First strike hpa tank leaking from bottle

[KMDPB]

I have a first strike 68/4500 tank that I've had for a couple years now that just started leaking from the bottle. Not the threads around the reg, THE BOTTLE! I first noticed it when my exalt tank cover started blowing up like a balloon. I couldn't believe my eyes. After removing the cover I discovered a pretty liberal amount of air leaking from the bottom of the bottle. This bottle has never been dropped or cracked. There was also 2 bubbles that formed under the "skin" of the bottle (shown in attached photos) I should also note the the tank has never been over filled. I tried contacting first strike in which they responded once and I haven't heard back from them since... I am quite concerned about the safety of this product. I have never had or seen a tank leak from the bottle itself. Has anyone ever seen this?

[Hobbes]

That is just insane.

[Shaftski]

Looks like the cylinder may have stress cracked. I would empty the cylinder for safety immediately. Thermal shock can cause this, where a cylinder is heated up way too much during the fill process. So even though bottle isn't overfilled, hot metal is structurally weaker than cool metal, and combination of heat and pressure can cause a hole/crack.

A local store cracked one of my cylinders during fill and I never wen't back there. I could barely pick the thing up it was so damn hot.

If someone handed a bottle like that to me to fill, I would reject and refuse to fill. So this is purely a warranty issue with the mfg. If out of warranty you may be out of luck.

[RedLeaderSB]

Do not like.
Document, empty it, send that back ASAP

[KMDPB]

Do not like.
Document, empty it, send that back ASAP

I leaked itself empty after a couple hours, after figuring out what was going on I was not touching that thing!

[Ecapnation]

Death.....

Yeah depending on age I'd hit them up immediately

[Jonnydread]

scared scared scared

[Ecapnation]

I always found it funny that we willingly put thinks tight next to our head that contain enough potential energy to turn it into "pink mist"

[Cunha]

Contact them and send it back they will want to see it. As you can see cylinders don't fail like that very often. They will probably warranty it.

Also as you can see, the cylinder failed non-catastrophically as intended. The liner is ruined but the thing didn't explode. Good job tank.

[DocsMachine]

Yep, saw that once before on an old Carlton bottle. As noted, the inner shell has cracked, and the outer wrap is letting it leak through.

Which is pretty much exactly how it's supposed to work.

Keep bugging FS, they should I believe, replace it.

Doc.

[Shaftski]

The one that failed on me was a Carlton, have seen other Carlton bottles fail too. They liked to be kept cool and fillers were slamming the bottles hard.

Wish people would just stick tanks in a bucket of water when filling like dive shops do. Not just for cooling, but visual leak checking too. Not hard to do.

[Cunha]

Ya I don't think a bucket of water would be able to keep the insides cool. We don't even know if the slam fills are what ruptured the liner here. Its probably a defect as there are lots of these FS tanks out there and so far none of us have reported having seen a failure of this kind on one, though I am sure there are others.

[russc]

I have never seen this happen. Wow.

[Cdn_Cuda]

Wow, that's definitely concerning but glad to know these are designed to leak and not explode! Hopefully it gets dealt with properly.

[FrankW]

Makes me wonder if you could make a tank cover out of kevlar.

[DocsMachine]

Makes me wonder if you could make a tank cover out of kevlar.

-Er, the winding is already Kevlar.

Composite HPA tanks are a comparatively thin inner shell if aluminum. (Somebody tried stainless not too long ago, not sure what came of those.) The outside of the shell is wrapped with Kevlar and carbon fiber, soaked in epoxy (very much like fiberglass) and cured.

The inner shell holds the pressure, the outer winding resists the pressure. That is, keeps the thin inner shell from blowing out like a balloon.

The outer winding is stronger and lighter than aluminum or steel, and the design is, if the inner bottle cracks or ruptures, it simply leaks out through the windings.

Doc.

[Memornix]

A similar thing actually just happened to me this weekend. I had a few month old Ninja 68/4500 and went to fill it for the first time of the day at a field where they fill it for you. The kid filling tanks didn't seem to sure of himself and about halfway through the fill he gave the marker back to me because he said it was leaking air. However, it was actually a crack in the tank that formed about an inch below the threads where the neck starts to curve.

I put the marker on the ground and had everyone back away until the hissing stopped. Called Ninja on Monday and they were very quick to say send it back for warranty.

[KMDPB]

Guess I'll try calling them tomorrow, been 3 days since a reply via email. Smh a nitroduck would have never done this....