has built confidence in my scuba journey. I salute you bro all the way from the WEST COAST

For me I ended up on a Xstream Deep due to cold water, being balanced and easy breathe. The LDS i used is a Mares and Poseidon shop and I had tried few of the Mares regulators and after i got try out the Xstream I liked how the the 2nd stage in weight in my mouth was very light, simple design without any twisty knobs on the 2nd stage to mess with and the consistent flow of gas at different depths with out any additional effort required.

I have all three types of first stages. Flow By Piston (unbalanced), balanced Diaphragm, and balanced Piston. Practically a recreational diver is not going to see any difference in air flow between balanced Diaphragm, and balanced Piston. I don't hesitate diving my balanced piston down to 45 degrees Fahrenheit. Below that I use a balanced Diaphragm. Service kits (parts) are more expensive for balanced Diaphragm. Easier to adjust Intermediate pressure on a balanced Diaphragm. With a balanced piston shims are used internally to change Intermediate pressure. Most of the time down to 100 ft. I dive an unbalanced piston regulator. I just haven't tried it deeper with two people breathing heavily on it. Very few parts and easy for me to fix in the field. But, unbalanced piston regulators very rarely fail. Because there are so few parts. Note, different types of second stages are more prone to freezing as well.

Thanks a lot!

Thank you very much for the information. When you talk about cold water, what temperatur do you have in mind?

@locodiver8665

3 жыл бұрын

10C/50F or colder is the general rule for manufacturers

Got 2 Mk25 evo, Love em. No problems in the waters that I’m diving but I haven’t had a chance to dive them in waters below 0.

@jeffconley6366

11 ай бұрын

Scubapro EVO piston regulators have a coating on the parts exposed to the water that retards the formation of ice.

I think the near universal adoption of pneumatic balancing of modern second stages has made the choice between piston and diaphram somewhat irrelevant (with the exception of ultimate environmental sealing, where the diaphram will alwys be better, because the diaphram IS the seal). Piston 1st stages have the singular benefit of being fundamentally able to be "long travel" becuase how far the piston can move in and out is practically unlimited, whereas with a diaphram has a necessarily limited travel as the diaphram itself must stretch and deform to move. What that means is really that the piston first stage can maintain a more constant intermediate pressure over both a wider range of air flows (breathing rates) but also over a wider range of deltaP's between the cylinder pressure and the IP. That really means that they can supply a very stable IP right down to low cylinder pressures and at high breathing rates when compared to a diaphram type. But, as second satages are now mostly pneumatically balanced, the Work of Breathing of a modern 2nd is really incredibly stable and rather un-affected by the actual IP. In some tests with an adjustable 1st stage, my Apeks seconds pretty much breath exactly the same from 12 bar to 4 bar IP, a range that even the worst diaphram regulator can manage! That makes the type of 1st stage pretty irrelevant ime!

When my son got his first regulator his dive shop gave him a chrome regulator which sold more than the one that was on his octo.the dive shop owner upgraded his octo regulator to the chrome.but tut he price was for the older regulator

Great video. I live in upper Midwest in USA so cold water performance is important. I use APEKS diaphragm first stage for local dives and dives in the Great Lakes. Water temps 40F/5C.

got my legend because of the acd features. im a klutz. extra protection suits me well.

If you are deep enough that you need the performance of a piston reg, you should be on CCR breathing a helium heavy mix.

Hello! I see you have a Poseidon regulator behind you. Are they special besides the fact that they're reversible? I was wondering that, because they seem very overpriced: I can get a MK25 evo/G260 combo for 100 euros less than a cyklon 5000. Not that the Poseidon is on my shopping list, but I was wondering if you could explain what they're about ;) Cheers!

@tobiashartung856

3 жыл бұрын

The short answer, they are very good quality and have been the standard regulator for many professional dive teams including the German Navy. I personally can attest to the fact that they have very good breathing qualities especially at depth. I've tried many regulators over the years but in the end, I always went back to Poseidon Cyklons. My current open circuit setups depend on the dive (of course) but it's either Kirby Morgans or Cyklons. Why is that? It is an extremely robust regulator that takes a lot of abuse (I've successfully finished a dive after losing the diaphragm on the second stage) and they are easy to maintain. I'm not sure if Poseidon still says it publicly, but in the olden days, they kept the warranty up even if you removed the first stage underwater and reconnected it to a different cylinder. As such, they are just very flexible and can adjust to many emergency situations that other second stage designs have trouble with. They are slick enough to not get in the way when you have a lot of cylinders with you. They work in basically all orientations equally well. If you know how to service these regulators, you can easily do that too. Thinking about taking a first stage apart on a boat at a noticeable sea state, I'd take the poseidons all day every day. Now, of course, it's not like there aren't other regulators that will do the same job equally well. But the Cyklon has been around since 1958 and isn't going anywhere. I know I can get the parts I need. I know I can get the tools I need. And I know that it will serve me well on any open circuit dive I want to do. At the same time, if you are doing recreational diving to no more than 40m depth, will you notice the difference to a top of the line Apeks/Hollis? Nope. Will you notice the difference at 80m? Maybe. But then again, I'm comparing a Cyklon to an MTX-R and an 200LX DCX which punch in at about the same price point. So in the end it's a matter of convenience. If you don't see the need of any of the distinctive features that the Cyklon has over regulators with similar specs, then no need to go for it. If you think the MK25 Evo/G260 and maybe an R195 will do everything you want to do in diving, by all means go for it. I wouldn't mind taking these down to 40m.

@eddieguyvh4765

3 жыл бұрын

@@tobiashartung856 Woah, great and expansive response! Thanks for that :) I guess I'll have to try them! For my part I'm not very snobby about regulators, my two aqua lung titans serve me very well, even in 60 meter dives in a 6-10°C water during winter. I also sport a Kraken when I do photo dives. I do notice the difference when trying some friends' premium regulators, but so far I did not feel the need to change. Since I now mainly dive sidemount, the probability of both my regs failing at the same time is... very low. I might upgrade next year, and I'll definitely look closer at Poseidon. Maybe someone in my entourage has one I could borrow :)

@tobiashartung856

3 жыл бұрын

@@eddieguyvh4765 Yeah, absolutely, give them a try and see how you like them. Sidemounting in particular can benefit from the smaller design when storing the regs while not in use and better hose routing if you have the left side feed from the left. But then again, there are other ambi-dextrous regs as well and if your out of air drill does not contain handing over the bottle, then you'll need a long hose anyway which you can route behind your neck. If you're diving titans down to 60m, you will definitely notice a difference ;) But in the end go with what feels best. Many of my friends dive sidemount with MTX-Rs. On the topic of probability of both regs failing simultaneously, that is actually a false sense of security. The argument only holds if your two regulators have no shared history. But as I presume your regs go to service at the same time and on the same dives, it's actually very likely that both fail if one has already failed. This actually once happened to me. Turned on air, o-ring blew. Changed o-ring. Turned on the other cylinder, second o-ring blew. It was the same o-ring in both regulators. There are some good studies on that with respect to CCR diving because many rebreathers use three oxygen sensors and they go with what two of them agree on if one is off. Here we have the same problem. 3 cells, same age, same history, relatively high likelihood of multiple simultaneous failures.

@Teampegleg

3 жыл бұрын

Yes, they can make the guy you’ve been diving with for an entire week look at them and go “Hey where is the purge button on this reg?”

Doesn't it come down to how you maintain your piston regulator for cold water diving? I know a few people who dive cold with piston and they say it is a matter of maintaining them properly

@BurhanMuntasser

3 жыл бұрын

This applies to both type, piston and diaphragm. I have used Scubapro MK20 and MK25 in ice cold waters in Northeast USA without any issues at all.

I live in Melbourne Australia, it's diaphragm for me, for the enviro seal, Apeks FSR ATX 200 my weapon of choice. 🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰

Can a ScubaPro mk25 be converted into a mk25 evo? and would the cost be worth converting rather than purchasing a new set?

@Teampegleg

3 жыл бұрын

You can put the blue spring and the carbon piston in a mk25, but I'm told that there are a couple of changes that can't be done to older Mk20/Mk25s.

@gee4526

3 жыл бұрын

@@Teampegleg thanks my friend for the info.

Proud Pistons gang here! All you Frammies (diaphragm users) best keep an eye over your shoulder, we're coming for you!

🤦🏽‍♂️ Mark, Piston service costs are much cheaper and frequency of service less often, really bullet proof hence dive shops will use them. Deep Tech divers will always use Ballanced Env sealed diaphragm regs which give better performance.

Your explanation didn't really explain very much. It might have been better if you could put up some diagrams of what actually happens, and why, in the different types of reg. I've only ever looked inside an old Spirotechnic (50/10 I think) 2nd stage, to see how that worked, because the flow adjuster knob had seized up.

You couldn't use a more easily understandable bar graph? You actually thought: "hey, why don't we throw up a confusing pentagon with smaller blue one inside that to show what regulator is better at what?...and only show it for a second or two in so our audience has to pause the video and break the flow of the video."

Mark, "when I was started" I've never heard such mumbo jumbo, who told you that ?

@justwayne4785

3 жыл бұрын

I used to could understand talk like that 😁

FIrsT

You are trying to be "neutral" because you sell both types, piston is the way to go and nothing comes close to compete with it. Scubapro MK25 or the Atomic first stages are supreme in performance and reliability.

@kabulbolan

3 жыл бұрын

Until you dive where I am in AK. Let’s see who freezes first lol

@BurhanMuntasser

3 жыл бұрын

@@kabulbolan I dove/dive in New England; Maine, NH, MA, RI and NY/NJ/PA and I dove with the Scubapro and Atomic piston regulators for decades exclusively without ANY issues at all. Generally, the issues that people have diving in icy cold water are usually because of misuse in second stage not first stage. I have friends and fellow instructors diving in the Great Lakes in the middle of the winter with SP regulators without any issues.

@Yggdrasil42

5 ай бұрын

You're exaggerating. A lot. The vast majority of divers won't be able to tell the practical difference at all. I'm a cave and OW tech diver with Apeks DST 1st stages, which are sealed balanced diaphragm models, and trust them with my life. I do the maintenance myself so I know what each part does and that it works well. That's more important.

WOW......This was a really lousy explanation of the difference's between regulators.....