04 Requirements for safe oxygen usage Poseidon Xstream Oxygen fulfils the O4 requirements for safe oxygen (O2) usage. These are;

1. O1 – oxygen engineered O2 – oxygen compatible materials O3 – cleaned for oxygen use O4 – oxygen approved O1 , oxygen engineered – constructing a regulator for oxygen use requires special engineering skills. It is not as simple as taking any regulator and changing the materials to be so-called “oxygen compatible”. Care must be taken, for example, to minimise the use of polymeric materials, avoid intersecting holes and sharp turns, minimise flow velocity, evaluate heat transfer and optimise it, ensure the product does not produce contaminants during assembly, make cleaning and inspection efficient, etc.
2. O2, oxygen compatible materials – the term “oxygen compatible” must not be taken too literally; it is meaningless to refer to a material as being “perfectly oxygen compatible”. It is more a matter of choosing materials according to a set of factors which will result in the lowest possible risk of causing a severe error of any kind. For oxygen use, the variety of materials that come into question is very much limited, since factors such as oxygen index, auto ignition temperature, heat of combustion, toxicity of fumes, risk for particle impact, etc must be considered.
3. O3, oxygen cleaned – is a standard where a certain level of contaminants can be accepted to expose a tolerable risk for ignition. Special methods and detergents must be used to obtain the correct cleanliness level. Poseidon prefers to call it “cleaned for oxygen use”, rather than ”oxygen cleaned”, which can be misleading.
4. O4, oxygen approved – The European Union Directive for Personal Protective Equipment requires that SCUBA regulators must be tested and approved by an independent notified body. Regulators for oxygen use must pass more tests specifically for oxygen, e.g. adiabatic compression shock testing.