Mares ATS BCD 30 dives after

[Qasar]

Hello scubaboard members,
I'm a new BSAC diver with 35 dives "behind the belt" in 6 months and just achieved the practical SD training this WE.
When I was OD certified, I started to buy my equipments. BCD was the first to top up the list, so I asked questions, read a lot (in this forum of course , and as I'm a little of a geek, I decided to buy the Mares Air trim System (ATS) BCD.
With a very little more experience and practice, I would like to share with potential future buyers my lessons.
ON the bright side:
1. It's comfortable
2. you have a very good swimming position with the hands on the inflator/deflator of your BCD, no need to extend the hose, normally no need to stand up to purge the BCD.
3. a lot of rings

On the other side:
1. Pockets are ridiculously small (not enough space to put my DSMB). When BCD is a little inflated very hard to access the bottom of the pocket and it’s impossible when really inflated (eg on surface).
2. Left pocket is already used by the oral inflating hose, and when you see the thickness of the hose you don't want to put something else in the pocket, afraid of piercing/harming it.
3. There is no trim pocket at the top of the BCD (just two at the bottom)
4. At the contrary of what is advertised, when the BCD is almost depleted you need to go vertical to have your air close to one of the valves to purge. In addition you always need to use the shoulder dump to be sure to completely purge your BCD. The advertisement on no need to change position for purging has led me to overweighting (compensation for unknown remaining air). Let give an example, at the start of the dive, you deflate “completely” your BCD with the ATS system (and you are vertical...), then you use the shoulder dump and there is still air going out.
5. When you are a young diver, the fact to have fingers on air in/out buttons leads you to use them too much (it's also a sequel of overweighting) and increases your air consumption.
6. When you practice AS (you are the one with air), you need to keep a hand on your BCD to purge air regularly, so just one hand to grab the buddy and monitor your computer.
7. When you practice CBL (you’re the dead guy) your buddy cannot grab your hose and your BCD in the same hand.

Well, as a result, like every piece of kit you need to learn it. I’m not telling people buy or not buy, it’s just that you need to understand what is really an ATS for a young diver. It’s harder to manage than a “normal” one, but once you know it and how to manage it, it’s pretty cool.
Hope this could help other people.

 

[fjpatrum]

First, thank you for the review. It's always nice to see reviews of gear when I'm ready to research my next purchase.

Now, a couple of questions and a couple of comments.

Which ATS bcd are you reviewing? The dragon, the kaila, the vector, the morphous, or something else?

When you say "no need to stand up to purge" do you mean no need to assume a vertical position or no need to raise the hose? You should never need to assume a vertical position to purge, with any BC.

I'm confused when you say the left pocket is already used by the inflator hose. Do you mean the hose is inside the pocket or the hose is just in the way of the pocket? Can you possibly post a picture of the BC? I think most jacket style BCs suffer from the same problem with respect to the pockets being "small" or hard to use when inflated. Nature of the beast, really. You can't stuff two things in the same space very well, and the air has to be there when the BC is inflated. It's one of the reasons a lot of people like the back inflate BCs, as I understand it. Best of both worlds, good pockets and comfort but also no interference with those pockets (or constriction around the ribs) when inflated.

Any BC that has the purge on the "front" side of the shoulder valve or vest is going to have the same purging issue. You either raise the inflator hose to purge or you raise your body position. Similarly any time you air share you're going to only have one hand for your buddy because you have to be able to purge somehow. The only auto purge system on any BC i've ever heard of was an over-pressure, which generally means you're already on a rocket ride to the surface if you reach that point.

I'm not sure I understand your point 7. What BC allows that? (Honest question as I've never towed a "dead guy" subject, just a "tired diver" who could presumably control their own air and I just did the manual labor part of pulling them.)

 

[Searcaigh]

Hi Qasar,

fjpatrum beat me to the first reply as I was checking out the Mares site to find out what BCD you are referring to, so I hope you can elaborate on that point.

I used to use a Mares BCD, now I have moved over to a wing as I occasionally dive doubles.

SMB and reel are clipped to a D-ring, never used to put them in a pocket

My Mares BCD had an additional shoulder dump and a butt dump, used both depending on circumstances, never had any issues

To fjpatrum ... dead guy, if you do a rescue course there is always a recovery of a body from depth, so you generally use their BCD to assist in going to the surface and I think that is what Qasar is referring to.

 

[fjpatrum]

To fjpatrum ... dead guy, if you do a rescue course there is always a recovery of a body from depth, so you generally use their BCD to assist in going to the surface and I think that is what Qasar is referring to.

Yes, I understood what he was referring to but I can't think of any BC that allows you to manage the subject's air and hold the BC in the same hand. Hence my confusion. Like I said, though, I've never even seen this demonstrated so perhaps it's just my ignorance on correct method that's making it difficult for me to envision that.

 

[Craig Smith]

You can sort of hold a corrugated hose inflator in the same hand that you use to hold onto the casualty, but the grip is not to strong.

Did the BC have the MRS weight system? I find it works great!

 

[Qasar]

Thanks for your answers/comments.
It is a Mares Dragon ATS.
For the hose: as you see on the picture the hose go within the pocket through a hole. There is around 60cm of hose folded in it. If you want to use it, you have to draw it out of the pocket (just by pulling it).
For the vertical issue, it's just the fact that when your BCD is almost empty and you want to deplete it, you have to go vertical to be sure that all your air reach a valve.
For the integrated weight system, I know that they are people having problems, but Mares has delivered a kind of v2 of their system and it's the one I got and until now no problems.

 

[Searcaigh]

Thanks Qasar for showing the photo, I looked at this system some time ago and did not like their approach for inflation and can see why there would be a problem managing a recovery of a buddy.

 

[Roatan]

OH, how I wanted a Mares Dragon ATS with MRS. It looked like the perfect BCD...and probably is in many cases. I went with the Mares Dragon with MRS (same thing only with the standard air hose) for two reasons. One, I had read here and other places that there was an issue with depleting all air from the BCD with the ATS due to the design. Two, The regular Dragon with MRS was about $120 cheaper. So far, my Dragon with MRS (no ATS) has worked perfectly.
But still, in a perfect world, the ATS would be a dream....if it worked perfectly, IMHO.