Question Cave 2 or sidemount full cave?

[DiveLikeAMuppet]

What are your thoughts on GUE Cave 2 vs. doing a full cave/staged cave with a good sidemount instructor?

I did Cave 1 as I was diving OC backmount at that point, but right now I mostly dive my JJ (stock, not the GUE fridge) in the ocean and won’t go back to OC backmount anytime soon - so there is no gear or skill commonality anymore between my wreck and cave diving. Which makes me wonder if it’s sensible to stay on the GUE path or not.

My thoughts:

• I really enjoyed the GUE approach but I’m mostly diving with non-GUE divers with different protocols anyway. All of my non-overhead training is TDI/IANTD.
• Sidemount is nicer in some tighter caves.
• Sidemount is significantly easier to carry into a cave or mine as you can carry individual tanks. Some local sites are simply not accessible in backmount at all, unless you are built like George Irvine, and I have a sports injury. One of my recent dives left me sore for 3 days…
• I never did any overhead in sidemount but have open water training, so I would need some practice and setup before any overhead diving.
• Most of my diving is CCR wreck diving. I dive caves or mines for a week once or twice per year, with an occasional weekend.
• At some point, I might look into bringing my JJ into mines but I’m not quite there yet. I’m probably not looking to buy a cave-specific unit such as Kiss/Fathom Gemini as I won’t be able to stay proficient on it.
• I can dive CCR for a year, then pick up my twinset, practice for a day in a quarry and still be OK. I’m not sure it would be so easy with a sidemount.
• I would rather stop diving than dive sidemount from a boat.

Any thought on what might be better for someone in my situation?

 

[Garth]

My hunch is that GUE and non-GUE will have opposing viewpoints. If you don’t commonly dive with GUE divers I would assume getting non-GUE instruction would work just fine. Do you modify your own protocols when diving with non-GUE divers or do you maintain the same protocols. Doesn’t seem like it would be possible to maintain them without diving with another GUE diver but then again I am not GUE trained so I wouldn’t know. Hard to comment on this thread.

 

[DiveLikeAMuppet]

My hunch is that GUE and non-GUE will have opposing viewpoints. If you don’t commonly dive with GUE divers I would assume getting non-GUE instruction would work just fine. Do you modify your own protocols when diving with non-GUE divers or do you maintain the same protocols. Doesn’t seem like it would be possible to maintain them without diving with another GUE diver but then again I am not GUE trained so I wouldn’t know. Hard to comment on this thread.

I’m not really after protocols, more about “sidemount for weekend warriors” vs “a monkey can dive backmount” thoughts for my specific situation …

 

[Garth]

Well, based on that. I would go full cave sidemount then look at a sidemount rebreather.

Personally I would finish CCR full cave in your back mount unit then look to get a sidemount rebreather. I understand you don’t want to go back to backmount but there is so many places to go where you can use a backmount CCR. Extended dives are great with a rebreather. If I lived next to caves I might dive open circuit more but find it nice to do one longer dive a day when I’m on vacation rather than many shorter dives.

 

[halocline]

I’m a little confused, are you currently a sidemount diver?

I’ll say this, I took intro and full cave (not GUE) in backmount and eventually switched over to sidemount. I took SM cave with an excellent instructor in MX and I was really surprised how much there was to learn. Getting trimmed out in SM is the least of it; SM allows you to do more things so there are more procedures and task loading. I enjoyed the class quite a bit and for the cave systems in MX, SM is overall better in my opinion. Entrance/exits are much more comfortable, most other divers are SM, and of course there are lots of SM-only routes.

 

[DiveLikeAMuppet]

I’m a little confused, are you currently a sidemount diver?

I’ll say this, I took intro and full cave (not GUE) in backmount and eventually switched over to sidemount. I took SM cave with an excellent instructor in MX and I was really surprised how much there was to learn. Getting trimmed out in SM is the least of it; SM allows you to do more things so there are more procedures and task loading.

Not a sidemount diver (did a good training, never really dived it much), that’s why I’m wondering if I can build and keep up the skills by diving sidemount just few times per year in overhead… which I can safely do in backmount.

 

[lermontov]

I do most of my dives on ccr back mount (rEvo)
if im going on cave trip or I have a specific dive that the back mount isn't suitable I use OC sidemount
-before the trip ill go spend 6 or so dives on OC in local lake to get into it again
it depends on the demand of the dive that determines whether you can easily jump back and forward but generally speaking even when I get to the site i do a few days build up before i undertake anything serious

a few times a year is ok if youve got the mileage under your belt and you dont launch into something unless you're very comfortable

 

[halocline]

Not a sidemount diver (did a good training, never really dived it much), that’s why I’m wondering if I can build and keep up the skills by diving sidemount just few times per year in overhead… which I can safely do in backmount.

I can’t speak for you, but I only dive a few trips per year, maybe a total of three weeks of diving, and I’m fine with SM. But this was after years of diving in the same cave systems in BM.

I’m a big fan of using the best possible dive configuration for the environment that you’re in. That’s easy to say, of course. I guess if I were in your situation I’d consider exactly where you want to dive and then learn whatever configuration will work best for that.

 

[rddvet]

As someone who started as a sm cave diver then moved into the gue world I would say finish cave 2. Become experienced, then move to sm. You will be happier. Finishing full cave with a non-gue instructor is a negative if you’ve already done cave 1
I’ve been cave diving 12+ years, sm, bm, gue, non-gue, ccr. I wish I had gone gue to start then added additional modalities such as sm after the fact. I wasted a lot of money taking the wrong classes. I have retaken multiple cave classes for the experience and different viewpoints as well so I’m speaking from personal experience.

 

[Jens Bölte]

Hello

There is a GUE sidemount cave course that you could take after cave 2 and 50 logged cave dives.

I doubt that a sidemount cave course differs a lot from a backmount cave course. The course is not about learning to setup and dive sidemount but to dive in a cave. It is only GUE that offers a sidemount cave course. All other agencies allow you take the course in either sidemount or backmount configuration.

Give that you dive a JJ and have taken the GUE cave 1, I would probably stick to GUIE and take the CAve 2 there.

Best wishes Jens