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FYI, we did Parker's 3 weeks ago, and the T is now a jump (R).

Simply for clarification, UTD Rec 3 certifies the student to use EAN32 or 25/25 for backgas with no deco gas, to 130fsw. UTD Tech 1 certifies the student to use EAN32 or 25/25 for backgas, to 130fsw, and O2 for deco. 50% is introduced at the Tech 2 level (160fsw with 21/35 and 18/45 for...

No reasoning behind the diaphragm/piston on left/right. I had both so I used 1 of each to illustrate hose routing only.

Congrats, Hunter and welcome aboard!

Agreed. It's great to see you getting out and doing these dives Lynne!

This is a good discussion. I would like to add a few points. The comparison between Fundies and Essentials is an apples to oranges comparison in several ways. Essentials design is for the student who has recently finished the 1 weekend, 8 student to 1 instructor open water class who wants to...

Hey everyone- Page 21 in the UTD S & P v1.4a....SMB deployment is a required skill in the Essentials class. It has always been a required skill in Essentials. Now, whether it was an oversight and accidentally left off previous versions of the S & P, I don't know, but it is, and always has...

Valid point. Our first trip to the mine was simply a hike in to look at the integrity of the mine itself. The return trip was a dive to look at the integrity and general layout of the flooded part. While it did have some shoring (as Richard described) it seemed quite stable. Only...

It's amazing we survived

There's not much left to explore, as far as we could tell. We're going to make one more dive, if for nothing else, to get more video footage. We had some camera issues, which resulted in us not getting much footage of the passages, which were really cool. However, Richard found a passage...

We made another dive in the mine yesterday. Matt did an amazing job of gathering some info on the mine, including maps. These proved helpful in planning the second dive. The maps are quite old, and the way they were drawn led us to believe the bottom of the mine would be in the 185 - 210'...

Skills are never taught, or performed, on the knees in any UTD class

Most of my regs are Apeks, and I do service my own regs. However, though I own 8 sets, I didn't start servicing my regs for economical reasons. For me, it was partly due to the fact that a) my reg tech has pretty much left the industry and b) my dives are getting more and more aggressive. My...

No affiliation with GUE at all. Andrew Georgitsis, the founder of UTD (along with Jeff Seckendorf) is the former Training Director for GUE. As Rainer said, we adhere to many of the same core principles, but not all. As for the Open Water certification...Rec 1 is the Open Water equivalent. It...

Intro to Tech incorporates use of a deco bottle, Essentials does not. Both courses are personal skills courses, which means there are no failures. All skills performed during the course are briefed before the dive. This includes the no mask swim, backup light deployment, etc.

What James said. I'll add that isolating does nothing to solve the problem. Isolating is simply trying to "fix" a problem, when you don't even know what the problem is. Figure out the problem, then solve it. That may or may not mean isolating.

Not enough info to say whether you pass or not....you didn't say whether there's a chamber on site for you to hop in as soon as you get out of the water. If so, then you pass.

Agreed. We actually spend about 90 minutes of the first night talking about the mechanics of balance, buoyancy, trim, and kicks. Our first dive is spent getting them weighted properly (amount and placement), balanced, in trim, and work on buoyancy and kicks as well. The second dive adds a...

Yes, we just follow them. They are completely on their own, unless safety becomes an issue. Typically, we'll have them do about 30' a leg.

Yes, and they must navigate a square for a certain number of feet (they do kick cycles earlier in the class to determine distance, then apply that to this dive). It can be done as a team, with a primary navigator, and the other diver's primary function of maintaining depth and backup...