Vintage Double Hose

Was Voit 50 Fathom VCR2 Balanced?
- On page 34 of Phil Nuytten's "Emile Gagnan and the Aqualing", he describes how Gagnan conceived a pressure balancing system that could be used with single-stage, two hose regulators. Then he says it was licensed to Voit and marketed as their 50 Fathom model. He goes on to say this high pressure stage design was to play a role in the Calypso, Royal Mistral, and Royal Aqua-Master designs.

The idea/information/tests/data for a balanced single stage may have been shared with Voit but the Fifty Fathom is not a balanced regulator.

- Yeah but... It's Phil Nuytten and the way he's wording it sounds like he's saying its balanced. So, I got myself doubting what I know. I think now that I just misunderstood him... There were a lot of Gagnan's innovations mentioned in that one paragraph and versions of which found their way into several of his other regulator designs. Diagrams in Basic Scuba illustrate two dramatic design differences of the VCR2 from all other regs:

1. The NOZZLE of the VCR2 is empty... No seat, no spring... Nothing like the stuff that's in the nozzles of the Mistral, DAAM, and RAM. The balanced RAM has its balancing machinery in the nozzle so how could the VCR2 share the same feature?

2. The Downstream valve mechanism of the VCR2 is HIGH PRESSURE and comes AFTER the nozzle... A unique push/pull mechanism. The high pressure single stage version of this must be what Phil Nuytten referred to as the only design US Divers never used but licensed to Voit. LATER, U.S. Divers used the same approach in the LOW PRESSURE 2nd stage of single hose regulators.

FYI - Phil lists "Bryan Pennington" among a very distinguished list of people in the credits for the article. Not too shabby...


This drawing is from an article in the archives of the Vintage Double Hose website.

Herman and Luis have taken up the challenge of balancing a single stage regulator with varying degrees of success. Phil has been a supporter of Vintage Double Hose since day one and I consider myself fortunate to have him as a resource.

I once hand fitted a balanced poppet setup from a Conshelf into a Healthways single stage. It breathed good in the pool(and benefited from some additional changes, like relocating level mounting holes to allow me to use a restrictor plate to channel air directly to the inhalation horn), but it was mostly done as an exercise in curiosity. I think Luis was playing with a similar test at one point.

I've never seen a Conshelf regulator with a balanced 2nd stage.

There is a great deal of difference between a downstream stage and a balanced downstream stage.

Regulator Savvy makes it clear in principal along with great illustrations. Think DA vis Royal first stage or 108 vis G250 second stage

Pardon me, I didn't mean poppet. I meant the HP seat assembly from a Conshelf 1st stage. Didn't mean to confuse the issue.