Ivans MCCR Dolphin

Ivan rebuild his Dräger Dolphin to a MCCR Kiss style

It is a pleasure to read people are inspired by work of others and combine many ideas in their ideal concept. This concept itself is used by others to even improve diving systems. Last years many conversions of the Dolphin semi closed rebreathers has been seen. Ivan Calcoen from Belgium used many of the ideas of homebuilders and added his own. Another step in manual controlled closed circuit rebreathers. Here is his story. Ivan thanks for contributing!

Hello all, I would like to present my Dräger Dolphin which I have modified to MCCR Kiss style Dolphin in the winter of 2004-2005.

Before I started to modify my rebreather, I spent a lot of time searching how I should do this. There are several  Dolphin owners who showed me there various systems; i.e. with needle valve, with Gordon Smith’s Kiss Valve, with different oxygen injection positions, how PPO² monitoring should be done etc.etc.

Thanks to JW. Bech  “www.therebreathersite.nl”, I was able to figure out how others have done it. Some of them have their own website which I also looked through several times.

 However, I rebuild my rebreather using a mix of different modifications :

 1)     I used the oxygen injection system similar than Kerry McKenzie

(Tubbie), which is perfectly explained on his beautiful website

http://www.vk4tub.org/rebreather.htm (not live unfortunately…)

2)     PPO² monitoring is done with VR3 with O² sensor, and a     

O² sensor in the inhale breathing hose ( Michel Urbani ) and read out by a display (design Paul Raeymakers) and fitted in a Mark Munroe Lexan Tube (purchased through TECME).

3)     A Halcyon wing has been fitted since the original Dräger does not have enough lift if extra bailout bottles are carried for the deeper dives

 Below you can find some detailed pictures with some explanation on certain details.

Well, that was it! I am very happy that Janwillem Bech allowed me these pages to be put or accessed on his website.

By doing this I wanted to show my appreciation to all of you who have contributed through Janwillem Bech’s website http://www.therebreathersite.nl

Without this help I really wouldn’t have been able to modify my Dolphin.

Thanks to all of you and safe diving.

Ivan Calcoen

Oostende, Belgium

Special thanks to:  

JanWillem Bech

Kerry McKenzie

Paul Raeymakers

Michel Urbani

Ivan, bedankt voor het delen van je rebreather avontuur, ik hoop dat je nog vele veilige uren mag duiken met je mooie systeem!