The back lighting circuit is finished and now the production die to mount the LED to the board is being made. The process will take a week and the boards will take a week to run after that. The NiTek X cases are in production. We should have these by the end of next week and start the pressure testing before assembly. Everything is coming together.
Lamar
The back lighting is finally here. We are ordering the final components and gearing up for a beta production run of 100 units. If all goes well, these beta units will be ready in 30-45 days. After we go through the first beta production run we should be in regular production 30-45 days after that. All is well with the project, but a couple of vendors created delays that slowed the project considerably. Now that we are over that hurdle we should be moving at a much faster pace.
Lamar
The manned dives on the NiTek X are moving along without any glitches. We are now into the military testing on case integrity with extreme heat and cold testing along with interval pressure checking. We are still waiting on the back lighting to complete the production beta units. We are pushing the vendor to give us a delivery date. More information on the intuitive decompression model: The NiTek X gas list is for the dive, just like the older NiTek HE you program in the gasses for the dive. The NiTek X assumes you will use all these gases for the dive with change points of 1.6 PO2. This allows the computer to look forward on the decompression schedule and predict your decompression. This was a feature I had asked for so I could have some real information when 2000 feet back in a cave at over 200 feet in depth. The decompression schedule shown on the NiTek HE would lead you to think you would never get out of decompression because it only looked at the current breathing gas when computing total decompression time. The NiTek X will look forward and show you a more realistic schedule. If you don’t use all the gases programmed it doesn’t affect the decompression schedule, you just don’t get accurate total ascent time information. Jerry experienced this on a dive last week when 95% was programmed in for a deco gas but he didn’t have it with him. The real decompression time was accurate but the total time was telling him he could get out earlier if he would make the gas change.
We have been asked by some customers if we will handle service repairs on the NiTek X in-house. The answer is yes. We have computer technicians dedicated to servicing the NiTek X and will offer service in the same time frame as most of our products - 72 hours turn around.
Lamar
Rose Sink Cave System, FL
Feb 11, 2008
My dive required using CCR so I ran the Nitek X in CC mode and compared the decompression schedules between the Hammerhead and Nitek X. I ran a set point of 1.2 and programmed my diluent as air. I had to survey the cave out from maximum point of penetration: 4800-feet to my last station from a previous dive. The display on the NiTek X made the survey work easier because of the large depth display, plus the depth reading to a tenth of a foot.
The first deco stop was at seventy feet after 110 minutes of bottom time. Usually this is where I avoid looking at the total deco time on the Hammer Head CCR Electronics or the NiTek HE because they always show more deco time than actual deco until you get to the shallower stops. Yesterday, the Hammer Head was showing 134 minutes of deco, yet the NiTek X was showing 74 minutes. I had asked the NiTek X designers to build in some type of intuitive deco stop time. I wanted to have a real deco check at depth and penetration so I knew when it was time to come home. It works in CC mode and is being checked on a similar dive today in OC mode.
The deco countdown went like clockwork following the 74 minute schedule. I watched the CNS clock on the left of the display climb. The CNS tracking is on the left side of the screen, the 9 pixel display fills up in partial pixel display so you get a more accurate measure of the CNS clock. The NiTek He would jump a full pixel on the display for every 12.5% of use. After seven pixels on the CNS clock the eighth pixel came to life as just a line, but this pushed the CNS clock to 80% and the display started flashing. The Hammer Head deco began accelerating the total deco time and matched the Nitek X at the 30-foot stop. Both the Nitek X and Hammer Head cleared within one minute of each other.
The testing is going well. A few more tech dives are needed to verify some of the alarm features. The only way to really know if the NiTek X is performing properly is to do the dives.
I guess I need to go diving again. Lamar.
Friday, Feb 8, 2008
Devil’s Cave System, Florida
Last Friday, I dived a NiTek X beta for the first time in awhile. Unfortunately, I didn’t have any place of note to go diving so I dropped in at our local standby; Devil’s Eye Spring. Using a conservancy factor 2 (30/75 gradient), I swam a 55 minute circuit between 90 and 100 feet of depth. The computer is easy to use; gas switches worked just as they should have. The deco matched the HE almost to the second except the NiTek X spread it between 20 and 10 ft stops where the HE merely had a 10 ft stop. So far I am quite happy with it.
Jerry Murphy
Product Manager
I know everyone wants it now. These projects take time and we are diligently working on it. The major delay is the custom backlighting. The vendor had machine problems delaying production. We are one of the first production runs to go on the new machine, but that will be at least one more week. In the meantime we have another beta without the backlighting and power management system to continue the testing and validation. The software for the logbook function is finished so we can begin testing that as soon as the Fischer connectors come in. Test dive results to be posted soon.
Lamar
Two additional NiTek X Beta units were received right before the Christmas break; just what I needed, another excuse to go diving! I managed to get several dives in; one in an unnamed sink that runs 145 ft in depth and the others in Rock Bluff, a small sidemount cave off of the Suwannee River. The X performed as planned and the new 75/95 gradient compared very favorably with the NiTek He for total deco time. The finish of the case held up well to the loose rocks that tend to fill the entrance to this spring.
More Beta units should be arriving as the new fiber optic back light becomes available in the next couple of weeks.
Jerry Murphy
Product Manager
Nitek X beta unit testing is underway. I took one cave diving in Mexico last week and it worked as designed the first three days. After that the screen contrast wouldn’t hold the setting due to a software bug. Additional beta units will be in next week, pending the arrival of custom fiber optic backlighting components.
We will begin doing weekly reports on the testing.
Lamar
We have updated the GF factors for the NiTek X, specifically the CONO GF. See Phil’s comments below:
Lamar
Based on your input, we have re-worked the gradient factors and have a new GF for CONO as follows:
CON0 : GF 75/95
CON1 : GF 40/100
CON2 : GF 30/75Briefly. CON2 is Eric Baker’s conservative base assumption, “if you want conservative, use this”. CON1 is good low GF but no surface penalty over an above the deep stop time “this gives considerable deep stops but does not extend shallow deco too much”, CON0 base level safety “Some movement of shallow stops deeper to hint at deep stops, for recreational use”.
I labored most over CON0. Use the Workbench to try these profiles. You will notice that 75/95 has the characteristic that for serious or less serious recreational dives the deco is hardly longer, but does move one or two stops deeper in the water and spread the deco over a deeper range. It is more conservative by “deep stop” rules for this reason. Eg. for a 130 ft dive that usually yields a Buhlmann deco starting with one minute at 9M you will see a few minutes at 12M followed by a slightly longer deco, total. This happens because you need to stop earlier because of the LO-GF, but you are not on-gassing still (much) because you are shallow enough. So the deco is actually more graceful by the same “deep stop rules”. It is more complicated than that physiologically, but as far as the model maps to this I think we are in bounds.
Phil
The programming to add more dive log memory has been completed as well as the fourth cell pin compatibility for the Fischer connector. Circuit boards for the Beta units are scheduled for October 9th at the PCB house, meaning we should have our beta units by mid-October.
Decompression software is in the works and a demo version will be available soon. We will post the demo version on our website as soon as it is ready.
