Griffo
Contributor
So I was at the DAN meeting last night and spoke with the head researcher for DAN. I asked him about the value of safety stops and had they done research on such. I specifically asked about the "bubbles". His answer was that for deeper recreational dives, no doubt safety stops are a benefit. However, he said if your dive profile is conservative and you are well within you decompression limits (like shallow dives typically), then doing a safety stop has very little benefit as far as helping with "silent bubbles". If there is any benefit in that type of situation it's simply to slow down the diver on their accent.
As a matter of fact he said that most people believe that you "bubble" each time you dive but he said studies show that is not the case at all. On some dives no bubbling occurs. And, of course, it can all vary between different divers and the same diver on different days.
So I know it's unscientific, but for me personally, getting better at holding my stops without changing depth, and then doing very slow, very controlled ascents during that last 3m has led to me being FAR less tired after diving.