DIVE GEAR PROJECTS

Here is my son Patrick at age 9 with his custom
dive gear. A BC made from a snorkel vest and a
aluminum 30 on his back.



I love building stuff. I always have. I get it honestly. It comes from both my Mom whose projects usually were either art or craft and my Father whose projects were and still are wide ranging. I remember helping Mom make all sorts of decorations while I helped Dad make his own surf casting rods. I always knew that if I came to Dad the day before a project was due and said, "Dad, I need to build a particle accelerator for tomorrows physics class", he would respond by saying, "There is an old washing machine in the basement, we can start with that." That man was and still is fantastic.

When you build it, you may save money but usually don't, get something you could not otherwise have, have the pride of building, and own it. That's right, you own it emotionally, intellectually, and physically. If it breaks, you can fix it.

I have been building or trying to build diving gear since I was 12 years old or so. My first project was to waterproof a flashlight. It didn't work. Over the years a number of my other projects have leaked---temporarily. All the time it has been fun.

Plexiglass created my first real success. I had bought a 16mm war surplus gun camera and wanted to make movies. I was about 16. Dad suggested that I walk up the street and talk to Bill Emanualson. He owned a plexiglass shop in Norfolk. I junped at the idea. Bill took me to work with him that next Saturday. I learned to sweep the floor. I learned to tidy up, a skill that unfortunately has been lost. I learned to cut plexiglass. I learned to glue plexiglass. I anted as a second pair of hands for Bill. I learned to glue plexiglass. I never mentioned my camera...neither did he.

When I got to lunch, he said, "Lets look at that camera."

I ran to the car and brought it in. Bill grabbed a spare plexiglass tube, heated it up, and flattened it. We left for lunch and the tube to cool. When we got back, he smoothed one end and glued a flat plate on it and let it sit. After a couple of hours he glued some blocks at the other end to hold bolts. Just before four, he made a sealing plate and gave me a couple of drill bits to finish it off.

I finished the housing on Sunday and used it a couple of years before someone on the beach wanted it far more than I did and bought it from me. I sold it because there was a Rolli IV with housing in Norfolk in a camera store on consignment for less than his offer. I took his money, gave him about twenty rolls of movie film, the film I had just shot, and went spearfishing. I could always build another movie housing, and was planning on going to 8mm,.

When I got my Rolli, I soon discovered that I was eating up press 25 flashbulbs with the regular flash. They weren't much good after a salt water immersion, were fragile, and sometimes hard to find. The solution was two strobes from Spiratone inside of a housing. This is how it came out. As you can see, my preferred housing is a tube. It is easy to close off at one end, and really easy to seal with a squashed "o" ring or gum rubber gasket. You do not need a lathe to build this type of housing. You do need a drill press to do a good job.

Since that day I have made at least twenty or more housings out of plexiglass and helped buddies build even more. In this shot you can see a ministrobe housing for my old Nikonos and an auxiliary wide angle lens. This was copied by my friend George Green who sold them to Aquacraft.



What follows is a number of projects that I have tried, and a construction tips page. A great trip down memory lane for me and maybe some good information for you.

Rebreather specific projects are on the rebreather page.

PROJECTS

Quick and cheap housing for a slave flash.

Mini Digital Movie Camera Housing

Ten Dollar Flowmeter

Outfitting A Little Kid

Mavica Digital Underwater Camera Housing

Digital Underwater Photo System

Control Glands for Photo Systems



Even get my kids involved sometimes.

This is my son Patrick working on one of my hair-brained ideas.	And my daughter Janie cutting out filter pads for her rebreather.