Is have an AI feature on dive watch better?

Please register or login

Welcome to ScubaBoard, the world's largest scuba diving community. Registration is not required to read the forums, but we encourage you to join. Joining has its benefits and enables you to participate in the discussions.

Benefits of registering include

  • Ability to post and comment on topics and discussions.
  • A Free photo gallery to share your dive photos with the world.
  • You can make this box go away

Joining is quick and easy. Log in or Register now!

I wasn't aware you could actually track your GTR and SAC with an SPG. Sure you could spend the whole diving doing calculations but why would you?

You wouldn't. Besides, its not needed to be done during the dive because in your training you learned how to compute SAC, build dive plans, stick to those plans, and dive within your limits.
 
You wouldn't. Besides, its not needed to be done during the dive because in your training you learned how to compute SAC, build dive plans, stick to those plans, and dive within your limits.
Yeah. Plan the dive, dive the plan.

Only there are aspects of a dive that you can't plan, including water temperature, surge and current. These can and do affect SAC and SAC affects GTR. Knowing your SAC and more importantly GTR in real time on a dive allows a more accurate adjustment to the dive plan because sticking to the original plan may no longer be appropriate.
 
WAI is nice indeed.

Knowing how much gas you have before it stops flowing and you have to pull the j-valve is nice. Having all pertinent information in one place vs. two different places, is good interface design vs. bad interface design.

Pity in this case good interface comes with an order of magnitude higher price tag.
 
Yeah. Plan the dive, dive the plan.

Only there are aspects of a dive that you can't plan, including water temperature, surge and current. These can and do affect SAC and SAC affects GTR. Knowing your SAC and more importantly GTR in real time on a dive allows a more accurate adjustment to the dive plan because sticking to the original plan may no longer be appropriate.

dive within your limits.
 
Yeah. Plan the dive, dive the plan.

Only there are aspects of a dive that you can't plan, including water temperature, surge and current. These can and do affect SAC and SAC affects GTR. Knowing your SAC and more importantly GTR in real time on a dive allows a more accurate adjustment to the dive plan because sticking to the original plan may no longer be appropriate.

This just my opinion (and I am all in on AI): You should plan for worst case on those things. If any of those parameters turn out to be outside of what you planned for, you should call the dive. AI should not be used as a justification for diving outside the scope of your plan. Calling it an adjustment to the dive plan is just another way of saying you're not diving your plan.
 
This just my opinion (and I am all in on AI): You should plan for worst case on those things. If any of those parameters turn out to be outside of what you planned for, you should call the dive. AI should not be used as a justification for diving outside the scope of your plan. Calling it an adjustment to the dive plan is just another way of saying you're not diving your plan.
Either you are misunderstanding what I'm saying or you must frequently abort dives.

What I'm saying is at certain times of the year in Sydney it is not possible to know before the dive what the water temperature will be. I could do a dive on one day and the minimum water temperature is 20ºC and be comfortable for the whole dive (RMV 12.5L/min). I could dive the exact same site (same dive plan) two days later and it's 18ºC. I'm a bit chilly on the dive and my SAC is slightly higher (RMV 14.1L/min). I'm certainly not going to abort the dive because it is a little chilly but I can see from the GTR on my dive computer that I need to go a little faster (stop less often to look for organisms). I'm still within the scope for my dive plan!

Note the above are real examples. Two days later the water temperature was 15ºC and a day later it was 14ºC but I was in a drysuit and my RMV was 12.7L/min.

Similarly, there can be a bit of surge on the dive. It is not dangerous at all but it means using more air to maintain buoyancy while taking photographs. Again, my GTR shows how much time I have and I pace myself for the rest of the dive accordingly. I'm still within the scope of my plan.

I could jump in at the water temperature is perfect, there's no surge at all and there's a gentle current to take me to the end of the dive. My SAC goes way down and I have more time so I can go more slowly and spend more time looking for organisms to photograph. All still within the scope of my plan.

Of course, if I just had an SPG I could still pace myself based on the above described conditions but it is significantly easier with SAC and GTR.

Would you really abort your dives under the above conditions?
 
https://www.shearwater.com/products/swift/

Back
Top Bottom