Asking here because...

[zuzanne]

Hi all, I am asking this here because most of you beach dive here in South Florida. When beach diving with the flag/float the line always seems to get tangled up in my hoses, my fins, or my tank. Is there a simple way or device that makes diving with the float/flag less of a pain in the....A?

I have the plastic thing that the rope goes on that you can put on your arm, use a floating plastic line. I have tried letting out lots of line and shortening the line, but still gets tangled up in my gear. Any ideas or help with this would be appreciated.

Zuzanne
:06:

 

[GrierHPharmD]

I have that same little plastic reel, and I usually just let out 20 feet or so of line, tie the line off on the reel, and then clip it to a D-Ring on the side of my BC (I have one on each hip.) I've added sliding bolt clips to my reel and to almost every piece of equipment I own (after dropping a few goodies)

I still sometimes get my fins tangled in the line when I'm in shallow water, but this arrangement works pretty well. I might ask one question, though: Are all of your hoses pretty well contained? At the risk of sounding DIR, it's a good idea to secure any danglers, as it protects both your gear and the reef.

I've attached a few photos of the sorts of clips to use and avoid. There's a double snap clip, a cable tie, and a single snap clip. These are inexpensive, and can be found at most dive shops and at Home Depot for around $3 each. As an aside, I added photos of two types of clips to avoid: the snap clip and the carabiner. Both of these can snap onto gear and underwater entanglements and cause problems. There have actually been fatalities from using snap clips. (Well, one double fatality that I know of, and it involved one on the outside of a submersible that attached to the rigging of a wreck.)

Hope this helps,
Grier

 

[CBulla]

When you find something other than a $40-60 cave reel, let me know... actually, I'm searching for the inexpensive version of those that aren't marketed as cave reels. OH.. that reminds me, check the DIY area.

 

[zuzanne]

Thanks Grier for the info & the photos. I am printing them off and will pick them up and try them on my next dive. Never tried tieing the line off, will definately be trying that as well. Yes I do have all my stuff streamlined as I don't like things dragging on the bottom or the reef. It protects the reef/me and the gear.

One other question, would one of those reels like the cave divers use, if I got a small one make any difference?

Thanks again for your help. I am looking forward to diving with all of you soon.

Zuzanne

 

[GrierHPharmD]

Yeah, I know what you mean. These are the least expensive ones I've seen, and they're all in the low $30's and made of plastic. I'm still using my little $9 el cheapo one.

http://s1059kxm.leisurepro.com/webapp/commerce/command/CategoryDisplay?cgrfnbr=969&cgmenbr=946

http://shop.diversdirect.com/item/100ft Safety Reel_ID17849

 

[CBulla]

We need to get in touch with Baitedstorm - her husband was telling me about being able to have a reel machined out for less than $20 that would do just what we're after.

My biggest concern with a reel is that with a majority of us doing shore dives, having a reel clipped to our gear can be a very heart pounding experience when a boater makes their presence in the very near vicinity thus leaving you with having to hold it. I've been using a plumb line on a reel (4.95 from Home Depot) and brass clip zip tied to it (1.95 at the same place) and do alright with it as I can clip it to an easily reached ring to release it when a boater is near.

Incidentally, the snap clip and d-ring (last two in Grier's post) are referred to as suicide clips. The reason is they have a tendancy to clip to most anything with little or no force and you can find yourself hung up quite quickly.

 

[GrierHPharmD]

Hadn't thought about needing to quick-release the line. I'll have to think about it a bit, weighing the option of adding a plastic pinch clip to the configuration. It seems like a good idea, but adds a potential failure point.

Something to cogitate on during the next meeting!

Let me know what Darrell finds out about those custom reels. I might be interested.

 

[CBulla]

Right on. My point of failure on my rig is in 2 places. The first being the plumb line on a plastic hand reel set up. The second, should that fail to break, is in the ziptie which would give out if a boat tried to take me, @220#, skiing behind it in full dive gear. Either way I'm out less than $20 in gear for the whole set up and I'm not DOA somewhere.

 

[Former FLL Now MSP Diver]

I've attached a few photos of the sorts of clips to use and avoid. There's a double snap clip, a cable tie, and a single snap clip. These are inexpensive, and can be found at most dive shops and at Home Depot for around $3 each. As an aside, I added photos of two types of clips to avoid: the snap clip and the carabiner. Both of these can snap onto gear and underwater entanglements and cause problems. There have actually been fatalities from using snap clips. (Well, one double fatality that I know of, and it involved one on the outside of a submersible that attached to the rigging of a wreck.)

Hope this helps,
Grier

When clipping off a reel to yourself, I think I might want to add the tie wrap as an attachment method to avoid.

Marc

 

[GrierHPharmD]

Good point. I'm not too into the idea of underwater waterskiing. (But it would make a nice Specialty Cert, wouldn't it?)