John S. Lamb

In 1988 my wife and I decided to take up SCUBA diving as a hobby. It was one of the best things we have ever done together. However, in 1993 I found two of the divers filling their air cylinders were adding Oxygen. The gas became known as Nitrox. Seemingly this made the diving safer. Unfortunately, they were using a calculation to do it and had no way of actually measuring what they had made. A little bit of background research and an opportunity was found, they needed an Oxygen analyser. Further research was completed and I realised that this was a good opportunity to help divers with this equipment. How good I did not know so we formed a hobby company “Vandagraph Ltd.” It soon became obvious that this was going to grow and that medical/industrial oxygen analysers were not the ideal instruments. The VN202 was born. At the same time another company had the same idea and our efforts kick started the diving training organisations into legalising Nitrox in recreational diving. The introduction of our VN202 combined with our unique DIN kit really captivated the world’s technical divers. We had an undisputed worldwide reputation. We were then approached by a manufacturer developing a re-breather. This device re-circulated the breathed out gas, took out the carbon dioxide and added some more oxygen. In 1999 in response to many questions worldwide, I introduced my first book on Diving sensors. By 2008 our competition had grown so I designed the Tex-Ox using the unique Quick-ox. The VN202 had the reputation of being the most accurate analyser but is was slower. The Tex-ox with the unique Quick-ox also continues to have a good reputation. In 2016 my 2nd book, with added sections for re-breather divers, was published. As you may be aware most of the underwater programmes such as the Blue Planet use divers use our oxygen sensors in their equipment. Without them some of the scenes we enjoy would not have been possible. My wife and I continue to grow the business Vandagraph and continue to inspire divers worldwide with our equipment and knowledge. www.vandagraph.co.uk