Preparing a Regulator for Oxygen Use

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Permalink Reply by George K. Watson on July 22, 2009 at 7:21pm

While I can't answer unless I know which specific Apeks regulator, in general the kits contain parts that are compatible with high pressure, high oxygen fraction gases including pure oxygen. The kits focus on the high pressure side of the first stage, replacing things such as seats and o-rings.

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Permalink Reply by Michael Soldwisch on July 23, 2009 at 1:02am

XTX50 2nd Stage and DS4 First Stage

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Permalink Reply by George K. Watson on July 23, 2009 at 8:40am

The DS4 can definitely be converted. I don't know where you can get parts directly, but any shop that services Apeks should be able to.

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Permalink Reply by Richard on July 23, 2009 at 9:05am

Most "nitrox" regs are suitable for O2 use. In many cases (not sure about Apek in particular) they are never labelled as suitable for O2 due to the increased liability and impossibility in keeping them perfectly clean room clean in actual use. All that said, focus on the valve as the most dangerous part of the O2 delivery system. There is no scuba valve built to proper O2 standards (scuba valves are fast opening etc). So valves need to be as clean as possible and O2 fills need to be as slow as possible (to avoid heating the nylon valve seat)

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Permalink Reply by Michael Soldwisch on July 28, 2009 at 2:08pm

Okay, so maybe some of this is new or something.

The link at the following site is intersted:

http://www.apeks.co.uk/products/product_cats_results.asp?Lan=ENG&am...

It basically says that their regulators are approved for use with up to 40% Oxygen and that their Nitrox version is approved for use up to 100% oxygen. This may be new, since may people are saying that manufacturers do not have regulators that are approved for use with 100% oxygen.

If I am ready the site wrong., let me know.

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Permalink Reply by Richard on July 28, 2009 at 2:45pm

<40% might as well be air. No special prep required. O2 use is sporadic, obviously Apeks actually warranties some of theirs for use with 100%. And some of those Apeks you see out diving that were originally are delivered as "normal" regs can be cleaned for O2 service.

Many companies don't make any "O2 regs", although they might have been assembled with o2 compatible lubricants and o-rings etc. For instance Scubapro does not make an "Oxygen regulator" although may are sufficiently clean and compatible to use in O2 service. I have a couple Apeks which are cleaned for O2 use, a couple scubapros, and a couple dive-rites. Cleaning mostly comes down to using suitable lubricants (cristolube, not silicon). Using all viton parts vs. some buna-n is debatable.

Do you have a suitable reg tech? Setting up a deco reg is not very hard for the knowledgable tech.

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Permalink Reply by Patrick Uy-Tioco on October 11, 2009 at 3:14am

Apeks has service kits that are O2 clean from the factory.

All Apeks regs use oxygen-compatible o-rings (Nitril) and lubricants from the factory to prevent any mix ups. So you won't find silicone grease and rubber o-rings in their factory. This effectively means that if you open up an Apeks reg and o2 clean everything and reassemble using Krytox lubricants you now have a reg ready for 100% oxygen.

So the only real difference between the regular regs and the nitrox regs is the amount of o2-cleanliness that went into the assembly of the regulator.

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Permalink Reply by Michael Soldwisch on October 11, 2009 at 4:12pm

Thanks.

Patrick Uy-Tioco said:

Apeks has service kits that are O2 clean from the factory.

All Apeks regs use oxygen-compatible o-rings (Nitril) and lubricants from the factory to prevent any mix ups. So you won't find silicone grease and rubber o-rings in their factory. This effectively means that if you open up an Apeks reg and o2 clean everything and reassemble using Krytox lubricants you now have a reg ready for 100% oxygen.

So the only real difference between the regular regs and the nitrox regs is the amount of o2-cleanliness that went into the assembly of the regulator.

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Permalink Reply by Jan de Kock on March 18, 2010 at 1:55am

Patrick Uy-Tioco said:

Apeks has service kits that are O2 clean from the factory.

All Apeks regs use oxygen-compatible o-rings (Nitril) and lubricants from the factory to prevent any mix ups. So you won't find silicone grease and rubber o-rings in their factory. .

EPDM rubber is also used by Apeks, and if iam correctly informed then apeks and aqualung ( same company ) dont use nitril anymore because if Nitril got inflamed by oxygen( fouling on the nitril) nitril rings will produce a very toxic gas ( dont know the english name for it, but it is extremely toxic)

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Permalink Reply by Arno Pijnappels on March 27, 2010 at 1:23pm

Correct, Apeks uses EPDM o-rings.
The difference between the O2-clean and non-O2-clean sets (beside the color differences on the regs) are very small.
The normal regs are assembled without using the clean-room and without using handgloves, the 100% O2-clean regs are assembled inside a clean-room where personnel is wearing hairnets and gloves.

the servicekits Apeks supplies are all the same, just o2-clean them, handle them with powderfree gloves and use o2-compatible grease and you're good to go.

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Permalink Reply by Air-Guzzler (aka John Turnock) on April 2, 2010 at 9:30am

Here in the UK we are not supposed to service regs but with the power of www. you can get manuals d=for apex regs

http://www.frogkick.dk/manuals/apeks/

and possibly service kits from here
http://www.deepstop.de/apeks-m-14.html?page=2&sort=3a

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