Is a Pony Bottle too complicated for a beginner?

[markmud]

It feels to me like people might need to get on the same page about some terms.

Even just "new diver" can mean wildly different things that impact this discussion.

• Diver 1: < 20 dives, Comfortable in the water, has their own gear, and plans to do a lot of local diving in easy conditions (lakes, ponds, etc) to practice
  • IMO this diver is perfectly capable of adding a pony and using it safely
• Diver 2: <20 dives. Had trouble with their skills, freaked out at mask clearing, rents gear and plans to dive on vacation on the occasional charter
  • IMO this diver is going to do more harm than good by adding things to manage

Same thing with the term "dive". What kind of diving? Where? What conditions? A New England diver diving with strangers on charters has a much different problem to evaluate than a tropical diver who always dives with their best friend.

If people are debating, and each has a different version of what a term means in their head, without clarifying, no one will make any progress and everyone will just feel like the other person is an idiot.

This is the money post. This answered the OP's question perfectly. Bravo to Moerae!

Yeah, I know my tone was a little over the top and it was intentional, but I am reticent to cede personal responsibility to a training agency(s).

And acknowledging that we can not BASH an agency, the strongest thing I will say is that: their perspective changes with time and technological, their training has been streamlined over the years and just because they feel the accident rate is acceptable, does not mean that the individual diver should necessarily accept their conclusion regarding safety equipment without a good bit of thought.

Someone can make a pretty solid argument that pony bottles may not be necessary, but I encourage people to think for themselves.

Money post #2: Bravo!

cheers,
m

 

[Julius SCHMIDT]

in the event that **** goes sideways unexpectedly.

Is there a thing where the **** goes sideways expectedly.

 

[scubaozy]

Add to this a bit of depth, dive times close or past to NDL, and/or solo diving and you get a nice set of reasons to carry a pony just in case

Should beginner diver do all these?
I also don’t get this fear of sudden catastrophic failure of equipment. It normally how divers use the equipment is the problem.
What if I asked “is an SLR camera with dual strobes and focus lights too complicated for a beginner?” What would be your answers?

 

[stepfen]

Should beginner diver do all these?

What if I asked “is an SLR camera with dual strobes and focus lights too complicated for a beginner?” What would be your answers?

My view for beginners was given in post #59 Is a Pony Bottle too complicated for a beginner?
To sum it up again here to me a diver should not be carrying a pony unless he has buoyancy control good enough to be able to handle it properly underwater (be able to don/doff it, employ it etc while holding position). New divers are usually not there yet.

After 14 pages the discussion has drifted to whether ponies should be used or not at all and that is what I was addressing in post #135.

Obviously beginners should not be diving deep enough, for long enough and far enough from a buddy to make carrying a pony necessary. That's another point why beginners shouldn't be carrying one. BUT more experienced divers who can dive deeper, longer and solo to me should be (or at least would be usually better of) carrying one.

I also don’t get this fear of sudden catastrophic failure of equipment. It normally how divers use the equipment is the problem.

"Normally" is the magic word here. Occasionally equipment fail too and I don't know about you, but I want to be prepared for that case too.

What if I asked “is an SLR camera with dual strobes and focus lights too complicated for a beginner?” What would be your answers?

Exactly the same goes to an SLR camera with dual (or even single ) strobes. The diver should be comfortable enough to carry and use it safely i.e. be very good with buoyancy, situational awareness etc before considering carrying one. These usually beginners don't have, hence it is a big no no for most if not all cases.

I think we agree. Maybe it is because I am not native English speaker hence I don't express myself clear enough.

And as always just my 2c.

Cheers

 

[grf88]

I have only skimmed through the 14 pages of responses but did not see any mention of cold water diving where free-flows can be quite common. Having two people breathe off of one first stage can result in the donors reg free-flowing as well especially when the receiving diver is a little panicked and breathing heavily. I have seen a number of double free-flows and all too often they result in a rapid ascent. By cold water I mean sub 40 degrees.

 

[skippy311]

As a beginner, in 1975 I was introduced to employing compact twin tanks. They are light, streamlined, you mount two independent regs providing you great safety, and the management is not complex. Much easier than using a pony tank hanging around.
Compact twin sets were the standard entry-level scuba system here in Italy until around 1981, when the first 15 liters tanks appeared. For diving in the Mediterranean sea, a standard AL80 or LP72 is definitely too small..

Hello! Can you still dive double tank?

 

[Lorenzoid]

I have only skimmed through the 14 pages of responses but did not see any mention of cold water diving where free-flows can be quite common. Having two people breathe off of one first stage can result in the donors reg free-flowing as well especially when the receiving diver is a little panicked and breathing heavily. I have seen a number of double free-flows and all too often they result in a rapid ascent. By cold water I mean sub 40 degrees.

Yeah, I know it's 14 pages, but it was mentioned somewhere. I have been on the side of arguing a beginner should avoid a pony bottle and stick to their training ... so long as the beginner is diving in conditions similar to those in which they were trained. Isn't that what we were all taught in OW class that our training qualified us to do?--and then, if our goal becomes to dive in more complex conditions, work our way toward that goal. If a diver progresses to diving in near-freezing water, then by all means the diver should consider adopting whatever equipment is considered appropriate for that. I don't think it's very common for OW classes to be given in sub-40F water, but if a beginner were to receive their OW training in such conditions, I would hope it included the use of a pony bottle or some other way to deal with the free-flow air-sharing problem you noted.

 

[scubaozy]

"Normally" is the magic word here. Occasionally equipment fail too and I don't know about you, but I want to be prepared for that case too.

I should replace “normally” with “actually”. I do not believe in magic or hokus pokus. There is something called fail safe design. Regulators are designed with that principle.

 

[Angelo Farina]

Hello! Can you still dive double tank?

Yes, of course. Why not?
I and my wife still own our two Technisub ARALU twin sets, made of a twin 9+9 liters alu tanks at 200 bar, providing roughly 3600 liters of air.

However, we also own a 15-liters steel single tank, at 232 bars, providing almost the same amount of air. It weights just 15.4 kg instead of 23 kg, and it also requires 4 kg less of weights. As it is equipped with a double valve, we can use the same two separate regs we use on the twin tank.
I did never consider a single first stage with an octopus "safe enough" for me...
And I did never use any tank providing less than 3000 liters of air. Again, smaller tanks are not "safe enough" for me.

 

[Lorenzoid]

I should replace “normally” with “actually”. I do not believe in magic or hokus pokus. There is something called fail safe design. Regulators are designed with that principle.

I agree with your thinking. That said, it has been countered that while the most common of the rare failures would be for the reg to free-flow (i.e., a fail-safe mode), there are some apparently even rarer failure modes in which a reg could stop delivering gas. How rare, nobody in this thread appears to be able to quantify. I think something like the main spring would have to fail. Seems exceedingly unlikely to me.