Acoustic Mouthpiece Skullborne Audio Information System for the Rebreather

The successful development of an acoustic mouthpiece based audio in formation system for rebreathing apparatus will revolutionize military, professional, and recreational diving. The system proposed provides the diver with voice and tonal audio imformation regarding depth, bottom time, tank pressure, gas mixture data, time, temperature, and any other critical information which is available from a dive computer or rebreather console. Use of this system will greatly reduce the delectability of a diver by elimination of the visible console, audible beeps, amd magnetic signature. The means by which the user hears the sound is with a proprietary acoustic mouthpiece, whereby the user hears through bone and hard tissue vibration originating in the mouth. This concept provides the diver awith excellent quality, loud and intelligible sound without the need for additinal headgear such as a facemask, hood, earphone, or helmet. The special mouthpiece encloses a novel transducer/propagation system based on Terfenol-D, a magnetostrictive, low voltage oscillation source. In order to confirm feasibility, the mouthpiece will be excited by an electronic circuit which awill utilize a conventional dive computer interfaced with a microprocessor based voice synthesis circuit. Water testing of the system adapted to a rebreather and audiological evaluations will determine intelligibility.