Which BP/W system to buy?

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Oh no! I had no idea how in-over-my-head I was! Can you recommend a good bp/w class?

Sure! :D

You might want to investigate a 'Fundies' course.... I hear that they provide some great advice on configuration optimization.

Also many tech instructors provide BP&W/Twinset/Tech Familiarization courses.

Whilst aimed at preparing students for technical dive training through an advanced level of buoyancy and trim control, along with optimized basic equipment configuration and fitment. These courses are easily adapted from BP&W Doubles to BP&W Singles.

It's a wonder that I survived the last hundred dives

Nobody mentioned 'survival'. We are talking about improvement and optimization.

Obviously you feel that you have nothing left to learn or improve. Good for you.

You know, one that will teach me the chicken-wing maneuver? Should I dust off my Scubapro Classic in the meantime?


There's no need for sarcasm.

Read my quote again.... Training AND Advice.

Advice can be had here on the board.... Ask a question. Get advice. Apply advice. Simple. :D

Training can be had anywhere. I am always happy to help a customer, on any course or when fun diving, with their equipment configuration issues.... or anything else for that matter.

I was not suggesting a dedicated course.... although that could be easily arranged and would be very beneficial.... allowing work on buoyancy, trim, weighting as well as configuration.... so that the diver really had a great head-start with their familarity to the BP&W system.

I did a "Twinset' familiarity course with Mark Powell, shortly before starting my tech training. It was 1 day, 2 dives. He completely helped me iron out everything with my kit (I threw away my comfort harness after!). When I started my following tech course it proved invaluable. It provided an early 'core' understanding that formed the foundations of my training and development since then.

There's no reason why such a 'familiarity' course wouldn't be hugely beneficial for single tank BP&W divers. Not essential (neither was my twinset fam course), but a big leap forward nonetheless.
 


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Is it a slippery slope, Andy, or does the "very weak and lazy mindset" come as soon as I add the quick release? Will it completely negate the strong and energetic mindset that suddenly emerged when I adopted the continuous webbing? :D

I think you must be mistakenly assuming I am some type of DIR zealot??

I'm not...really.... :eyebrow:

I am just cautioning against reacting to a problem, by immediately rushing to adapt your configuration, without first confirming that your techniques and procedures are correctly performed.

It doesn't matter whether this is BP&W removal, or shut-down drills, or anything else. Get the skills perfected first. Get expert advice, training and mentoring.

If all else fails... and you can confirm a necessity to approach a solution by using a more complex and expensive equipment solution, then go for it. :wink:
 
Andy
1) The point is that some of us disagree and find the quick release harness to have some advantages to many divers under certain conditions and we find these harnesses just as safe under more ideal conditions.

Let me try and be diplomatic. It is fine that you have an opinion. However, I fail to see where this opinion is based on any particular fact, evidence or personal experience that you can recount to support it.

I teach recreational and technical scuba diving. I've taught many divers to use BP&W with single-piece harness and that included removal/replacement both on the surface and underwater. I expect my students to master these skills in confined and open water. Our open water training can sometimes be very rough, due to Asian monsoon conditions at certain times of the year. And yet, students still demonstrate mastery of this skill.

I, personally, have used a single-piece harness for years. Since my initial training and fitting, I've never encountered a problem or restriction using this. I can put it on or take it off, in seconds, under any condition, without thinking about it.

I do not dispute that some divers will benefit from having a release within the harness. Some divers have impaired shoulder mobility.

However, I do make objection to your previous unsubstantiated assumptions/ allegations that a single-piece harness, by design, was dangerous to remove/replace at the surface. It is not. 000's of divers prove that every day.

2) Althought these more eleborate harnesses may not be necessary for many or even most divers many good experienced divers do find them worth the extra cost and use them under many conditions. (the pictures demonstrate that)

When posting on these threads, I am merely providing sound advice to less experienced divers, who have asked specific questions.

These divers usually ask for advice because they do not want to waste money by buying unnessary or unsuitable equipment. I try to bear that in mind, when I prioritize and formulate my advice.

Whilst it is not strictly wrong to suggest buying the most expensive and least favoured option.... it is, perhaps, not the most well considered advice that could be given.

With regards to comfort harnesses... I have considerable personal experience of divers who opted for this purchase, only to later regret it. In each instance, they wasted money on that purchase. A minority prefered the comfort harness.

It still remains... the comfort harness is unnecessary for most divers. It is the most expensive purchase option. In contrast, a single-piece harness offers exceptional value for money. It is cheap. A DIY constructed single-piece harness can be put together for under $25. If the diver later decided to upgrade, then they would suffer no real tangible financial loss.

3) the reverse can be said and has been posted one piece harnesses have drawbacks and risks that do not exist with quick release harnesses.

Please feel free to open a discussion in an appropriate section of the site to discuss this. Advanced Diving, would be ideal.

4) No arguement here we agree that divers with disabilities do often benefit from these but I'll add that divers without these disabilities do use these harnesses and enjoy diving them. They very rarely end up on craigslist or left in the closet.

You state this with absolute confidence... but haven't substantiated it with any evidence. I've dived for nearly 2 decades. I've seen a lot of dusty comfort harnesses in that time. I'd be interested to know what you base your ascertations on?

I say this because I am interested only in providing the best advice that I can. It isn't an ego boost for me. I get paid to give diving advice every day. It's my job, not a hobby. Here I am on the forum doing my job, for free, as a service to SB members.

If I say you are wrong...it is because I care about the members getting the best advice. I don't care about 'making you look bad' or 'winning an arguement'. It's not a competition and, really, I have nothing to prove with you because we aren't in the same league.

When, or if, the time comes when you are also an experienced instructor with a few hundred student certifications, then I am sure that you will have a different appreciation of things. For now, you are most welcome to express your opinions, but I would caution about claiming to state facts, when they are actually just assumptions. Such actions do not provide a great service for the less experienced divers who may look to you for accurate and definitive advice.

I'll add a #6:
6) Divers progress in there knowledge and experience at different rates. Some bring other experiences that do apply to diving while others are just sponges that learn fast and practice often. To put it plainly there are some very good well rounded and knowledgeable divers that are as skilled as divers with many times the number of dives as some of their peers.

That is indeed true. And yet, it is still a matter of perspective. The definition of a 'good diver' from the perspective of a newly qualified divemaster may vary considerably from the perspective of a newly qualified AOW diver... or an experienced cave diver etc etc.

On the other hand... There are many divers that have logged thousands of dives, even some instructors that simple should be ignored and or avoided.

If someone doesn't understand the criteria, function, skillset, procedures, knowledge-base or capacities of higher level roles, then it is impossible for them to make any accurate analysis of that other persons' relative capacity.

When any diver has accumulated a considerable amount of experience, they are worth listening to. Wisdom is valuable...and it comes only through experience.

I promise you.... when you're logging dive number 1000.... you will have a very different perspective than you have now. Only then, with hindsight, will you appreciate how inexperienced you were at dive 100. At dive 100, you will appreciate how your knowledge and capacity has grown since dive 10.

btw... I see you grew near Jones Beach. I was in that area as a kid also... in Massepequa 76-79. :cool2:
 
Well, the poll I posted shows 80% either started with simple webbing and never changed or started with a comfort type harness and switched to webbing.

Only 10% have gone from webbing to a comfort harness.
Only 10% have started with a comfort harness and no plan to change.

I'd further question those few that started with a comfort harness and no plan to change. Question would be how long have they been using it? 10-20 dives? Change may be coming soon. 100-200 dives? I'll agree they'll keep it til it wear out.

So advising a new diver to skip the comfort harness and just learn to use a standard harness correctly seems the most sound advice. There's a higher probability that diver will end up going to the bare harness anyway.

Now look at the financials. If diver goes with bare harness and learns it correctly but still wants a comfort harness, he's only spent $20-30 max for the harness. On the flip side, if he buys a comfort harness and decides he wants to go with a basic harness, now he's spent up to a few hundred dollars and will likely lose 50% selling used gear.
 
He's essentially getting paid to wear a comfort harness. It's basically advertising.

That's very true. However unlike on-land athletes who get paid to wear or display certain things (for example wearing a Rolex watch while scaling Mt. Everest - a watch which has little to do with the athlete's ability to perform the climb), cave penetration/wreck penetration/arctic diving/exploration diving entail a high degree of risk and hazard. If an item (BC for example) were to have numerous "failure points" that unnecessarily jeopardizes a diver then why should that diver risk his life and the lives of his buddies by using it?
 
Perhaps of interest . . . I have dived a number of places that have a "no cutting implement" rule, and no one has ever spotted or made a fuss about the small knife on my belt.

I can, through sad personal experience, testify that the "sawed off steak knife" goes through harness like butter, especially when wielded with a bit of adrenaline assist.

I don't really care very much how other people set up their equipment, if they aren't diving with me, and I have few areas of fussiness if they're diving no-deco OW with me. (Overheads, virtual and real, are different.) But when I give advice here, like Devon Diver, I'm trying to save people from making mistakes I have made, or my friends have made, and particularly those which have annoyed them and cost them money :)
 
Just because someone is photographed in something doesn't mean it's his only option. I'd like to see a picture of him inside a wreck at 200 fsw wearing that gear. Then I'll believe he uses it exclusively.
 
Just because someone is photographed in something doesn't mean it's his only option. I'd like to see a picture of him inside a wreck at 200 fsw wearing that gear. Then I'll believe he uses it exclusively.

No one ever said they use the gear pictured exclusively.
What we did suggest is the people pictured are "World Class Divers" and they consider those rigs to be valid options for their own use.
What we also infer is that people consider them choices even without any disabilities.
However as pointed out we do not know the what prompted those choices for those particular dives. But fnfal did make a valid realization that considering the inherit risks of the sport it is unlikely that they would wear anything that would put them at high risk regardless of a sponsors request.
 

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