international flooding day

underwater electric and electronic equipment is usually normal equipment, encased in a protective casing, and isolated with natural latex o-rings (which are usually coated in silicone grease themselves).

to flood underwater equipment, you will have - depending on your inventivity - multiple options;

for one, you could just get the equipment out of the casing and throw it into the lake/sea/ocean/quarry/kitchen sink; but that's too easy.

for another, you could ignore the silicone grease, and pretend you're actually protecting the equipment;

then, there are the more ellaborate ways, like go through all the right moves in the handling manual, but do it a bit carelessly, like I did :)

The moves are like this:
first, you wipe all himidity from the casing and arround it; if you trap a small drop of water on the o-ring when closing the casing, it will leak;

second, get out the o-ring and wipe out any dust from it; then coat it in a thin, uniform layer of silicone grease; If you add too much coating, water will push it in and the casing will flood in; If you don't add enough or not in an uniforma coating, water will push through, and it will (again) leak in.

third, put the oring back, being careful not to stretch it at all; O-rings are sensitive to stretching and if you do, it's sealing capabilities lessen some more;

fourth, place camera inside the casing, and close it carefully; Afterwards, inspect visually the o-ring again, making sure it makes a continuous contact with the casing, both on the lid and the actual case.

fun? Yeah ... all ten minutes of it :|


Now, if you really want to be inventive about flooding your camera unit (for example) you will go through all the steps above, but you will not wash (and dry) your hands before starting; and in case you're handling SCUBA gear (or something else having sand particles on it) before that, you might actually get somewhere.

I know I did: When I finished the first dive I had about 1cm of brown, muddy water in the casing, and the camera had been blocked open; batterries had shortcircuited in the first few seconds and I'm not sure I'll be able to use them again (they were rechargable).

I was able to save the memory though, but the four shots I took before the great flood are nothing spectacular in themselves :(.


Anyway, since it's international flooding day, I figured a small camera is not enough; thus, for the second dive I decided I'd flood my torch as well;

I'm not sure how that happened, but I guess you can't have all the knowledge all the time.


So, in conclusion, I'm thinking seriously about getting a Canon Rebel, with another underwater casing.



Happy flooding day to all of you :)
utnapistim