Nihon Aqua-Master

[Bryan]

USD let Kawasaki build regulators under license in the 60’s. I don’t know a lot of details about them, If YOU do please E-mail me. Besides all the parts being metric and 95% of them not interchanging with their US made brethren there are some very unique differences in the parts. In the photos the US part is on the LEFT in all pictures. Take a look…Enjoy.

LINK TO PICTURES

[kgehring]

Wow! It looks like almost every part is different! Do you think that any of the Kawasaki parts are a better design than the Aqualung parts?

[Bryan]

I can’t speak to the actual advantages as I have no real data to back them up but from looking over all the parts I definitely like the spring pad and pin support pad. Both of them were more saucer shaped than the USD versions and the pin support is thicker and larger diameter. Since the HP diaphragm flexes up and down as pressure changes the curve of both parts seemed like it would have advantages of more surface area contact with the HP diaphragm..
When you remove well worn HP diaphragms they definitely have a shape formed into them…..When I set it up there was no difference between this one and the US version.
Very neat regulator, glad I got to work on it and share the pictures with everyone.

[YankDownUnder]

Nihon parts appear in Australia too. I often see Nihon tank valves on SCUBA here. They also made a Conshelf single hose regulator. I was given one recently and I tried to exchange some parts, but nothing was interchangable.