Divers watch

  • Hey Guest, Early bird pricing on the Summer Moot (29th July - 10th August) available until April 6th, we'd love you to come. PLEASE CLICK HERE to early bird price and get more information.

Tengu

Full Member
Jan 10, 2006
12,776
1,510
51
Wiltshire
Of course, the battery is flat...

Changing is a black art, but people do do it.

If I could get it working it would be worth so much more to me....should I invest in a battery and O rings?
 

Toddy

Mod
Mod
Jan 21, 2005
38,937
4,570
S. Lanarkshire
Our local repair shop charges under three pounds to open up, replace the battery, and reseal modern watches.

If the watch is worth more than that, why not ? Find someone who does it frequently enough to know what he's doing though.

M
 

Tengu

Full Member
Jan 10, 2006
12,776
1,510
51
Wiltshire
Ah. Big difference between Divers computer and watch!

One has DO NOT OPEN on the back.

(And the screws are sealed in with paint...)
 

Toddy

Mod
Mod
Jan 21, 2005
38,937
4,570
S. Lanarkshire
Ah, right then. :sigh:

Son1 has tools and expertise and he does this kind of thing with his own kit, ours and his friends.
You need to find someone like Jamie. I have no idea who, and I'm not volunteering the son, sorry.

Have you checked the prices to have it done professionally ? If it's going to increase the value significantly, it'd still be worth doing properly…..besides, then you could give that guarantee too.

M
 

C_Claycomb

Moderator staff
Mod
Oct 6, 2003
7,353
2,364
Bedfordshire
Do not touch a dive computer, unless you know your tables...
As in, don't try fixing it yourself?

Tengu,
A little more info from you would improve the usefulness of the answers you get. Watch or computer, make, model, age, and in a perfect world what would you like to do with it, sell or use?
 

Tengu

Full Member
Jan 10, 2006
12,776
1,510
51
Wiltshire
Found it at the car boot from someone who wasnt sure what it was.

Serendipitous find a few years back taught me they have good value even if not working! (Who leaves their computer in the toe of a pair of flippers I bought?)

I can swim (just about) but wont put my face in the water!

I will take it down the local scuba centre and see what they say.

its a Suunto companion
 

Nomad64

Full Member
Nov 21, 2015
1,072
593
UK
Google is your friend.

https://www.underseas.com/index.php/suunto-companion

I'm not familiar with Suunto dive computers, I've always used Uwatec and not bought one for well over a decade. Older dive computers had long life batteries and were intended as a return to dealer/manufacturer for replacement but newer ones are user serviceable and these days may even be rechargeable.

Sadly I think the computer is likely to be worth about what you paid for it but nothing to be lost by taking it apart or asking for a second opinion. :(
 

Janne

Sent off - Not allowed to play
Feb 10, 2016
12,330
2,293
Grand Cayman, Norway, Sweden
As in, don't try fixing it yourself?

Tengu,
A little more info from you would improve the usefulness of the answers you get. Watch or computer, make, model, age, and in a perfect world what would you like to do with it, sell or use?

Correct. If you screw it up and it ceases to function and you do not know your tables you will be in dire straits!

My old assistant is also a dive master with several organizations, a qualified rescue diver and recovery diver ( of dead people) and she told me once that today very few people know the tables when it hits the fan, panic and die.
People rely too much on the computers.

She dives with air, helox and rebreathers. Wears a Rolex plus a computer. She has the watch WR tested every year, serviced every three years, her computer she WR tests every 6 months.

I do not dive myself. Prefer to see the fishes at the end of my line and then on my plate!
 
Last edited:

Robson Valley

Full Member
Nov 24, 2014
9,959
2,664
McBride, BC
Some brands of dive computers look almost like a clunky fat watch.
As Nomad suggests, you can probably chase the brand down with Google.
I think my brother uses a "console" type, sort of rectangular.
Anyway, a new DC in Canada runs $500 - $1,500 each.
 

Nomad64

Full Member
Nov 21, 2015
1,072
593
UK
Correct. If you screw it up and it ceases to function and you do not know your tables you will be in dire straits!

My old assistant is also a dive master with several organizations, a qualified rescue diver and recovery diver ( of dead people) and she told me once that today very few people know the tables when it hits the fan, panic and die.
People rely too much on the computers.

She dives with air, helox and rebreathers. Wears a Rolex plus a computer. She has the watch WR tested every year, serviced every three years, her computer she WR tests every 6 months.

I do not dive myself. Prefer to see the fishes at the end of my line and then on my plate!

Sorry Janne, you may have a friend who dives with a Rolex but this is all rather academic and/or nonsense;

If you look at the link I posted, the chances are that the computer is beyond economic repair because;
(i) replacement batteries are no longer available,
(ii) if batteries are available, the computer probably cannot be resurrected if the battery is completely dead,
(iii) if it can be repaired, it is a return to manufacturer job and likely to cost more than a 20 year old computer is worth.

The OP is a non-diver and simply looking to fix it up to sell on. Anyone (sensible) person buying a secondhand dive computer will test it before use in anger - against tables or more probably, a known good computer.

A dive computer is not witchcraft, it is just a pressure gauge linked to a computer running an algorithm for calculating nitrogen absorption. In the unlikely event of the OP succeeding in opening it, replacing the battery and resealing it, if it works and doesn't succumb to its first immersion in water, then it will be tested before use - see above.

With all due respect to your dive master friend, who I'm sure is a very competent diver (after all she dives with a Rolex!), the problem is not divers not knowing the tables but inexperienced divers certified by agencies typically based in blue water resorts more interested in pushing novice divers through impressive sounding but meaningless qualifications rather than ensuring that they are not a danger to themselves and others when they go to a dive resort every few years.

I've got all the qualifications I need to keep myself and anyone I am diving with safe - all earned while wearing a drysuit, 10kgs of lead and more often than not two air tanks in the cold murky seas (or colder, murkier quarries), around the UK and I don't know whether to laugh or cry when people who were previously non divers return from a two week trip to Thailand or the Caribbean with Rescue Diver or even Dive Master certificates with only 20 or so dives under their belts. Many years ago on a trip to the Red Sea, I was discretely asked if I would mind being buddied with someone who held an instructors ticket but in the opinion of the boat skipper was a complete liability and they wanted someone experienced able to look after themselves and if necessary him. Nothing to do with knowing your way around the tables, some people are competent to deal with an emergency underwater and some are not.

A computer is just a piece of kit and any properly trained diver should be able to deal with a malfunction as with any other piece of essential kit - abort the dive with gradual ascent using the analogue depth gauge with a safety stop should sort you out and if you are doing dives requiring multiple stops, or in overhead environments like wrecks or caves, you should be building redundancy into air/gas supply, and are unlikely to be using a computer from a car boot as your sole means of calculating your nitrogen intake. The only real risk is that the computer continues to function but underestimates your nitrogen absorption rate (in theory that could happen with any computer) and lets you dive deeper or longer than you should - at which point, if you don't have a back up computer, hopefully your buddy diving the same profile should be tapping you on your shoulder.

The tables are a good starting point and a good discipline to grasp but they are a blunt tool, based on the effect of nitrogen on the physiology of fit young male navy divers and IME, divers come in a variety of genders, shapes, sizes and ages. Personally (having clocked up somewhere between 500 and 1000* dives in the waters of every continent bar Antarctica), although I still have a rough working knowledge of the tables, like most experienced divers, I know, I tend to rely heavily on a computer plus experience to keep me safe particularly when doing multiple multi-level dives each day on extended liveaboard trips (say 5 dives a day for a week) which would be way outside the scope of the tables.

50 years ago, as the only means of telling time underwater, Rolex Submariners, Blancpains, Omegas etc were essential bits of dive kit, now I'm afraid they are just bling. The £20, 200m rated Casio permanently attached to my BCD as a backup timepiece has never malfunctioned but as I'm a cautious chap, I also tend to have at least one backup computer.

So, to the OP, good luck but you are probably wasting your time and to Janne, a dive computer and knowledge of the dive tables are not like a main and reserve parachute when falling from an aircraft, it is perfectly possible to emerge unscathed from the depths without either. :)

* Edit Mrs Nomad (who keeps track of these things) has pointed out that whilst my dive tally is between 500 and 1000 it is definitely to the lower end of the range!
 
Last edited:

Toddy

Mod
Mod
Jan 21, 2005
38,937
4,570
S. Lanarkshire
:notworthy: :D
Seriously that post deserves rep Nomad64:cool:

See the things I learn on this forum ? it never ceases to amaze me :) The sheer range of knowledge that folks have is brilliant.

M
 

Robbi

Full Member
Mar 1, 2009
10,226
1,027
northern ireland
Nomad64 ... I won't copy the whole post but that was / is one of the best posts I've ever read on here....superbly well written and explained :)
 
Last edited:

Nomad64

Full Member
Nov 21, 2015
1,072
593
UK
Thanks Nomad, we cant win them all.

Don't take my word for it, contact a Suunto service centre and give them the serial number - you may be lucky and it may be a later model that could be salvaged and batteries and seals described as being for a "Suunto Companion" are available from the Bay of E;

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Battery-Kit-for-SUUNTO-Companion-Favor-Favor-S-Octopus-2-Octopus1-probeD9-/252457255884?hash=item3ac7a003cc:g:TGYAAOxycmBS2~1t

Just a thought, are you certain that it is "dead" - I'm not familiar with Suunto computers but Uwatecs of that generation only come to "life" when immersed in water or if the metal contacts on the case are "bridged" with wet fingers.

Good luck, there is always a "for spares or repairs" listing on the Bay of E.
 

Tengu

Full Member
Jan 10, 2006
12,776
1,510
51
Wiltshire
Well, I put it on as `spares or repairs` at the price I paid (£10)

Hardly turned around and someones bidded.

<shrugs>
 

BCUK Shop

We have a a number of knives, T-Shirts and other items for sale.

SHOP HERE