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Post by vance on Jun 15, 2021 14:05:13 GMT -8
R-3s are buggery to get to seal up.
Try some teflon tape. Spray with soapy water to narrow down the exact leak. It's very hard to tell where leaks are coming from. You should not use a strong thread lock on the orifice. It is just a hollow brass bolt, and might break under the torque needed to break blue loctite. Heat isn't an option, what with the rubber diaphragm. Some RTV applied and allowed to cure 24 hrs?
Maybe this is way off and not the problem you have, but R-3 valves often don't seal in later than very early tank valves, due to a slightly bigger fit than other regs. Same thing happens with Spiro Mistrals. I've had to turn the outside diameter a bit to get a good fit.
Before I realized this, I was going nuts thinking my valve body was leaking around the yoke nut threads.
BTW, I have seen a thin brass washer under the second stage orifice on some regs, and no washer on others. I'm not sure if one or the other, or both, is/are correct.
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Post by Jim Perdway on Sept 2, 2021 11:27:00 GMT -8
I had had some trouble sealing it up and neglected the project for a couple months. I revisited it this morning with Teflon tape but really loaded it up good (I originally was cautious not to break the bolt so I didn’t go too hard). I had to stretch the spring a bit but now everything is sealed up nicely. Going to test it in the lake in a couple hours with the original, adhesive RTV repaired diaphragm
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Post by Jim Perdway on Sept 2, 2021 13:42:43 GMT -8
Well, it's tested and working great! A big thanks to everyone for their guidance (and very importantly Phil's second stage seat mod). It's a good feeling to get it off the to-do table and put with the dive-ready stuff. Dacor R-3 restoration test dive by Jim Perdway, on Flickr
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Post by SeaRat on Sept 2, 2021 14:03:26 GMT -8
R-3s are buggery to get to seal up. Try some teflon tape. Spray with soapy water to narrow down the exact leak. It's very hard to tell where leaks are coming from. You should not use a strong thread lock on the orifice. It is just a hollow brass bolt, and might break under the torque needed to break blue loctite. Heat isn't an option, what with the rubber diaphragm. Some RTV applied and allowed to cure 24 hrs? Maybe this is way off and not the problem you have, but R-3 valves often don't seal in later than very early tank valves, due to a slightly bigger fit than other regs. Same thing happens with Spiro Mistrals. I've had to turn the outside diameter a bit to get a good fit.Before I realized this, I was going nuts thinking my valve body was leaking around the yoke nut threads. BTW, I have seen a thin brass washer under the second stage orifice on some regs, and no washer on others. I'm not sure if one or the other, or both, is/are correct. It may not be clear to those who haven’t experienced this problem, but what Vance is referring to is that the regulator itself may not seat into the O-ring on the tank valve due to dimensions of the tank valve. The same goes for early yolks, which may not fit over some tank valves. I’ve had problems with Scubapro valves not allowing this seal on Dacor double hose regulators. I simply have to use one of my other tanks, with a different valve (Sherwood). Jumperdway, Congratulations on getting your Dacor R-3 wet. That is a great accomplishment. I got mine wet with James’ new silicone diaphragm a few weeks ago. By the way, I used my Dacor R-4 some years ago (wow, well over 20 years ago) at the request of a friend of mine, also a diver, who asked if I’d dive his mill’s log pond. It seems that one of his workers was pushing logs around, got excited about something, and accidentally spit out his false teeth into the pond. Well, I did dive the pond, in zero visibility, in an attempt to find the false teeth. I found the bottom littered with limbs and “stuff” from the logs, feet deep, and was unable to recover the false teeth. But I tried. I used the R-4 because it had the duel diaphragm, and was pretty much immune to getting “stuff” caught in it to make for a malfunction. All these double diaphragm regulators by Dacor, while not the best breathing regulators, were extremely reliable in dark, polluted, and extremely cold water. They were used in Antarctica for years, for instance, too. John
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Post by Jim Perdway on Sept 2, 2021 14:23:59 GMT -8
Thank you John, and soon I’ll be placing an order for a few of James’! (I want to keep my r-4 c-3 r-3 trinity going for many years) Luckily so far it seems to have no problem sealing on any of my steel tanks (USD and Dacor valves). I’m curious to see how it behaves on the others but will wait until psi is down.
That’s an interesting story there; I enjoy objective-based dives like that (makes me feel like Mike) which I suppose you have a lot of experience with. My first few dives with the nice MR-12 I got from JB was looking for some girl’s Apple Watch. I burned through a couple tanks but no luck; still a neat concept to be using late 60s technology to search for a piece of 2021 technology.
That’s interesting about the use of Dacor regs in situations like that. Do you suppose that being a geographical outlier of the major manufacturers and based in the Midwest influenced this engineering difference?
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Post by vance on Sept 3, 2021 10:04:46 GMT -8
Excellent that you got it working! Congratulations, Stephan!
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Post by vance on Apr 21, 2022 14:41:32 GMT -8
Bump. Just to be able to find it.
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