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Promoting the hobby...

Thought I'd change the subject line ;)  I think the biggest problem
with promoting this as a hobby and getting more commercial mfgs is
summed up in one word....LIABILITY.  The cost of currently available
subs is so high due to liability insurance and ABS spec conformance.
I heard somewhere that to get a particular sub certified could cost
upwards to $100K-200K.  That pretty much puts the commercial sub out
of reach of the average Joe.

Maynard, The guy who builds and sells Kitteridge subs, lives near me
and he sells the K-350 for $100K.  Now I have the plans for this and
have to believe it could be built for $10K-20K, so either he has one
hell of a markup or a big chunk of that goes toward liability insurance.

This is one reason a lot of airplane mfgs, such as Piper, went out of 
business.  Lawsuits and excessive costs for liability insurance.

On a side note, how many on the list are certified scuba divers? I've
been diving over 10 years and am currently an instructor with over a
thousand logged dives.  I think anyone seriously contemplating building
and operating a sub should definately be certified for scuba.  Mostly
for bailout capabilities, but also to understand the effects of pressure
on the body, bouyancy control, and working with pressurized gasses.

Sorry for making this so long but I have one other request....I would
like suggestions for a name for my sub.  The picture can be seen on
Ray's PSUB web page at:

             http://pw1.netcom.com/~rayek/picture.html

I'd like to come up with a spiffy name instead of calling it XC-600 !
Any suggestions are more than welcomed!!

--
Al Secor  ARS:WA3PWX/2  SSI DCSI5828  PDIC 10750
e-mail: work: secor@btv.ibm.com  home: wrkdiver@clarityconnect.com