Black faced spgs

[Kelly Jessop]

Does anybody have an experience with black faced spgs in cave diving. I am intrigued with them because the way I have my sidemount spgs (note this is not a discussion on alternate spg positioning,because I have done them all,and I am not changing),when I illuminate the face with my primary light,and then look at the guage,the glowing guage nails my night vision for a moment. I am curious if the numbers and needle standout well without a lot of background light.

[Sludge]

I'm not sure I understand you - do you look at the gauge while the light is still shined on it, or do you shine the light at it for several seconds to activate the glow-in-the-dark, remove the light and THEN look at the gauge? The second way is the way I do it.

[Kelly Jessop]

I'm not sure I understand you - do you look at the gauge while the light is still shined on it, or do you shine the light at it for several seconds to activate the glow-in-the-dark, remove the light and THEN look at the gauge? The second way is the way I do it.

The second way. My spgs are at my sternal area,so when I look at them they are close to my face. This is actually bright enough that it can disturb my night vision for a moment,which can be an issue when doing critter counts.

[Sludge]

If I think about it, there ought to be a bunch of the old black Scubapro spg's at the shop. If you haven't received an answer I'll try to look at some in a dark room with a light to activate them.

[DA Aquamaster]

I have used the older black faced Scubapro SPG's on stages. The large hash marks and number (every 500 psi) stadn out well as does the needle. The smaller 100 psi hash marks get indistinct after a minute or so.

The clarity of the lens on the face makes a great deal of difference. Most of them are pretty beat up, but they will almost always clean up. A few minutes with a soft polishing wheel on a dremel tool with some jewlers rouge will clean them up nicely and once all the scratches are polished out or at least polished, the markings on the face are much brighter and more focused when you are relying on the glow in the dark feature.

The latter is important as with just the markings glowing you have a lot less total light to work with and if that light is dispersed by a scratched gauge face, the markings and needle will be much harder to see.

[RN]

I've seen the HOG black face SPGs in person but not in the water. The only issue I have is they don't make them in the smaller version, only the 2 inch and 2.5 inch sizes.

[L.A.]

I have one of the black Hog 2" SPGs on a stage reg. The only reason I bought it was that it was on sale at TDS, thus cheaper than the regular luminous face SPGs. What I didn't expect is that I would like it better. The black SPG has luminous hashmarks, numbers, and needle, which I found much easier to read underwater. I liked it so much I ordered two more.

[rjack]

I like my Hog blackfaced SPG. The illuminated needle and hatch marks makes more sense to me than the illuminated back with a black needle in silouette. I esp. like them better than the few gauges I have which have a non-glowing "red" zone below 750psi, those are truly annoying in dark environments. I have not been cave diving with the blackfaced ones yet, but I have been in zero ambient light with them and it works as well or better than my old gauges.

I also wish they made a stage bottle sized gauge.