When do you retire your lifejackets?

[sidsknot]

Preparing the ship's kit after an extended absence, I note that the expiry dates printed on the gas cylinders for the life jackets are.... a few years ago. Presumably the lifejackets lights are similarly past it, although they switch on ok (for how long?). I guess the gas cylinders would "probably" still function.

I'm thinking I should be binning the lot and splashing out on new lifejackets, rather than messing with replacing gas cylinders, activation stuff, batteries.

What would the forumites do? Do you replace your lifejackets every x years as a principle of good/safe practice?

 

[prv]

I'm surprised that the gas cylinders have dates on them. Mine don't. I weigh them each year and will discard if they ever come up less than the weight stamped on the side.

The lights and auto heads have dates, and I replace them when expired. So far the jackets themselves are all sound although I'll start a rolling replacement programme (to spread the cost) once they start looking tatty. Ten years is sometimes quoted as an expected lifespan for inflatable jackets although I'm not sure there's much science in that.

Pete

 

[ballyabroad]

To me it generally depends on the cost and environment the LJ is going to be used in. A £30ish lifejacket is hardly worth servicing i.e. replacing components, whereas a £150 LJ it makes sense to. My coastal LJ's when they are looking tatty, but still serviceable got relegated to the dinghy/pub run i.e. not to bothered if I forget it/lose it and inland racing. Essentially situations where I'm not expecting to be in the wet-stuff for too long!

 

[NealB]

Our local RNLI station have a couple of experts amongst the crew who inspected ours (no charge).

Of the four lifejackets, two were condemned (they had lain in a locker, largely ignored, for most of their twenty years aboard various boats). The two nearly new, very expensive, Kru jackets were given a clean bill of health.

May be worth a phone call?

 

[jac]

Lots of places do free lifejacket health checks - look at posters on local yacht club / marina.

Agree with pete though. If a good one - change the out of date components and weigh the cylinders. lots of cheap but accurate scales for the job. I would also suggest doing a pressure test. I use the dinghy pump to avoid getting moisture inside the bladders - inflate all the LJs until hard then leave in a quiet room for 24-48 hours. Discard any that have deflated.

 

[prv]

Have to say it does surprise / shock me a bit how often people pop up here saying "I opened up my lifejacket for the first time in umpty-ump years, and the gas bottle fell off in my hand / bladder was rotted through / auto head had already fired". In my book inflatable jackets need a wash, thorough inspection, and inflation test at least once a year. I wouldn't consider a mid-season check to be over-cautious although I don't currently do it.

EDIT: By "inflation test" I mean blowing them up with a pump and leaving overnight, not test-firing the gas system!

Pete

 

[yachtorion]

I had some Seago jackets that had a lifespan in the manual of 3 years. I respected that. For a jacket that didn't have a written lifespan, as long as it passed an inflation test each year and there was no obvious damage I'd be fine with it.

 

[prv]

I had some Seago jackets that had a lifespan in the manual of 3 years.

Seriously? That seems amazingly short. Don't mean to impugn your reading abilities, but was that definitely the lifespan for the jacket itself or just the time before the auto head first needed replacing?

Pete

 

[kippers26]

replaced one of our life jackets this year ,it was bought in 2010 and failed the inflation test as it was leaking along a seam, visually it looked in perfect condition and had always been stored in a dry location and had not actually been worn for the pervious 2 seasons.

 

[Plevier]

I test inflate mine for 24 hrs every year and inspect carefully.
I have 2 Parmaris Raider ones bought in 2000 that have just passed test.
On the other hand, I had a Seago which was fine at 4 years but at 5 years had split on the folds.
It was one of their suspect ones but had passed the recall inspection.

 

[yachtorion]

Seriously? That seems amazingly short. Don't mean to impugn your reading abilities, but was that definitely the lifespan for the jacket itself or just the time before the auto head first needed replacing?

Pete

Well it's a good few years ago now and I don't have the docs anymore, but it was UML so the cartridge life was only 2 years so it wasn't that, and I remember it only had 3 years space on the service card as well. So I'm reasonably sure... Doesn't seem to be the case with the current range though which is an improvement.

The liferaft has a lifespan of 12 years which is definitely better...

 

[Fantasie 19]

Have to say it does surprise / shock me a bit how often people pop up here saying "I opened up my lifejacket for the first time in umpty-ump years, and the gas bottle fell off in my hand / bladder was rotted through / auto head had already fired". In my book inflatable jackets need a wash, thorough inspection, and inflation test at least once a year. I wouldn't consider a mid-season check to be over-cautious although I don't currently do it.

EDIT: By "inflation test" I mean blowing them up with a pump and leaving overnight, not test-firing the gas system!

Pete

Yeah - I replaced the gas cyclinders when I was first given the pair I currently use, but weigh the cylinders every year to ensure they remain same, and then open them up, blow them up (by mouth as well as I'm not sure I ascribe to issue about moisture), leave them for 24 hours and then deflate/re-pack...

 

[Fimacca]

check them annually inflating them. weigh bottles. some canisters are little rusty but come up well with a sand ! my kids do well at setting them off now and again and they always work.....
I have to say 2 of the automatic sensor parts got set off accidentially whilst dumped in a wet dinghy, they worked very well and then i noticed the date of 2011, i was impressed the use by date, as usual , means very little...........

 

[Tim Good]

Same as many others. I inflated all mine the other day with a bike pump and left for a few days. I feel using mouth could be misleading as the wpwarm air will cool and make it appear as they have gone down.

All stayed inflated. All gas cylinders weighed in at their official 33g so I put them back after a little clean and grease and all jacks back in service.

 

[jac]

check them annually inflating them. weigh bottles. some canisters are little rusty but come up well with a sand ! my kids do well at setting them off now and again and they always work.....
I have to say 2 of the automatic sensor parts got set off accidentially whilst dumped in a wet dinghy, they worked very well and then i noticed the date of 2011, i was impressed the use by date, as usual , means very little...........

AIUI the use by date on such things is a fairly conservative estimate of when it may start to have an unacceptable failure rate. So for a lifejacket, the specification might be that 99.99% of lifejackets will inflate from the canister ( making that figure up) Testing will show that they can be 95% confident that will be achieved if the head is less than x years old so the best before date is therefore manufacture date + X.

After that - it maybe that only 95% of LJs in flate, the following year, 90% , 10 years later - 50%