Equipment Problem in Costa Rica

I recently dove in Northern Guanacaste Province, Costa Rica. I tried
several dive shops (Aquacenter in Flamingo Beach was the most
professional of them all) but had a problem at one particular place.
By the way, when I asked a guy at the hotel if he knew this particular
dive shop owner he said "Yeah, 'Joe' is a real nice guy. He's here at
the bar every evening". That should have tipped me off right there.

Greg Mossman...

Why? How does a dive shop owner's choice to unwind at the local bar
necessarily impact how he runs his business during the day?

On our first morning dive we went to about 60 feet for about 30 minutes
or so. At about 700 psi left in my tank, I got the attention of the
divemaster and we started to ascend and at about 30 feet or sol I
noticed that there were air bubbles coming from from the "face" of my
air gauge. I stayed right near the divemaster in case I needed to use
his octopus. He didn't seem concerned and the psi reading kept
dropping "too quickly". Anyway, we made a truncated safety stop at 15
feet and ascended.

When I got on the boat I told the owner (the drinker) what had
happened. He kind of "pooh poohed" the matter and said that a few
"breathfulls" of air might have been lost by the air bubbles. He also
acknowledged that my tank was empty!

Can anyone give me feedback on this besides the obvious advice to stay
away from alcoholic diver types?

Al Wells...

First, here is some information that might have made you a bit less=20
uncomfortable with the situation. It is copied from another forum, and=20
the author is Curt Bowen From Advanced Diver Magazine:

-hh...

Empirical tests. Gotta love 'em.

\"Magilla\"...

-hh...

Interesting in that these are all roughly 1.5 minutes, yet a 1999 test
performed by Undercurrent...still on the web at:

..reported a time of "almost 2 minutes" for what should be a slightly
faster dump, namely a a wide-open valve with no regulator attached.

At very roughly a ~20% divergence, seems a bit too wide for routine
variance. Okay, there's test measurement error to consider...how fast
you're able to crank the open the valve, what the "start" time is
considered to be, etc. There's also a possibility that K-valves have
improved in the past half decade to increase their total flow
potential, or that there's a minor difference in K-valve manufacturers.

Don...

As long as we're clear that you're an asshole np.

Don...

Smart move. Your learning.

All in all, it would provide some useful insight to have a slightly
better sample size of "1".

Maybe the DM deemed the bubbles were from a source that is not likely to
fail catastrophically (yeah, it needed fixing), you did say the dive was
ended at that point with a normal ascent? The guage goes down quickly if
you're nervous, and your air consumption is probably relatively high anyway
from your info, so really doubt the little bubbles did as much as the big
ones you were making.

Dillon Pyron...

Missed the beginning of this one.

Some regs (remeber the Sherwood "breath dry") are designed to bubble.

chilly...

From the first stage, not the console.

To illustrate how much gas small bubbles lose, take the '04 hurricane
season. I powered an airstone in my aquarium for 9 days while the
electricity was out with less gas than an AL80 holds. Damn fish still talk
like Donald Duck ;-)

Limey...

Boy, did you pick the wrong place to ask that.

Greg Mossman...

You didn't say what your normal air consumption is like. You didn't seem
surprised that you were down to 700 psi after only a half-hour. Plus your
writing indicates that you were obviously stressed by the bubbles and not
too confident underwater ("I stayed right near the divemaster . . .") so it
makes sense that you were sucking down the last 700 psi at a rapid rate,
ending up with an "empty" tank on the boat. BTW, what do you mean by
"empty". You didn't say that you ran out of air underwater.

The owner (the drinker) was likely correct that the bubbles used up nothing

hammond...

Maybe, but...

Bubbles coming out of SCUBA gear where there should be no bubbles
indicate a maintence problem. It could be a prelude to a more
serious failure.

The general rule is don't dive with equimpent that is not woriking properly.

more than a few breaths of air. Nothing about his presence at the bar
implies that he's an alcoholic since (a) you don't know what he's drinking
there (could be diet coke), and (b) bars are the usual social gathering
place for expats in third-world countries even when they don't drink.

The obvious advice here is for you to stay away from diving. Have you
considered golf? If not, at least bring your own gear, especially when
diving in third-world countries where maintenance may not be up to American
standards and liability and insurance are practically non-existent.

(BTW, had you not taken your own advice to avoid PADI-affiliated dive
centers, you could have complained to PADI about your experience)