BP/W phenomenon

[Ron Brandt]

I have been diving for 25 years and not noticed they ever went out of style.

Really, I trained with people that had them in 1981....Scuba Pro's I believe and onle lady who is now retired and still does underwater photography will not sell me her's.

Trends come and go......

Ron

 

[Vie]

I saw that Rodales article last month, I didnt think much of it at the time...I was suprised that Halcyon was not included but thats another story.

I was bored enough to e-mail them (even in their reply they did not mention the big “H”):

To: edit@scubadiving.com
Subject: ScubaLab Review: Backplate Buoyancy Systems-omissions.

Dear Scuba Diving magazine,

I applaud you for finally publishing a “ScubaLab Review: Backplate Buoyancy Systems” in the July 2005 issue.

I am a little puzzled though as to why you decided to omit the very fine recreational (i.e. backplate + single tank wing) systems offered by Halcyon and OxyCheq. You also failed to include the more appropriate OMS single tank wing as well as the recently discontinued (but still widely available) Scubapro S-Tek system in your review.

Sincerely,

Vie


Subject: ScubaLab Review of Backplate Systems

Hi Vie:

Thanks for your interest in ScubaLab’s review of backplate systems. For this—and for all ScubaLab reviews—all major manufacturers are invited to participate by sending in product. And in the case of the backplate systems, we left it up to each manufacturer to submit the system they thought best for recreational diving. OMS, Oxycheq and Scubapro were all invited to participate but never responded to our invitations. In the case of OMS, the only system they sent us was the one included in the review.

Yours is not the first e-mail I received asking these questions. I hope this helps clear up the mystery and I hope you understand that the decisions you’re asking about were made by the respective manufacturers, not ScubaLab or Scuba Diving magazine.

Take care, safe diving and feel free to contact me if you have any questions.

Sincerely,

Keith Phillips, Senior Editor
(912) 351-6234

 

[djanni]

:shakehead No, I'm not seeing that at all.

So far this year, or season for us WWW's, I've only seen 1 and last year, I don't think I saw any.

:11: ooops...... what am I saying? I guess I am seeing more of them after all.


Just kidding. I'm sure they're really really nice BC's.

 

[TeddyDiver]

Yours is not the first e-mail I received asking these questions. I hope this helps clear up the mystery and I hope you understand that the decisions you’re asking about were made by the respective manufacturers, not ScubaLab or Scuba Diving magazine.

As Scubalab answers the right place to send complains are the manufacturers... It's a common way in most of the rewievs done in any magazine...

 

[Canadian_Diver]

For some reason I have noticed a lot more BP/W posts lately....is it me or is there a growing trend among recreational divers?

IMHO, it falls into the same category as giant dive machete's, jet fins, and matching black gear to make you look / feel like a Navy Seal. In otherwords, major testosterone overload.

BP/W in my humble opinion is really only neccessary for technical diving, otherwise, I don't really see a point in them. The only other added benefit to BP/W is the ability to get a better fit when a normal BCD won't fit you properly.

I myself am currently using a Genesis Cobra (vest inflate) which works extremely well for recreational diving, and is a very well balanced BCD. This includes drysuit diving in cold freshwater lakes. I would however, like to upgrade to the Genesis Recon, which offers similar configurability to that of a BP/W. The only thing I don't like about the Recon, is the rediculous 75lbs of lift it comes with. I'm also considering a Zeagle Concept II.

Cheers.

 

[jiveturkey]

Jive,

Your comment about waiting until starting Deco has got me curious. If you are thinking about doing deco diving, I would highly recommend getting into a BP/W ASAP. The reasoning is you'll have alot to digest with the theory/procedures with deco, let alone new equipment. I have about 200 or so dives in my BP/W and they are all purely recreational dives...if I ever move on to deco, I won't have as much to get use to as adjusting straight from a jacket style BC..something to think about.

J

I'd love to have a bp/w and I agree 100% about getting as much experience as possible with it. But it's more of a financial thing for me. No need to buy new gear when I don't plan on changing the type of diving that I do. I'd rather spend the $ on diving. I wont' be doing any deco diving anytime soon. I've been diving for 4 years but recreational diving still has lots of appeal for me. When it starts to get boring, I may try more challenging things and I guess to do that I'll have to cough up the coin for a new buoyancy system.

 

[TX101]

IMHO, it falls into the same category as giant dive machete's, jet fins, and matching black gear to make you look / feel like a Navy Seal. In otherwords, major testosterone overload.

BP/W in my humble opinion is really only neccessary for technical diving, otherwise, I don't really see a point in them. The only other added benefit to BP/W is the ability to get a better fit when a normal BCD won't fit you properly.

I tend to agree. I feel SB pushes people towards a bp/w when they don't really need it. If your fine diving a jacket, keep the jacket. If you want to start going deeper and jacket doesn't have enough lift for the extra weight.. then upgrade.

When I "upgraded", I didn't feel that much different in the water and didn't have the epiphany most posters rave about. If I wasn't also upgrading to doubles, I would have thought it was money down the drain.

 

[Diver0001]

I saw that Rodales article last month, I didnt think much of it at the time...I was suprised that Halcyon was not included but thats another story.

Nothing odd about that at all. Rodales reviews are thinly disguised "infomercials". Most of the manufacturers write their own product-reviews and the amount paid for the spot has a big influence on the outcome. Halcyon didn't anti-up so they simply don't play in Rodale's world (in any event, I suspect the people at Halcyon would be mortified to be reviewed in Rodales).

As for your observation, I've noticed a full swing. I learned to dive in the early 80's when the BCD was gaining popularity and horse collars were rapidly disappearing. Before that many divers were using horse-collars or BP/wing setups. Horse collars were said to be safest because they would tend to float an unconscious diver with his/her face out of the water. The BP/wing was being universally slagged off at that time because it had the tendency to float an unconscious diver face down. At that time the big debate had nothing to do with stability.

I think it was scubapro that put out the first modern looking BCD. It gained popularity because it solved one of the main problems of the horse-collar, which was that it would tend to float up around your neck when you weren't totally horizontal. Horse collars weren't particularly stable either. The BCD solved that but there was still a debate about the fate of the unconscious diver. In rec circles, BP/wings were still thought of as death-traps, an image that was underscored by the large (really large) numbers of tek divers having accidents at the time.

It wasn't until the early 1990's that things started to change. The big changes didn't really have anything to do with the gear at all, the change was the internet. For the first time rec divers were getting access to direct discussions with tek divers. The tek divers were writing back and the big BP/wing debate started in earnest. The first time I remember reading about DIR was in 1992. A guy called Dan Volker was trying to change the world by getting the DIR message out. Some others joined in the fray and the big DIR discussion started in earnest. The discussion spent a good 5 years sounding more like a gang war than a debate but in the mêlée the BP/wing configuration started to gain some acceptance. Since about 1997 or so the DIR discussion has calmed down somewhat, tek diving has become much safer and many recreational divers are starting to engage in light tek diving (or at least using doubles). The nature of the debate is now different. People talk about comfort and stability instead of safety for unconscious divers and since the BP/wing wins big points on comfort and stability the acceptance is beginning to grow.

And it will go on like this for a while, at least in internet circles. Among divers who don't cyber dive the BP/wing config is still very uncommon and kind of spooky looking to them. We're still a long way from general acceptance.

R..

 

[MXGratefulDiver]

I tend to agree. I feel SB pushes people towards a bp/w when they don't really need it.

I find that a very strange comment ...

ScubaBoard does not either sell or market scuba gear ... it simply provides a forum for its readers to discuss gear that they use.

As such, SB doesn't "push" people toward anything ... it simply provides you with a place to talk about what works for you.

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[Damselfish]

I find that a very strange comment ...

ScubaBoard does not either sell or market scuba gear ... it simply provides a forum for its readers to discuss gear that they use.

As such, SB doesn't "push" people toward anything ... it simply provides you with a place to talk about what works for you.

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

Perhaps, but I can certainly understand the perception.

I guess I'm seeing more too. I saw my first (and last) last year.