Best portable oxygen set up

andybean

andybean

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andybean
I have found 3 brands. Air King, Aerox, Sky Ox.
Air King seems to be the least expensive. I have an old 20 CU Sky Ox but it is old school, very heavy. Its at least 20 years old.

Hoping for a 4 place set up but might resort to two based on cost.
Air King has a 9CU two place set up for $225.

Any thoughts?
 
I have a two place sky ox,

Perfect for me and I've used it on both trips to the rockys and once to take advantage of high winds on an east bound X-C. Allowed a non stop flight from Spearfish SD to Cincinnati.

It has easily saved the purchase price in fuel already.
 
andybean said:
I have found 3 brands. Air King, Aerox, Sky Ox.
Air King seems to be the least expensive. I have an old 20 CU Sky Ox but it is old school, very heavy. Its at least 20 years old.

Hoping for a 4 place set up but might resort to two based on cost.
Air King has a 9CU two place set up for $225.

Any thoughts?
Click to expand...

A 21 liter Faber/OMS LP steel '125' bottle that feeds a full face mask with microphone that you can turn up to pressurize delivery .5- 1.25 psi. That bottle would last 4 people a pretty descent trip at 210, call it 3 hrs at altitude. If you build with dive gear, your rig is always modular adding people and changing tank capacity is simple. Now you can get very light weight SCBA composite tanks as well.
 
Henning said:
A 21 liter Faber/OMS LP steel '125' bottle that feeds a full face mask with microphone that you can turn up to pressurize delivery .5- 1.25 psi. That bottle would last 4 people a pretty descent trip at 210, call it 3 hrs at altitude. If you build with dive gear, your rig is always modular adding people and changing tank capacity is simple. Now you can get very light weight SCBA composite tanks as well.
Click to expand...

I think that those SCBA composite tanks are life limited aren't they?
 
bigred177 said:
I think that those SCBA composite tanks are life limited aren't they?
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I would consider that to be possible, yes. I use steel because I use them to dive as well, but they're heavy. Whatever you get, everything is on some destructive cycle, just check the time and inspection cycle.
 
Henning said:
I would consider that to be possible, yes. I use steel because I use them to dive as well, but they're heavy. Whatever you get, everything is on some destructive cycle, just check the time and inspection cycle.
Click to expand...

Of course, just the last I heard they were significantly more expensive with a significantly shorter life.
 
bigred177 said:
I think that those SCBA composite tanks are life limited aren't they?
Click to expand...

Composite pressure tanks are life-limited to 15 years from date of manufacture, even if they have never been pressurized. Brand new tank never used, sitting on the shelf, at 15 years plus one day, must be condemned. The reasoning is that the Newnited States Gummint doesn't have a long history with composites and so they are establishing "safe" guidelines for the composite material until they have more evidence of how age and use affect the material.

All high-pressure DOT pressure tanks, whether composite or all-metal, must undergo periodic hydrostatic pressure testing - either 3 or 5 years depending on the methods used for manufacture. The only exception I'm aware of is for some small Chrome-Moly tanks under 2" in circumference and less than 2' in length, usually used for small CO2 tanks for air-powered guns like paintball.

ASME rated tanks are exempt from testing, but only because they have very high corrosion allowances which results in very thick walls (heavy weight) and so you're not likely to find those in aircraft use. ASME tanks are intended for use only in stationary installations, anything that is mobile is supposed to be DOT rated.
 
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bigred177 said:
Of course, just the last I heard they were significantly more expensive with a significantly shorter life.
Click to expand...

I would believe that. They are significantly lighter lol. Luxfer gave us these Kevlar strand/ Mylar laminate over a very thin wall aluminum that were nice and light but we had to strap lead to them to take em diving.
The next problem was the real killer, salt crystallizing in between the aluminum and the wrap.
 
bbchien said:
Steel: expansion tested every 10 years.
Aluminum: every five.
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We still do a hydro on steel breathing cylinders every 5 for DOT and typically we do a voluntary visual annually. If you are going through a fair bit of O2, a Haskel type booster pump allows you to really suck down your feed cylinder as well as delivering a full fill every time regardless the feed pressure and fill pressure; allows for 3500psi 120cu/ft HP steel from a 1500psi K/440 bottle.
 
Is that "Dr. Bruce O2 thread" thread a Sticky? If not, it should be. Mods?
 
Anybody got pictures of how they secured the oxygen tanks in their birds?
 
I have a Nelson/PreciseFlite unit with the conserving (scuba style) regulators. They do a great job of really getting a lot of use out of a single tank fill. The other similar product is from Mountain High. When I bought my unit, Precise had a slight edge, but MH has subsequently enhanced their unit to deal with the issues I thought it had, so both should do a fine job.

As for mounting, I never did find something that worked well. I just lave the thing on the floor in the rear seat (or if we have stuff packed in there as typical, I just wedge it standing up behind the seat.
 
Morne said:
Anybody got pictures of how they secured the oxygen tanks in their birds?
Click to expand...

Portable tanks I seat belt them into place. My dive tanks typically have extra rings, loops, and straps. If you seat belt over them then wrap that with an empty weight belt, that works well.
 
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