Maintaining Your Equipment

Keeping your housing salt-free is an important part of maintenance. After every dive in salt water, be sure to soak your housing, strobes, and any other accessories in a fresh-water tank as soon as possible, and leave it there for 20-30 minutes if possible. The fresh water dissolves any salt accumulation from the housing. Press all buttons and turn all dials/levers on the housing to help get fresh water back into the areas behind the buttons and dials where salt can accumulate.

A tip for rinsing: an ice chest or water-tight food container makes a good fresh-water tank if you have one at hand.

If you don't have access to a fresh-water tank, the next-best technique is to rinse your housing under running fresh water, working buttons and dials/levers to help rinse them out. (Do not rinse under a high-pressure jet of water-it might force water past the seals and into the housing.)

If you neglect to rinse salt water off after a dive, it evaporates and turns into abrasive salt crystals that can ruin O-rings and make buttons and dials/levers hard to work. Un-evaporated salt water is a serious corrosive that rust metal parts over time. Make it a point to keep your housing as free of salt as possible.

O-rings create waterproof seals in housings, strobes, watches, and diving equipment. You'll find them where there are openings in equipment. If you open the cover of your housing or strobe, you'll see them: large, fat rubber rings along the edge of the opening.

The size, thickness, and color vary from model to model, but they're all O-rings. Because they create the seal between water outside and air inside, it's important to handle them correctly. If you abuse them, you may let water inside your housing or strobe and damage what's inside.

Before you open your housing or strobe after a rinse, use a towel or something similar to wipe off all water drops from your equipment and let it dry. You'll need to open the rear cover of the housing to remove the camera. Be careful as you open it to avoid getting water inside the housing. Point the lens port up and the cover side down when you open the housing to keep any remaining water drops from getting inside the housing. (There's usually a little water still around the O-ring.)

Carefully remove the O-ring so you can maintain it. Use an O-ring remover, a tool that makes it easy to remove an O-ring without damaging it. (Removing an O-ring with a knife or other metal tool often nicks the O-ring, which can destroy its ability to create a waterproof seal.)

Examine the O-ring closely and run your fingers around it to feel for dirt, dust, grains of sand, hair, lint, salt, or other debris. If you find any, carefully remove it. Leaving any of these in place can ruin the O-ring's seal on the next dive and lead to water inside the housing.

Gently wipe off any old grease or other materials from the O-ring. Use a lint-free soft cloth or something similar. Inspect the O-ring closely once again to make sure there's no cracking or surface damage, and that there's no dirt, hair, or other foreign objects on it. (If you wipe with a cloth or paper towel that's not lint-free, it may have left lint on the O-ring.)
Apply a drop of grease about the size of a grain of rice to the O-ring. Using your thumb and index finger, spread it thinly so that it covers the entire surface of the O-ring.
*Applying too much grease makes it easier for dirt and dust to stick to the O-ring and compromise the O-ring's seal. Don't use too much or too little grease.

Check the O-ring groove for any foreign material like grains of sand or dried and hardened salt. The O-ring groove can be hard to see, so check carefully. Remove any foreign material you see there by blowing it clean with a blower or gently using a cotton Q-tip. Check to make sure the Q-tip doesn't leave lint behind.

When you put the lubricated O-ring back in its groove, take care that dust and other particles don't stick to the O-ring. Insert the O-ring evenly into the groove, and be careful that it's not twisted, pulled tight in one area, or bunched up in another.
Once the O-ring is back in place, make a final check. Make sure there's no twisting, no differences in height from one place to another, and that no dust or other particles have fallen onto the O-ring. If everything looks okay, finish up by closing the cover.