AOW/Expierence

[brutus_scuba]

I'm done with the classroom and pool portions of my OW and only have the checkout dives remaining. I'm part of a group at my college that should afford for many dive trips this summer hopefully 40 or 50+. I have a strong desire to get my AOW certs eventually. Should I get them as soon as possible if I have the desire or should I get expierence and if so how much with simple OW dives before I attempt the AOW certs?

Thanks for your input ahead of time
Go Bucks
-A.L.

 

[DandyDon]

I'm done with the classroom and pool portions of my OW and only have the checkout dives remaining. I'm part of a group at my college that should afford for many dive trips this summer hopefully 40 or 50+. I have a strong desire to get my AOW certs eventually. Should I get them as soon as possible if I have the desire or should I get expierence and if so how much with simple OW dives before I attempt the AOW certs?

Thanks for your input ahead of time
Go Bucks
-A.L.

Commonly debated topic here. I think the general feeling is get some diving done, become comfortable with it, then do Aow in hopes of learning on top of that.

But if you get a good Inst, it hels either way.

 

[veek]

Dear A.L.,

If you're comfortable with the knowledge and skills that you learned in the OW class, I recommend taking AOW soon. Typically, dive shops offer a course that requires deep and navigation dives, and you get to choose a couple of others. Deep diving just requires being aware of your increased air consumption at depth and reserving enough air to make a safe ascent; if you have reasonable buoyancy control and can make a slow, controlled ascent, this is no problem. Navigation diving teaches you how to use a compass and plot out a few courses (reciprocal, triangular, square); if you are comfortable in the water and aware of your surroundings, this is also fine. I didn't feel that the AOW course was challenging for me at all, even though I had only done a few dives between OW and AOW, but it was nice to have an instructor with us on the deep and night dives and to read the AOW course manuals, which had more in depth info than the OW manual.

 

[diveman7683]

Depending on what agency you're certified with will depend on how quickly you get your AOW. With PADI you can take AOW right after OW. SSI requires you to have 24 logged dives and specialties. As with the rest of the agencies, I'm not sure of.

With that said, I still think of few mores dives past OW and some specialties under your belt is good.

Hope this helps.

 

[TSandM]

I think it really depends on the course and the instructor (how many times do we say that here?) The AOW course I took was immediately after OW, and served its purpose, which was to get me some more dives with an instructor. But if I took that same course today (at close to 100 dives), I wouldn't get anything out of it at all. On the other hand, I have seen the syllabus for NW Grateful Diver's AOW course, and I have participated in one of the dives, and I can say quite honestly that that course would seriously challenge me today. So they can be quite different.

 

[DreamingOfScuba]

I got my Open Water at the end of January an by the end of February got my AOW and Nitrox. My intention was to do ten dives on holiday then return and then do the AOW. However after three dives on holiday with a guide and doing a slightly more advanced dive I felt it was the right time for me to do the AOW. Its ideal if your in an environment where you can eat, breathe and live scuba for a week or two. I did the AOW and Nitrox over two days - 3 dives per day. It was intense with the studying as well (especially the Nitrox) but my dive skills progressed so much it was unreal. I also had more dives right away to put into practise and work on those skills I learned.

For my AOW I did the Deep dive, Navigation, Peak Performance Buoyancy, Night Dive and Enriched Air Dive. I then did the second enriched air dive to get the Enriched Air Diver card. Out of all of them I really got the most from the Peak Performance Buoyancy course. The Night Dive was my favourite though, it was literally like being in space plus we saw a sleeping turtle - going up and down was cool.

 

[DandyDon]

Like I said....

Commonly debated topic here.

​

 

[brutus_scuba]

Depending on what agency you're certified with will depend on how quickly you get your AOW. With PADI you can take AOW right after OW. SSI requires you to have 24 logged dives and specialties. As with the rest of the agencies, I'm not sure of.

With that said, I still think of few mores dives past OW and some specialties under your belt is good.

Hope this helps.

My certs are with YMCA, my instructor is PADI and YMCA certified so he told me if I ever need a PADI cert he can make sure I get those with lil' problem. I think YMCA has a 10 dive min. for AOW if i'm not mistaken.

 

[brutus_scuba]

I got my Open Water at the end of January an by the end of February got my AOW and Nitrox. My intention was to do ten dives on holiday then return and then do the AOW. However after three dives on holiday with a guide and doing a slightly more advanced dive I felt it was the right time for me to do the AOW. Its ideal if your in an environment where you can eat, breathe and live scuba for a week or two. I did the AOW and Nitrox over two days - 3 dives per day. It was intense with the studying as well (especially the Nitrox) but my dive skills progressed so much it was unreal. I also had more dives right away to put into practise and work on those skills I learned.

For my AOW I did the Deep dive, Navigation, Peak Performance Buoyancy, Night Dive and Enriched Air Dive. I then did the second enriched air dive to get the Enriched Air Diver card. Out of all of them I really got the most from the Peak Performance Buoyancy course. The Night Dive was my favourite though, it was literally like being in space plus we saw a sleeping turtle - going up and down was cool.

Unfortunatly i don't live in an area where I can eat/breathe and sleep SCUBA, but I should be able to get a lot of expierence as my instructor has a deal where members of the scuba club that i'm involved in get free rentals from him on the weekend trips that he or his partner takes each weekend. It will be a lot of quarry diving but it'll be good expierence.

 

[DiverBuoy]

Many schools of thought, not everyone has an opportunity like you. Therefore, their dive experience comes only from signing up for the next class, and the next class, and the ... well you get the picture. In which case they may literally have 9 total dives after receiving their AOW cert (including the 4 open water cert dives). They would be beginners with a second c-card.