Ontwreckdiver
Contributor
I have been diving a Suunto Cobra for over 20 years without any backup and it has never missed a beat. IF they still made the original Cobra, I would buy another one if mine ever dies.
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As long as you are happy with the deco algorthmI have been diving a Suunto Cobra for over 20 years without any backup and it has never missed a beat. If they still made the original Cobra, I would buy another one if mine ever dies.
I did never thrust electronics underwater, nor I thrust nowadays. I prefer simple, old mechanical objects.
In the last 45 years I always employed just deco tables. The past summer I was forced to buy a computer as it was "mandatory" with the dive center I was going to. So I bought the chapest I found, a Cressi Leonardo for 99 Eur.
Hence now I have some redundancy, still using watch, mechanical depth gauge and tables, but having also the computer attached to my mechanical console. It provides a duplicate as bottom timer and depth gauge. So now the strategy is to always be conservative, and following the shortest NDL between tables and computer. With my surprise, I discovered that the computer can often indicate a shorter NDL (or longer deco times) than tables...
Regarding air management, I have always been very prudent, as I am still employing my old 15-liters, 200 bar cylinder, equipped with a valve with reserve and two independent posts. So I can use two fully independent regs, and I have an air reserve, in case my SPG fails. All being fully mechanical and proven by more than 30 years of usage, I do not plan to change anything in the next future.
God forbid we use modern technology to make life easier, safer, more convenient and more fun...
I started diving in early 70's and used tables all through the mid 80's. I switched to using dive computers, and was an early adopter and believer, in late 1987 and never looked back. I have NEVER used dive tables since 1987 and never missed a day of diving because of computer issues and I dive extensively all around the world. The myth about not trusting dive computers or "electronics underwater" is just that, a huge myth that some good folks propagate just like when some people don't trust automatic transmission and always insist manual transmission giving many irrelevant and very out of date rationalization.
How about I just prefer s manual transmission
God forbid we use modern technology to make life easier, safer, more convenient and more fun...
I started diving in early 70's and used tables all through the mid 80's. I switched to using dive computers, and was an early adopter and believer, in late 1987 and never looked back. I have NEVER used dive tables since 1987 and never missed a day of diving because of computer issues and I dive extensively all around the world. The myth about not trusting dive computers or "electronics underwater" is just that, a huge myth that some good folks propagate just like when some people don't trust automatic transmission and always insist manual transmission giving many irrelevant and very out of date rationalization.
Years ago, I worked on dive boats, both in he US and abroad; and there were frequently serial failures of electronic gear among the tourists, especially air integrated computers, with and without transmitters, for whatever reason -- so much so, that there was a milk crate full of cheap-scheiß SPGs, to cover them in event a failure occurred. More often than not, few gauges remained, after a few days; and I was usually tapped to lead a refresher on tables.
No, I don't rely entirely upon air integrated computers or electronics; but use them, regularly; and carry analogue back-ups. I also have tables, which date from the late 1970s; and they too have been put to use as well . . .
Well, but in my (very limited) cases, computer and analog equipment did both agree perfectly on maximum depth and total diving time. Of course the real diving profile was not spent at max depth for the whole time, so I was expecting the tables to require more deco than the computer. It appears, instead, that for the very same "square" profile the Leonardo computer is less tolerant than the old US Navy tables.Here is another thought on that comparison.
...
So the difference can be that the computer is working off the dive you actually did in terms of depths and times, not the dive you think you did.