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Hi Jay. Although the maximum depth I'm aiming for is 600 fsw, I expect to
stay above 300, with MOST dives maxing at 150.
I will be testing ( unmanned ) to 500 feet and it calcs out for a crush
depth at about 900 and change.
This is partly an educated guess though because I never got the hull
calculator program to work so I had an old engineer friend work up the numbers.
That's what he came up with and frankly, I'm no math whiz.
I haven't installed the stiffeners yet either so the deep water testing
will be after it's had a few shallow dives on it.
I'll just be careful to stay in water that doesn't go that deep until I get
better information. The stiffener design for a saucer is a little more complex
than a straight tube. It resembles the ribs on a pumpkin with extra supports
near the windows, gussets under the hatch flange, and behind the window
flange bases.
On the scuba tanks, I'm piping the tanks directly into a HP manifold with
regulators on the outlets.
The tanks get pumped to 2400 psi but that drops as the air is used. Here
too I'm relying on a friend who as a pipe fitter, has a lot of experience with
high pressure gas systems.
Frank D.
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