Aow

[StephM]

I have a question about the advanced open water certification (padi)... When do you think is a good time to do this - dive experience-wise? Is it better to wait until you have a fair amount of experience or is this part of getting the experience and training you need?

To put the question into context... My friend and I are PADI OW certified newbies with 10 additional dives logged. We're planning a 10-day dive vacation soon and I would love to do a night dive so I was thinking of doing the night dive specialty.

While inquiring about our vk dive options, a couple of people have suggested that we do our AOW cert. We hadn't thought of doing that. We were thinking that you'd need more experience to do the "advanced" but others have noted that we would be getting trained in important advanced skills as part of the course. We have big plans for the future that include lots of diving and I like the idea of advanced training...

I'd love to hear what everyone thinks!

Steph

 

[fisherdvm]

Nice to do it before you try night diving. The navigation training is more comprehensive than what you've got in OW. The search and recovery dive help to add to the navigation skills.

I'd do it as soon as you find a good instructor who loves to teach, and one who wants to make sure that you are competent and ready to plan and execute a dive safely. That is hard to find, and worth every penny he/she might demand.

Or you can take this AOW thing piece wise, using the SSI model. I think PADI might allow this as well, where you take individual specialty course - ie night, deep, navigation, search recovery - and once you accomplished a minimum number, 5 or so, they'll grant you an AOW card.

Either way, you'll get exposure to more skills, more instruction, and hopefully better and safer diving. If you don't, at least it is a stepping stone for Rescue class (which PADI will require AOW, and many SSI instructor also expect (but not required)).

The AOW certificate is simply a card, which does not represent advanced diving skill by itself. But it is nice to have, as many dive opts will require it for going on dive trips to "advanced", "deep" or challenging sites.

 

[micklock]

I took it a couple weeks after ow, then the rescue class the next summer. It was nice to get more training and more dives with instructors early on.

 

[RJP]

OW = Intro to Diving 101
AOW = Intro to Diving 102

Feel free to take it right after OW. On vacation it's a good way to do a handful of dives with a local instructor.

I did mine as logged dives 5-9 while on vacation in Hawaii. It was an easy way to have a buddy and the total cost worked out to be the same as if I did 5 guided shore/boat dives. The instructor I had was great and I actually learned quite a bit and got a lot out of it.

YMMV

 

[emttim]

I have a question about the advanced open water certification (padi)... When do you think is a good time to do this - dive experience-wise? Is it better to wait until you have a fair amount of experience or is this part of getting the experience and training you need?

To put the question into context... My friend and I are PADI OW certified newbies with 10 additional dives logged. We're planning a 10-day dive vacation soon and I would love to do a night dive so I was thinking of doing the night dive specialty.

While inquiring about our vk dive options, a couple of people have suggested that we do our AOW cert. We hadn't thought of doing that. We were thinking that you'd need more experience to do the "advanced" but others have noted that we would be getting trained in important advanced skills as part of the course. We have big plans for the future that include lots of diving and I like the idea of advanced training...

I'd love to hear what everyone thinks!

Steph

Just to warn you, you'll hear a lot of people on here say AOW is useless. Ignore them.

Now then, that out of the way, I had 16 logged dives when I started my AOW class and I did just fine. People who didn't do any post-OW dives before AOW in my class also seemed to do just fine, however, they were a lot more dependent on the instructor whereas me and my dive buddy (who have comparable dives logged obviously) were completely independent.

If you plan to do lots of diving in the future, I'd say get AOW done asap so you have night and deep diving available to you. I would not recommend doing either without training in them beforehand. If you plan to do deep diving, or work on your air consumption to the point where you may start bumping up against your NDLs or you want shorter surface intervals, you may also want to look into the Enriched Air specialty.

I wish you the best of luck on your decision, have fun on that dive trip!!

 

[fisheater]

Agreed.

If you're serious, do the AOW now. Just don't think that you'll be an "advanced" diver. Know your limits. Training AND experience are required to extend your limits. Get the training now and the experience as best you can.

 

[driftwood]

The worst thing Padi did was to name the class advanced open water and then to compound the error by issuing a card is pretty bad. For four additional dives with an instructor, not a bad deal and you learn a lot of things that should be in the OWC.

 

[Danninella]

I also took my AOW soon after my OW. As someone else said it felt more like a complement to the OW than "advanced diving".

I also did my AOW the first days of a diving vacation in Thailand (I took my OW in Sweden). It felt good to do a night dive, do some more buoyancy training and so on, before doing more dives on that vacation.

//Danni - newbie

 

[spectrum]

To put the question into context... My friend and I are PADI OW certified newbies with 10 additional dives logged. We're planning a 10-day dive vacation soon and I would love to do a night dive so I was thinking of doing the night dive specialty.

Go ahead and do AOW.

IMO it's best to have some number of post OW dives under your belt and it's hard to put a number on that. I usually say 1-2 dozen. My point is that you should give yourself a chance to get some confidence in your basic skills before someone leads you into the night, deep etc. AOW dives are often little more than exposures to other aspects of diving and may do little to prepare you for the undertaking. Other instructors will impart a wealth of knowledge.

You don't want to wait forever since the scope of your diving will probably grow naturally and by then AOW will be largely redundant.

With 10 dives under your belt you have some idea of what you're doing down there so go ahead and extend yourself a bit.

Pete

 

[DevonDiver]

There are already two current threads debating the AOW course... the main theme (for me) being to clear up any illusions that people have, thinking it is an advanced diver course. It isn't.

The Advanced Open Water course is just that - an advancement (addition, addendum, add-on etc) from the very basic skills that you learnt as an Open Water student. It will give you another 5 dives under the supervision of an instructor (good for your confidence) and will provide you with two main benefits:

1. You will consolidate the skills and procedures you learnt on the Open Water course.
2. You will develop certain skills (i.e. navigation, buoyancy) from Open Water level and will have the opportunity to expand your 'comfort zone' by trying activities such as Night diving and Deep diving.

IMHO, the best time to undertake the AOW course is shortly after you finish OW training. After which, you will be more confident and knowledgable - gain some further experience with fun diving and then head for a Rescue course (which is where every responsible diver should be...)