[Jen S]

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<font color='#8D38C9'>Hi,

Sorry if there has bee a post about this before.

I was just wondering how strong a manifold is. When I brought my twin 10's I was told NEVER to lift it by the Manifold as this could bend it.

Is this true as there seem to be a few of these you must/must not ideas in diving because something has a miniscule chance of breaking!!

Jen

 

[Sandman]

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I suppose it depends on the make of the manifold.  The MDE I use is a fairly substantial piece of metal.  Some other makes look a bit tupperware if you know what I mean.

Cheers

Simon

 

[Fathoms Down]

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Its not so much the manifold thats going to get damaged, but the O-rings inside it which form the seal  

However, some manifolds aren't so tough and can bend quite easily.

 

[Woz]

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<font color='#000080'>The Agir-Brokk manifold I have is strong as a spanish grandmother.

Main thing is to make sure that the manifold is not stressed when you bolt up the stainless bangs- keep turning the centre part to make sure it spins freely as you are tightening them up and also make sure the valves are dead level. Otherwise stressed threads and leaky O rings will result.

 

[Dominic]

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It's not so much a question of strength. Manifolds are designed to resist pressure from inside. Picking a twinset up by the manifold puts a completely different type of stress on it.

In the same way that nobody thinks twice about lifting a cylinder by the valve, but nobody would lay a cylinder down and then stamp on the valve

 

[Norbert]

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It still doesn't stop some DC staff (not us, BTW) lifting twinsets by the manifold and wondering why the owner goes a pretty shade of purple!

Good way to get 'em animated tho'.

 

[Dinger]

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Once saw a novice helping my buddy get his kit back onto the rib grabbing the manifold and just hauling it over the tubes - my mate about shat himself but Custom Divers I see have a new lift bar thing out now the slips in below the manifold and takes the strain although could this allow a bad habit of lifting by the manifold (in this case lift bar)? and forget that others may not have it - wonder were the DIR lot stand on these bars - are they an entanglement hazard?
Dinger

 

[Lawrence Debono]

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I agree with cages to protect the valves from banging against some thing hard. They are good especially for inverted twins or when penetrating really tight wrecks. This though hmmmmmmm........ Don’t know if it's just a gadget or if it is really useful?

 

I would rather see a hook with a handle placed under the upper band. This can be used until one transport the tanks. Just like a handle of a shovel with a hook on the end. Or some thing like a fish grappling hook. This would also give more ground clearance and can be used against sharks and whales  

Re--strength of manifolds. I honestly can not give you a 100% straight answer. I had an OMS manifold that was built like a main battle tank. Never an issue with that. The new set that I got was armed with Dive right. When I picked them up they leaked. The store owner suspects that some one banged them against the metal rack. When we took the center post off and changed the o rings it still leaked and then we replaced the whole thing.

There's an article on immersed magazine on a bizarre case of manifold failure. The setup was fine at 232 bars but when the pressure dropped the isolator was not pressing as hard on the pillar valves and there was a failure. Quite interesting..... My opinion is to treat it good, so it teats you good. After all your life depends on that piece of metal.

Lawrence Debono

Lawrence