Best Comprehensive Book on Diving

[jseyfert3]

It used to be 60 fpm.

I'm finding references that the US Navy changed from 60 to 30 fpm around 1993. So it's been quite some time since they recommended 60 fpm. It actually looks like the recreational scuba guidelines took a while to "catch up" to the US Navy in this regard.

 

[caveandreas]

The best answer really depends on what you want to learn.

"Deco for Divers" is a great resource for understanding advanced decompression theory, but its scope goes far beyond what most recreational divers will ever need.

For core concepts of recreational diving, I haven’t found a better book than Beginning with the End in Mind. It’s about 500 well-illustrated pages, packed with information that almost all recreational divers will find useful. You can get it for $30 from the GUE website:

Beginning With the End in Mind - the Fundamentals of Recreational Diving - PDF | GUE

While the book could have benefited from more editing, the content makes it the best resource on recreational diving that I’ve come across. Every recreational diver I’ve recommended it to has learned something valuable, many have said they didn’t realize how much they didn’t know until reading it.

I’d be curious to hear what Scubaboard thinks.

 

[BoltSnap]

I'm finding references that the US Navy changed from 60 to 30 fpm around 1993. So it's been quite some time since they recommended 60 fpm. It actually looks like the recreational scuba guidelines took a while to "catch up" to the US Navy in this regard.

I vaguely remember NAUI changing it circa 1988 along with mandating precautionary stops.

 

[tursiops]

Info Thread 'History of the Safety Stop'

Aug 14, 2020

There have a number of threads recently on ScubaBoard that refer to a Safety Stop, and some assertions as to how it came about and when.

Here is what I can find on this topic; it would be nice to flesh it out so myths and speculation can be minimized! And always remember the research has been about reducing bubbling, not reducing incidence of DCS. That is a different subject.

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Origin of the term Safety Stop in early 1970s.

Andrew A Pilimanis, a researcher for the US Air Force, worked on bubbles in the blood, after diving, under a contract from the Office of Naval...

• tursiops
• Replies: 8
• Forum: History of Diving Gear

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[old frogman]

"Deeper into Diving" by John Lipman and Dr Simon Mitchell outlines the history of dive tables including their development and rationale by various navies and civilian training agencies. Some of the key points in the book regarding ascent rate are as follows.

-US Navy original ascent rate was 25 ft/min for hard hat divers.
-Changed to 60 ft/min circa 1956 to satisfy UDT swimmer requirements (UDT originally requested 100 ft/min).
-UK Royal Navy used 15 m/min (45 ft/min). 1950s onwards.
-UK BSAC used 15 m/min. BSAC/RN modified UK Royal Navy tables 1970s and later the BSAC 1988 tables (for multi-level diving).
-Bhulmann introduced 10 m/min (30 ft/min) early 80s. Known as the Bhulmann tables.
-Various civilian training agencies gradually adopted 30 ft/min.

First reference of safety stop noted is in the 1972 BSAC Dive Manual.

Most conservative dive tables are the Canadian Navy Tables (developed for cold water diving) followed by UK Royal Navy Tables and US Navy Tables.

 

[tursiops]

How does this

First reference of safety stop noted is in the 1972 BSAC Dive Manual

reconcile with Info - History of the Safety Stop

 

[old frogman]

History of the safety stop is about confirming the existence of microbubbles through use of emerging doppler technology however, most navies and individual divers suspected the existence of micro bubbles well before the 1970s. Both UK and US Navy suspected their existence and in practice naval divers used dive tables in a more conservative manner, in addition to slower ascent rates and precautionary stops. They knew from trial and error that there was a link between feeling better after a dive (including incidence of DCS) and how you conducted the dive. In the 1970s researchers such as Pilmanis, Graver and Spencer using the doppler technology developed tables specifically to reduce the number of microbubbles during ascent (this also included the safety stop). Consequentially, in 1984 PADI recommended the safety stop and in 1988 released the RDP dive tables, both aimed at reducing microbubbles on ascent, based on doppler technology research. The BSAC, in their early days 1950s and 1960s, assimilated UK Royal Navy diving protocols for conducting recreational dives. This is clearly evident when you read their early manuals. This probably explains why the safety stop is mentioned in their 1972 dive manual.

 

[tursiops]

This probably explains why the safety stop is mentioned in their 1972 dive manual.

Is it actually called a safety stop in that manual? Pilmanis says the Doppler systems were widely available by 1971, so it would be interesting to know if the BSAC mention used Doppler data or just the empirical stopping that was going on. There seems to be no published studies prior to those of Pilmanis.

 

[pauldw]

Umm, have the laws of physics changed? Human physiology? It is out of print, not out of date.

Cool! We can all find doctors to treat us who only use Middle Ages medical techniques and pharmaceuticals. After all, physics is physics, and physiology is physiology.

 

[David Wilson]

"Deco for divers" may make a snappy in-crowd book title with fewer syllables, but the term "deco" has always conjured up in my mind "Art Deco", a popular design style in the 1920s and 1930s that used bold colours, geometric shapes, and luxurious materials, example below:

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"Decompression for divers" might have suggested a less colloquial and hence a more serious approach to this important diving subject.