Suunto Vyper Air & Transmitter Question

[Diving Now]

Hi All,

I'm looking into buying a Suunto Vyper Air. I see it is offered in some shops with a transmitter.

I read the manual on line, and although light on the details it seems that the computer/ transmitter (and I'm quoting from the manual here)"... will automatically adapt to your cylinder size and current air consumption."

Can anyone confirm how this happens and give any advice as to if its worth it?

Thanks for reading.

[Steve Clark]

Personally, I wouldn't bother with a transmitter. It's a novelty at first to be able to log your SAC, but you can do this anyway by writing down your start and end pressures and just putting these in the suunto DM software and it will work it out (or just do the simple maths on your average depth).

I'm not sure about the actual functionality of the thing. I wouldn't get too carried away with relying on it for planning dive time in the water. Your spare gas is in your buddy's cylinder and it's not connected to that!

Steve

[Tim Digger]

I use a Vyper Air with transmitter. I have it on my right wrist. This is the hand I hold a large camera rig with. Thus the pressure display is next door to the viewfinder and camera controls ready to be frequently checked even when stalking something a bit shy where extra movements are not wanted. I agree the function with the downloaded file and calculated SAC requires manual input of cylinder size and is not very useful. The transmitter can be techy establishing a link occasionally. Unless like me you have a particular use where having a handy pressure display is useful when hands are occupied don't bother.

[Diving Now]

Personally, I wouldn't bother with a transmitter. It's a novelty at first to be able to log your SAC, but you can do this anyway by writing down your start and end pressures and just putting these in the suunto DM software and it will work it out (or just do the simple maths on your average depth).

I'm not sure about the actual functionality of the thing. I wouldn't get too carried away with relying on it for planning dive time in the water. Your spare gas is in your buddy's cylinder and it's not connected to that!

Steve

Thanks Steve. I wasn't planning on using it for in water dive timing. I just thought it would be one of those nice to know things.

[MinimalMayhem]

I like it a lot. Anytime I check my depth I see my gas left including what it thinks is my remaining air time.
I think adapting to your tanks just means it works like a normal spg whether fitted on a single, twins etc.

[Ian@1904]

I have been using the transmitters for years and years.* The transmitter is a nice to have, not essential piece of kit. Best to have SPG available. I like looking in one place to see the information i.e. how much gas I have.

In previous years Suunto have offered the transmitter FOC in their Christmas offers....

*I have two transmitters, one for my twinset and one on my single setup. First transmitter purchased in 2002, still works fine.

[Baron015]

Suunto Vyper Air & Transmitter Question

It measures how many bars of air you are consuming per minute and predicts when this will reach 50/0 bar, as gas time remaining.

Clearly this will be dependent on many things, some of which it can't take into account when forecast ascent plan.

But it doesn't need to know how big the cylinder is, it just uses the rate. Obv with a bigger cylinder the rate is lower, at same depth, so this is 'automatically adapted'.

I love the transmitters and like to use one or more. For rec diving I don't bother with a normal spg as well, it's rec so what's the worst that can happen. But anyway I wouldn't read too much into the 'gas time remaining' figure.

[Diving Now]

It measures how many bars of air you are consuming per minute and predicts when this will reach 50/0 bar, as gas time remaining.

Clearly this will be dependent on many things, some of which it can't take into account when forecast ascent plan.

But it doesn't need to know how big the cylinder is, it just uses the rate. Obv with a bigger cylinder the rate is lower, at same depth, so this is 'automatically adapted'.

I love the transmitters and like to use one or more. For rec diving I don't bother with a normal spg as well, it's rec so what's the worst that can happen. But anyway I wouldn't read too much into the 'gas time remaining' figure.

So in essence, My lord, it senses pressure, and I assume depth and establishes rate of fall, and therefore remaining duration?

If that is the case it just got a lot clearer.

[Baron015]

So in essence, My lord, it senses pressure, and I assume depth and establishes rate of fall, and therefore remaining duration?

If that is the case it just got a lot clearer.

Spot on.

[Ian_6301]

It's a novelty item.

You still need an SPG, for when it has a funny five minutes.

It can work out your air consumption and hence dive time remaining, but it doesn't take into account any reserve requirements.

You can do all of that, and more, in your head, for free. If you can't, ask your instructor for help. If they can't, choose a better instructor...

Save your pennies. Buy beer instead.