Flooded GATES EX1 housing

[marksm 0]

Flooding sucks I'm sure...my time has yet to come..yet. So with that in mind. I'd like to hear from other EX1 housing owners or John on how to properly inspect these controls. I'd love some pictures and instructions. What to look for, be worried about, etc. I'd like to thank all in advance for their time in doing this.

 

Mark

[ce4jesus 1]

So you lower the housing on a rope before every dive???? The leak happend after the 3th dive of the day whitout opening the housing between dives!

....and followed by

 

Gates is not at fault here. There are no faulty parts. A part that can potentially come loose, came loose.

 

I completely disagree with this logic. A wheel on a car can "potentially" come loose but if they did there would be an outcry like no other. The bottom line is we shouldn't expect any less quality from our underwater housings. If Gates is using an inferior part or has known about this issue where this part "comes loose" then they should be held responsible. Especially if they didn't send out notices to customers owning all of the affected units.

Bottom line, I'm not sure I know anyone who does a dive and then completely rechecks his/her gear before the next dive if they never opened the housing. Olympus replaced a housing for me last year for free because of a similar issue. I was able to save the camera because I notice the leak early.

Edited September 1, 2009 by ce4jesus

[ce4jesus 1]

I'm not suggesting that you go around and break the Loktite seal. I am suggesting you check the seal.

 

If you gently apply a bit of pressure with a spanner (because its easier to apply the correct pressure with a spanner and not your fingers) and it doesnt turn, then the loktite is fine and and the gland doesnt need tightening. If of course it does turn, then you need to tighten it!

 

Loktite is not epoxy, its not some permanent glue. There are several grades, each with different levels of strength, some more permanent than others (Loctite 242 is temporary and forms a soft bond, and loctite 270 (studlock) is semi-permanent/permanent, there is a third, loctite 290, that is for penetrating pre-assembled parts but I doubt thats the one they use), but they are all, releasable with a spanner no matter what 'permanent' claims are made.

 

Loktite helps stop things coming lose under vibration, its great stuff, but if you think its a permanent solution that requires no checking, ever, then I'm afraid your probably going to flood another camera. Sorry to be brutally honest.

 

Okay, I'll be brutaly honest. If he takes a spanner and tightens this thing after finding it loose and the housing floods it is his fault again. Gates will simply reply, you should have sent it in for tightening instead of doing it yourself. Your argument here is ridiculous. Loctite is used on automobiles, aircraft and the like and to be brutally honest I've yet to see a head bolt fly off after 200,000 miles of driving. I would think an auto would be subjected to much more "vibration" than a camera housing in transit. The users only fault was trusting a piece of equipment to do what it was designed to do. We do this in everyday life.

Edited September 1, 2009 by ce4jesus

[Brumpy 6]

Hey Brumpy,

Do you have a picture of the gland in question... I'm paranoid now about my housing and want to double check everything!

What about household insurance... can you make a claim on that... just say you got water on while out sailing with friends....

 

I just got back the housing, GATES "fixed" it!? the only thing they did't was locked the "gland" again, pretty stupid to send it to the states for a 2 min job what everybody is saying here i have to do this myself before every dive :-(

 

So i can send you a picture but nothing to see on that!

 

I also got news from Sony, fixing the EX1 is 200 euro more expensive then buying a new one :-(

 

And i do not have eny insurance, DAN is only for USA residance, i will chek in the other one for the future.

 

 

 

Sorry to 'maybe' ask the obvious, I've never owned a Gates housing, but is there an accompanying manual with the housing that suggests checking the glands etc, etc every so often... ??? Even us award winning shooters can't know or think of everything...

 

Dive safe

 

Dean(checking his glands daily)B

 

Nop nothing in the manueel is saying we have to do that!

[Brumpy 6]

By the way Bruno, what did you do to your Z1 / LMI rig that made it flood?

 

Ok this is really stupid!!!!!

The big LMI housing have opening that you need to open when flying for the pressure, i forgot to close this! :-(

[Brumpy 6]

Brumpy. Sorry to hear about your flood but perhaps you could try to look on it this way. You say that your housing had had 50 dives on it prior to the flood. You also say that the gland had loosened and this is what caused the flood. So I'd say that you have 2 scenarios:

 

Firstly, that each dive the gland loosened slightly until after 50+ dives it had become undone sufficiently to cause the flood, or

 

Secondly, that something had caused a substantial change in the way the gland was secured and that it had loosened over a short period of time.

 

Unfortunately if it was the first, then I'd say that everyone who suggests that this should have been picked up on a pre-dive check was probably right AND from what you state of your experience then I'd suggest that you may well have noticed that the gland was not sitting as it should. Which makes me suspect that it was the second - a sudden change in the secureness of the gland. You may never establish the cause BUT my experience of baggage handling in transit is not good and I have had glands damaged as control rods have been bent - even with the housing secure inside a Pelicase - and I'm not alone in this. I have no idea what the handlers/security people do but it wouldn't even surprise me if they have removed the housing and knocked/dropped/otherwise damaged it. It may well be that this is the cause - it would certainly be my best guess.

 

As for future checks, well I check controls very carefully after transit, feeling for stiffness, tightness, etc. as well as a visual check to ensure that nothing is untoward - a boring time consuming chore but unfortunately very necessary.

 

Absolutly the first one! And yes probely if i used a KEY to chek the glands before every dive this was never happend!

But so my questions is do you realy need to use a key before every dive on the glands? this is ridiculous!

[Brumpy 6]

Isn't the beauty of a Gates the fact that it allows full access to all controls for field repairs? For things like the flip filter holder its a doddle to just nip it tight again. Housings do get shaken around a lot and it is down to us as the end user to check if all sits well before we dunk them. After long haul flights, during liveaboard trips and if I have the time at home I take the time to check and re-check the controls. I don't personally think that a housing manufacturer can be held accountable to replace a camera that was in their product when it flooded IF that housing had been used for quite a number of successful dives prior to the flood.

 

I can understand the 'red mist' knee jerk reaction to the flood and to whom the accountability of replacement equipment should be placed. I can only hope though as logic prevails the poster will realize that the camera should have been insured, if it wasn't, and that the responsibility to replace that lies either with the insurance company or with himself.

 

I hope the issue gets resolved without the smell of burning wood.

 

Cheers,

Mark.

 

Thats true the nice thing about the GATES is that you can do enything on the spot with the housing, but after diving 3,5 years with the LMI Z1 housing i never had eny problems what i was not able to resolve on the spot, and only after a few months of diving with the GATES i have this problem!

So you can ask yourself what is the best?

And yes insurance, i had a insurance the first year with my Z1 in the LMI the bill for 1 year was 900 euro (housing and camera half of the price of the GATES) and after a year the company stopped with the insurance and i never had a problemm!

I loooked for a Insurance here but did't not found one :-(

[DeanB 19]

....and followed by

 

 

 

I completely disagree with this logic. A wheel on a car can "potentially" come loose but if they did there would be an outcry like no other. The bottom line is we shouldn't expect any less quality from our underwater housings. If Gates is using an inferior part or has known about this issue where this part "comes loose" then they should be held responsible. Especially if they didn't send out notices to customers owning all of the affected units.

Bottom line, I'm not sure I know anyone who does a dive and then completely rechecks his/her gear before the next dive if they never opened the housing. Olympus replaced a housing for me last year for free because of a similar issue. I was able to save the camera because I notice the leak early.

 

Agreed !!! especially if its a 'known' defect/problem ... I was told, when buying my first housing to check it every 10 dives... Although this wasn't an official recommendation...

 

Maybe a leaflet/dvd concerning these issues with every housings ...

 

Dive safe

 

DeanB

[HMP 0]

Okay, I'll be brutaly honest. If he takes a spanner and tightens this thing after finding it loose and the housing floods it is his fault again. Gates will simply reply, you should have sent it in for tightening instead of doing it yourself. Your argument here is ridiculous. Loctite is used on automobiles, aircraft and the like and to be brutally honest I've yet to see a head bolt fly off after 200,000 miles of driving. I would think an auto would be subjected to much more "vibration" than a camera housing in transit. The users only fault was trusting a piece of equipment to do what it was designed to do. We do this in everyday life.

 

 

I dont understand why the concept of a gland here is so difficult. Control rod glands and cable glands are super simple devices, made by many different manufactures and used across underwater housings for cameras, electronics, torches, ROV's etc etc. They are incredibly tolerant of pressure meaning that they are still usable when sprung buttons will have been squashed and rendered completely useless.

They tend to be the most reliable through-wall fitting around (if they are tight). The reason they (and by they I mean anyone who uses a gland fitting, not just Gates), dont utilise locking washers on the outside is that glands have a face sealing O-ring. So introduce the locking-washer on the outside and it wont seal.

A possibility is to use a nut on the inside of the housing to lock it tight, but they require care to use so as not to damage threads and make manufacturing the fittings more difficult in terms of thread length, housing wall thickness, control rod length and attachment. They also take up more room, so if the side of a camera with buttons you want to control is very close to a a wall your going to have to make an even bigger housing to allow room for the nut. Lastly the most annoying thing about having nuts on the inside of a housing, is that they are far more difficult to check. On a large housing, grovelling past various control rods, wires etc to get to a nut thats placed awkwardly, deep inside, just makes your life a lot harder. Its a lot easier to tighten from the outside.

 

Comparing fittings that are not designed to be waterproof under 10 bar of pressure such as those on car wheels, and domestic appliances etc is a pointless exercise. They have completely different design parameters, work in completely different environments and do different things! You could use all those automotive parts, it wont come undone but your housing isnt going to be watertight!

 

 

"Gates will simply reply, you should have sent it in for tightening instead of doing it yourself."

 

Really? You really think that? That is hilarious. Really I'm laughing. Its a nut. Quarter of a turn and its tight.

 

Oh yes, come to think of it I suppose I am being completely "ridiculous" as you say for using a spanner to tighten a nut and not expecting a bit of glue to last forever under saltwater immersion. Perhaps I will stop taking anykind of responsibility for any housing I close and give up on doing basic maintenance. I could perhaps take it back to the manufacturer for checking before going into the water just to make sure. And then there is all the dive kit...... oh its all too much! I'm going to take up bowling.

Edited September 1, 2009 by HMP

[HMP 0]

Absolutly the first one! And yes probely if i used a KEY to chek the glands before every dive this was never happend!

But so my questions is do you realy need to use a key before every dive on the glands? this is ridiculous!

 

Did I say before every dive? No, I did not. That would be ridiculous.

 

And before you jump in with 'it was fine for the previous two dives'. Its a face o-ring and can still be water tight but slightly loose on the thread, increasing water pressure will help it seal. It only takes a fraction more of a turn for the o-ring to lift off the sealing surface and you have your flood.

 

Although I'm rapidly losing sympathy here, especially with some of the comments. I do understand the frustration. I nearly lost a camera through a loose gland a few times (and yes, once it was a gates) and I've completely flooded rebreather electronics by not tightening glands (and thats life support), but they are good at what they do when looked after. Its deeply annoying to be caught out by something that I admit looks like you should never have to touch it, but its still your responsibility. You learn, and you change your habits for each housing and thats it really.

Edited September 1, 2009 by HMP

[Nick Hope 151]

I love a tight gland as much as the next underwater video housing owner but before you all go off swinging on your wrenches, 2 thoughts...

 

1. Those little threads strip easily, especially if aluminium is in the equation, and then you'll have a new nightmare. So go easy.

 

2. Tightening a loctited gland might actually break the loctite, increasing the chances of the gland coming loose in the long run. As the actress said to the bishop, better to give your glands a thorough visual inspection and check them firmly with the fingers.

[Brumpy 6]

Did I say before every dive? No, I did not. That would be ridiculous.

 

And before you jump in with 'it was fine for the previous two dives'. Its a face o-ring and can still be water tight but slightly loose on the thread, increasing water pressure will help it seal. It only takes a fraction more of a turn for the o-ring to lift off the sealing surface and you have your flood.

 

Although I'm rapidly losing sympathy here, especially with some of the comments. I do understand the frustration. I nearly lost a camera through a loose gland a few times (and yes, once it was a gates) and I've completely flooded rebreather electronics by not tightening glands (and thats life support), but they are good at what they do when looked after. Its deeply annoying to be caught out by something that I admit looks like you should never have to touch it, but its still your responsibility. You learn, and you change your habits for each housing and thats it really.

 

Do not lose your Symphathy pls!

It is allready bad enough what happend with my camera!

 

You are saying "Its deeply annoying to be caught out by something that I admit looks like you should never have to touch it, but its still your responsibility. You learn, and you change your habits for each housing and thats it really."

 

I like to agree with you but if this is the way to do it then it sounds more then logic that GATES explains this in there users manuel not?

 

I say it again, i dive 10 years with a video camera now, Ikelite and Light and motion i used for years i know how to handle the housings and i never had a flood in +2000 dives (except the Z1 but that was my stupid mistake) and now i have a bought a GATES that flooded in a few months, and people are saying i was doing somthing wrong?

I do not see enything in the users manuel what i did't wrong!

And i do not believe in using a tool to chek the glands on a regular basis because i also think you are going to break the seal with the locktide then!

[Paul Kay 65]

A wheel on a car can "potentially" come loose but if they did there would be an outcry like no other.

 

If it was a design/manufacturing fault then you would be correct. However, in the UK it is the car driver's responsibility to ensure roadworthiness of the vehicle being driven and "it shouldn't have come undone" would not be an acceptable reason for not being prosecuted if a vehicle is stopped and checked. To be accepted as an excuse you would have to prove either a design or manufacturing fault.

 

What Brumpy is arguing is that a loctited gland should not have unscrewed and that this might have been a manufacturer's problem. Unfortunately for Brumpy, a careful inspection of the housing should have revealed the problem (especially important after it had been in transit) and I would suggest that the same argument would apply. It may not be palatable but .....

 

In my experience, virtually all floods I have seen are down to:

 

poor pre-dive assembly, or

 

insufficient pre-dive housing checks

 

As I have said before, I have had housings damaged in transit (I remember having to straighten out a control rod in a hotel room in New Zealand, the night before the first dive, unfortunately I couldn't fix the strobe which was as dead as can be - both damaged in transit) and have found the problems during reassembly and checking prior to diving.

[DeanB 19]

If it was a design/manufacturing fault then you would be correct. However, in the UK it is the car driver's responsibility to ensure roadworthiness of the vehicle being driven and "it shouldn't have come undone" would not be an acceptable reason for not being prosecuted if a vehicle is stopped and checked. To be accepted as an excuse you would have to prove either a design or manufacturing fault.

 

Paul are you telling me that I should be checking my nuts everytime i go out ??? Damn !!! I'm going to have to leave a little earlier each morning

 

Dive safe

 

DeanB

[Paul Kay 65]

What you do in your own time Dean, is up to you .

[HMP 0]

I love a tight gland as much as the next underwater video housing owner but before you all go off swinging on your wrenches, 2 thoughts...

 

1. Those little threads strip easily, especially if aluminium is in the equation, and then you'll have a new nightmare. So go easy.

 

2. Tightening a loctited gland might actually break the loctite, increasing the chances of the gland coming loose in the long run. As the actress said to the bishop, better to give your glands a thorough visual inspection and check them firmly with the fingers.

 

 

Completely agree, the only reason to use the spanner is to tighten something that the loctite has given up on. Occasionaly its easier to use a spanner to check, not to crank on the pressure, but to hold the hex head in a positive manner and apply no more torque than you would with your fingers. In fact with a spanner you can apply even less pressure and be more accurate because your not trying to get a good grip with your fingers. Very handy if the hex head is recessed into the housing wall in anyway. A tiny movement in the nut/gland is very visible because of the length of the spanner. It was only a tip.

 

Dont forget that using loctite is not mandatory for a gland fitting on a housing. Most fittings I've worked with dont have it. They work perfectly fine with out it. I'm more concerned with the O-ring and not the loctite when it comes to prepping a housing.

[HMP 0]

....and followed by

 

Olympus replaced a housing for me last year for free because of a similar issue. I was able to save the camera because I notice the leak early.

 

 

The only similarity here is that the both housings leaked around a control. How they leaked is a different matter, and thats down to being a completely different type of housing with different methods and materials used. On a molded polycarbonate housing, unless its the o-ring on the control rod thats been damaged, there is nothing really that can be replaced or re-machined. If the problem lies in the hole of the control then the whole housing has to be replaced. Relatively cheap option for a mass produced plastic housing, compared with a large machined aluminium housing.

The end use is different too, Gates housings are rated to and will work at 130m+, a depth were the fittings on, say your Olympus housing, really wont remain water tight, if the housing hadnt already imploded at 90m. To achieve such high depth ratings requires fittings which are subtly different from ones on mass produced housings, and require a subtly different level and type of care from the end user.

Edited September 2, 2009 by HMP

[DeanB 19]

Completely agree, the only reason to use the spanner is to tighten something that the loctite has given up on. Occasionaly its easier to use a spanner to check, not to crank on the pressure, but to hold the hex head in a positive manner and apply no more torque than you would with your fingers. In fact with a spanner you can apply even less pressure and be more accurate because your not trying to get a good grip with your fingers. Very handy if the hex head is recessed into the housing wall in anyway. A tiny movement in the nut/gland is very visible because of the length of the spanner. It was only a tip.

 

Dont forget that using loctite is not mandatory for a gland fitting on a housing. Most fittings I've worked with dont have it. They work perfectly fine with out it. I'm more concerned with the O-ring and not the loctite when it comes to prepping a housing.

 

There you go ... Get this written in the manual ... Under 'important to check' hopefully others can learn off of Brumpsters misfortune ...

 

Dive safe

 

DeanB

[Brumpy 6]

If it was a design/manufacturing fault then you would be correct. However, in the UK it is the car driver's responsibility to ensure roadworthiness of the vehicle being driven and "it shouldn't have come undone" would not be an acceptable reason for not being prosecuted if a vehicle is stopped and checked. To be accepted as an excuse you would have to prove either a design or manufacturing fault.

 

What Brumpy is arguing is that a loctited gland should not have unscrewed and that this might have been a manufacturer's problem. Unfortunately for Brumpy, a careful inspection of the housing should have revealed the problem (especially important after it had been in transit) and I would suggest that the same argument would apply. It may not be palatable but .....

 

In my experience, virtually all floods I have seen are down to:

 

poor pre-dive assembly, or

 

insufficient pre-dive housing checks

 

As I have said before, I have had housings damaged in transit (I remember having to straighten out a control rod in a hotel room in New Zealand, the night before the first dive, unfortunately I couldn't fix the strobe which was as dead as can be - both damaged in transit) and have found the problems during reassembly and checking prior to diving.

 

The housing was in handlugage the whole trip!

[jonny shaw 16]

The housing was in handlugage the whole trip!

 

Hey Brumpy,

 

Can you post the pictures of the glad, were you just supposed to have checked the main nut or were you supposed to have pulled the thing apart and then tightened something up inside?

 

J

[Nick Hope 151]

I wonder if any housing manufacturer has ever replaced a camera or compensated a customer for camera damage caused by a flood.

[Steve Douglas 16]

Only in your dreams Nick. And even then there'd be a shipping charge plus tax plus a boxing fee and wrapping paper fee

Steve

[Brumpy 6]

 

The complet housing with the new Wide angle port

 

 

Most of the controls on 1 side

 

 

The basterd!

 

 

 

like you see it is not easy to to reach the glands

Edited September 3, 2009 by Brumpy

[jonny shaw 16]

Thanks Brumpy,

 

I have actually had Ikelite pay for a camera repair for the exact same same as what happened to Brump's, the housing was probably 20 dives old and a gland had come loose and caused a flood. I sent to back to Ikelite the fixed the problem and paid the camera repair bill. I wasn't a huge bill as I noticed early on but it still was a few hundred AUD's.

[ce4jesus 1]

The only similarity here is that the both housings leaked around a control. How they leaked is a different matter, and thats down to being a completely different type of housing with different methods and materials used. On a molded polycarbonate housing, unless its the o-ring on the control rod thats been damaged, there is nothing really that can be replaced or re-machined. If the problem lies in the hole of the control then the whole housing has to be replaced. Relatively cheap option for a mass produced plastic housing, compared with a large machined aluminium housing.

The end use is different too, Gates housings are rated to and will work at 130m+, a depth were the fittings on, say your Olympus housing, really wont remain water tight, if the housing hadnt already imploded at 90m. To achieve such high depth ratings requires fittings which are subtly different from ones on mass produced housings, and require a subtly different level and type of care from the end user.

 

No the similarity is that both housings leaked after being used on previous dives without opening them between dives. The housing I had was for a DSLR with a facing oring seal that simply breached after two previous dives the same day. Enough folks had experienced the same issue that Olympus not only responded by replacing the housing for free and the camera bodies extremely cheap. They also made corrections to the faulty design partly due to feedback from their customers. Personally I think it was a good thing I just didn't throw my hands up in the air and decide to go bowling. I had enough folks like you who were kind enough to blame me and tell me to just do a better job in the future. My perserverance paid off. I also think the gland in question is something that probably occurs often enough to warrant a different design. Especially if there's no notice in the operators manual. But hey, if you're satisfied with dysfunctional equipment and handy enough with a spanner then why bother...right?