It is the first Wednesday of the New Year, Happy New Year by the way! I hope that the new year was good to you. I would like to say I stayed up and partied hard, but the reality is I was in bed by around 10pm on New Year’s Eve, Mark set an alarm for 10 minutes before midnight, he woke me up, we said Happy New Year, and that was it. I then woke up at 3am, said, “Well crap, we missed midnight.” He laughed at me, said “no, I woke you up and spoke to you even.” Then I was wide awake for about 30 minutes before falling back asleep and waking up at 6am to get ready to head to the lake for the New Year’s Day dive. So that was my New Years, how was yours?
As I mentioned in a previous post, this year’s weekly post is going to focus on the ins and outs of our SCUBA gear. We want to take away some of the mystery of the gear that is used while diving the depths of the great unknown, of course most of these places we dive have been dove before, but go with me, it’s the “great unknown.”
We decided to start this blog post off with one of the more important pieces of dive gear, a REGULATOR. But not just any regulator, we’re starting off with the:
MK25 EVO/S600.
The MK25 is a balanced, piston style, first stage regulator (the breathy thing )
What makes the MK25 an EVO regulator is an extra coating on the spring, an added plastic spring cup, and an exterior fin redesign. This makes the regulator better for cold water diving than the previous generation of MK25 regulator. EVO stands for evolved.
The S600 (second stage) is a balanced, adjustable, second stage regulator. This is one of the most common second stage regulator’s used.
So why should we care about the MK25 EVO S600?
This regulator combo is great for use by beginning divers all the way to the most advanced tech divers. When this combo is serviced properly, it has the potential to last you a lifetime of dives.
I’m going to leave the technical aspects of this regulator to the pros at SCUBAPRO:
Technical Information
MK25 EVO First Stage:
- Air balanced flow-through piston in a chrome-plated brass body provides constant and effortless airflow unaffected by depth, tank pressure, or breathing rate.
- Patented XTIS (Extended Thermal Insulating System) fully isolates the mechanical elements from the cold, increasing freezing resistance 30 percent over the previous MK25 without compromising breathing performance. Key insulation system components are visible in blue.
- New spring insulating coating, body insulating bushing, anti-freeze cap, bigger body and cap thread all work in concert with the XTIS to improve cold-water performance.
- Anti-freeze protection radically increases breathing reliability when diving in the most extreme water temperatures.
- Two opposing high pressure ports allow the first stage to be positioned either up or down.
- Five high-flow low pressure ports on a swivel turret maximize hose routing options.
- External intermediate pressure adjustment enables technicians to fine-tune performance quickly and easily.
- Available in either 3364psi/232bar INT or 4350psi/300bar DIN configurations.
- Weight: INT 232 (oz/g): 27.9/790; DIN 300 (oz/g): 20.1/572.
- Airflow at 2900psi/200bar: (l/min/SCFM): >8500/301.
- Intermediate pressure (psi/bar): 130-142/9.0-9.8.
S600 Second Stage:
- Metal valve housing (barrel) is able to withstand years of aggressive diving.
- Air-balanced valve smoothes out the inhalation effort when diving at varying depths and supply pressures.
- User controls include a diver-adjustable inhalation effort knob and Venturi-Initiated Vacuum Assist (VIVA) dive/pre-dive switch.
- Super-flow hose features an oversized bore (larger inside hose diameter) that allows more air to flow on each inhalation.
- Ultra-comfortable orthodontic mouthpiece is easy to grip yet doesn’t inhibit airflow.
- Weight: 6.8oz/193g.
- Airflow at 2900psi/200bar: 1850 l/min – 66 SCFM.
- Maximum low pressure: 203psi/14bar.
- Interchangeable purge covers allow you to make your regulator truly unique.
- Available purge cover colors: Blue, White, Yellow, Red, Pink
For even more information on this combo, check out the SCUBAPRO website here.
Your first and second stage regulator is your primary life support system when exploring the underwater world. As you learned (or will learn) in your Open-Water SCUBA certification classes, the first stage attaches to your tank (in this case the MK25 EVO) and takes the high pressure from the tank and converts it to an intermediate pressure. Then the second stage (which is the S600) converts that intermediate pressure to a breathable pressure based on depth and the exterior pressure on your second stage regulator making it feel just like you’re breathing on land. Why buy a less performing regulator when your life relies on this piece of equipment; our suggestion, buy the best.
Make sure to contact us here at Extreme Sports Scuba for additional information and how to purchase this product.
Also make sure to read this post if you haven’t yet!! Trust me!!