Compound lever systems

[vance]

As many of you know, I have been working on a couple of custom regulators.

The compound lever system has been used with great results in many single and two stage regulators. I like them a lot, and have made a few different styles for my custom regs, although my go-to lever has usually been a single, split lever.

Some of the OEM systems are one unit (-ish) parts, like the Healthways and USD (Spiro, etc.) single stage levers. The Snark IIIs have pivots riveted to the box, and there are other systems that use the same kind of pivots, soldered or riveted.

In my quest for the whole cloth custom regulator, I'll probably use a compound lever.  3D printed boxes, or some judicious soldering could work wonders here. 

[SeaRat]

I also like compound levers for the second stage in either double hose regulators or single hose regulators.

I think the most successful single hose system with a compound lever was the Dacor Dart (their original single hose regulator. That one worked pretty well, and the bottom lever slid along the top lever toward the fulcrum of the top lever, which increases the leverage.

The other single hose regulator with a compound lever was the Aquamatic, and that was not a good design (with two levers upened by a circular wedge).

The Dacor Dial-a-Breath had a compound lever that worked well. When they went to the R-4, they put a weird “U” there to the top lever, which caused the contact point on the lower lever to slide away from the top lever as the “U” slid down the bottom lever. This caused increased resistance when the levers were actuated. I tried modifying my top lever by pounding out the “U”, and it worked better, although my pounding caused ripples that caused increased resistance. I sent it to Dacor with the Dacor rep, and did not hear back from them. I inquired, and they said that they had “lost” my regulator, and sent me a pre-production Pacer instead (i know it was pre-production as the exhalation ports were drilled in three circles under each of the two exhalation mushroom valves).

0D4EB6CD-D3E9-45DD-9BD3-A96A0BD5A159 by John Ratliff, on Flickr
Dacor R-2, with the same levers (oriented differently) as the Dial-A-Breath.

Dacor R-4001 by John Ratliff, on Flickr
Dacor R-4 with the weird top lever.

IMG_8525 by John Ratliff, on Flickr
Photo of the Dacor R-4 levers.

So keep that in mind when you design these compound levers. They should slide fwd the Mistral’s and Healthways Scuba levers.

Healthways Scuba Hybrid3 by John Ratliff, on Flickr
Healthways hybrid Scuba regulator.

The most complex compound lever system was the Voit 50 Fathom:

Voit 59 Fathom 001 by John Ratliff, on Flickr


John