1st time past 100ft for a big guy, Advice needed!

[NCadiver]

Toshman001 if you been diving the cool water of New Jersey your air consumption is going to go down right away and as the week goes by you should make more progress as your skills improve. If you can get a bigger cylinder for the dive if not make sure you are head for shallower water by 1500psi.

If you take your pony you will need to empty it and have it open for the TSA your shop may have a cap for the cylinder.

It's great that you ask before jumping into the dive. You may want to take the advance course either at home or on your vacation it much more fun then the OW class.

 

[diver 85]

on Roatan---you can max dive to 70+/- on most dives.....they are basically all wall dives, ie pick & chose your max depth...

 

[vinegarbiscuit]

Having dived in Roatan a bit, I can assure you that the time spent at depth on wall dives is quite brief. You'll stay at depth for a wee while, but you'll ascend the wall and spend a goodly portion at about 60 ft, looking at nifty stuff. You can clear it with the DM to hover some 10-feet above the rest of folk to assuage lingering concerns. You'll then spend a the rest of the dive - at leats half the dive, I reckon - coming back across the top of the wall to the mooring ball, which is about 30-feet of water. As a result, your average depth is considerably less than 90-110 FSW.

 

[kanonfodr]

If you don't want doubles then rent a 100 cube or 120 cube tank.

Another alternative is to get a larger pony and use it for your ascent. This allows you you to draw your primary tank down to a lower psi than you ordinarily would if you were using it for your ascent.

If you breath a 120 cube down to 500-600psi (switch to the pony and make your ascent) you will have much more bottom time than breathing an 80 down to 1200psi and then starting your ascent.

This method allows more bottom time and maintains a redundant system.

I don't see how that maintains his redundancy, especially if he chooses to make a second dive. Also, what if his buddy isn't carrying a pony, and then goes OOG? Sucks to be you?? If it's a 120 cu ft AL (3000 psi) cylinder, then that gives it a tank factor of 4 cuft/100 PSI, or rather 20 cuft at 500 psi.

While that is spot on the money for Rock Bottom (combined total of 40 cuft of gas for two divers to ascend and make stops from 100 feet), you have just turned your pony into an ersatz stage bottle and negated any safety factor that the buddy bottle provides. I would much rather leave the full 40 cubes (1000 psi) in my backgas and wait for a real Oh S**T moment before I deploy the pony, saves a lot on fills and ensures the redundancy is there for the second dive.

To the OP: until you get over there, dive dive dive! I'm not nearly your size (5'8", 120 lbs) but I used to have a SAC rate nearing yours. I got a few tips on breath control when diving but the main thing is that I went diving and got more comfortable in the water. Log another 15-20 dives before your trip and see if that doesn't help you out when you land in Roatan.

Peace,
Greg

 

[danvolker]

Background: I'm going to Roatan in December and the first dive each day is to 90-110ft. My dive buddy is a 5'3" 120lbs female AOW (15 dives), I am 6'7" 230 lbs male AOW (25 dives up to 75ft). Her SAC rate is about half of mine (.45 vs .9) and the dive operator does not have any tanks bigger than Al80s. I dive a Deep Sea Supply SS BP/W and have a 19cf bailout slung for the deeper stuff.

My Question: Is this smart for me to go past 100 (probably on EA32) on a single Al80 + 19cf bailout (not part of my gas plan) at my size and experience level, it just doesn't seem like enough gas to me? I have considered getting training on independent twins for safety and to even up dive times, but this seems like a huge hassle and too much to worry about for my first major dive trip...Yet I don't want to skip the morning dives.

Thank you everyone, just trying to dive smart...

My advice is to get a heart rate monitor, and find a place in freshwater, even a pool, to practice getting in to the water and then "forcing" yourself to relax. A large percentage of new divers, even experienced divers, hit the water excited, and suck up a large chunk of thier air supply in the first 5 minutes of the dive. Your job, should you choose to accept it, is to ELIMINATE this gas waste the moment you reach the bottom...On your dives, you just need to stop for a moment and concentrate on the relaxation techniques you will have practiced in a pool or freshwater location with your HR monitor( they dont work well in salt water, usually). You should be able to drop from 110 beats ber minute heart rate, to 75 bpm or so, within a minute of trying this....it is mostly concentration and focus--clearing your mind of all other thoughts and ignoring the present experience of diving, for the minute it will take you to relax your heart rate down to the lowest resting HR that you are capable of...when you reach this low HR, your breatig rate will be much lower, so your bottom time potential can become much longer....throughout the dive, you need to pay attention to your excitement level, and make sure you don't let your HR go up.
After doing this HR drill for several dives, it should be very easy to do with no interuption to anybody elses dive experiences.

The other thing you MUST do is to make certain that you have perfect weighting and perfect trim. Your swimming has to be flat horizontal, not head up and feet down from an instructor with his head up his *&^.....I don't know how you were taught, but the flat trim is critical....with it, you should be able to kick, and get a glide or coast--and a rest. Without it, with a head up feet down trim & bouyancy mistake, you will kick furiously and never get a coast or rest, never get much speed, and pretty much move like an inflated pufferfish. Again, if this is you, I blame this on your instructor.

Streamlining your body will help with the glide and rest potential to keep HR low....that means no dangling consoles, no clipped net bags, etc.


REGards,
DanV