Review Diving the Avelo System

[CT-Rich]

In a life or death emergency, you can swim down 6 pounds positive. But an Avelo diver can only be 6 pounds buoyant after finishing a dive with a nearly empty tank, surfacing and blowing any ballast water. Attempting a rescue with low gas and when already Nitrogen loaded is not a good idea no matter what's on your back,

We don’t always get to choose our emergencies. I agree about swimming down six lbs, but I am asking a pretty straightforward question. How long would it take to go from buoyant on the surface to neutral. A traditional BCD would be able to go negative in a matter of seconds.

I don’t really have an objection to the system, but I am not really seeing the upside to it either. When I look at successful innovations in diving there is usually an obvious upside. LP inflators and BCDs make maintaining buoyancy at any depth super easy. Dive computers maximize bottom time and reduce task loading. Nitrox increases the NDL on certain dives. They all add costs to diving. I don’t dive nitrox locally because the benefits relative to the price aren’t worth it shore diving to 40’.

 

[EdMcNeill09]

I meant, how long would a diver in an Avelo system at rest on the surface (6 lbs buoyant) take to become negative to retrieve a diver on the bottom. I am assuming the electric pump needs force water into the tank/bladder system to become neutral.

At the start of a dive an Avelo diver is 1lb positive if properly weighted. The worst possible scenario is that this is after a dive and the Avelo diver has vented water from the tank. Now the Avelo diver is potentially 5-6 lbs positive. If you have to do it this is definitely possible. Just swim down. Not easy but managable for a rescue situation. At the same time as swimming down you could be running the pump.

Funny story. Each year in Dec I put on a new 5mm wetsuit and dive it 400-500 dives until the next Dec. It keeps me warm through the winter months and warm enough into the fall. When I first trained on Avelo I ended up needing no extra weight. That was April 2022. Then I did my Avelo IDC in May of 2023 and became an Avelo Dive Center in March of 2024. This past December was the first time diving Avelo with a new wetsuit! Even worse my first dive with the new suit was while teaching Avelo. I figured I needed a couple of pounds to compensate for the new suit. I spent that first dive instructing really underweighted. I actually needed 5. My students were not aware that I was gently finning myself downwards the entire dive. I owe the CEO of Avelo an apology for telling him the weight calculation in the elearning wasn't that good. It actually is.

So basically it's not that hard to swim down 5 lbs underweighted in Avelo. It's not ideal but definitely doable in a rescue situation.

 

[EdMcNeill09]

We don’t always get to choose our emergencies. I agree about swimming down six lbs, but I am asking a pretty straightforward question. How long would it take to go from buoyant on the surface to neutral. A traditional BCD would be able to go negative in a matter of seconds.

I don’t really have an objection to the system, but I am not really seeing the upside to it either. When I look at successful innovations in diving there is usually an obvious upside. LP inflators and BCDs make maintaining buoyancy at any depth super easy. Dive computers maximize bottom time and reduce task loading. Nitrox increases the NDL on certain dives. They all add costs to diving. I don’t dive nitrox locally because the benefits relative to the price aren’t worth it shore diving to 40’.

2lbs per minute.

I only shore dive when I'm teaching Rescue but think the Avelo Weight difference would be a nice to have for shore divers. For me this is somewhere between 15-20lbs

 

[Still Kicking]

These are Carbon Fiber wrapped over thin walled aluminum. Taking the carbon fiber off the tanks would remove the strength of the cylinder. Spraying the carbon fiber wrapping with Rhinoliner protects the carbon fiber from abrasion that is looked for in the annual visual inspection. Your concern is really valid when thinking of traditional aluminum tanks that have been painted. When it comes to carbon fiber tanks the concerns during the annual visual inspection are different.

The RhinoLiner on the Carbon Fiber tank is a total winner. I dive Avelo regularly on charters and haul the tanks in my truck. They get handled exactly like my aluminum tanks and over the past year I've noticed some scuff marks on the Rhino Liner but no cuts or other penetrations.

Inspections of fiber wrapped cylinders also check for evidence of blunt-force impact damage (crazed surface of the resin, dull sound with a coin tap etc.) that might allow water to permeate the fiber weave and weaken the wrap. I don't see how this kind of inspection is possible with a Rhinoliner coating.

There was the same argument about vinyl coating protecting steel tanks. The coating only hid the damage that was going on underneath.