Do you use reg. necklace for your primary?

[Boxcar Overkill]

Maybe you missed my point, which was if someone claims that their regs fail 10% of the time, they have a lot more problems to worry about then this discussion. If their regs hardly fail at all, why do they use a failed reg as the rational for donating the primary?

Rather than going back through your post point by point, let me cut to just this question.

How often does your alt reg not work when doing air shares? Could you express that in "1 out of every X times I donate". I presume you test both regs before you dive.

 

[TSandM]

Well, Boxcar, I apologize for my assumption that you have never dived a long hose, but I still don't understand why you think that somebody would have any difficulty obtaining enough hose length to be able to breathe easily, if they pulled the reg from your mouth. Yes, if somebody approached you from behind and pulled the reg from your mouth from the left side, there might be a problem, but I don't see somebody approaching from behind and reaching around in front of you to extract the reg as something very likely.

No, I have not dived a stuffed and bungied long hose. I have read a lot of discussions about it, and it's pretty easy for me to see that it has some issues I don't see the need to deal with, because the basic long hose configuration works so well.

I can see where, if you used a 5' hose and it was too short, you would find a wrapped hose uncomfortable, but that isn't the fault of the configuration -- it's just a sizing problem. But how, even with too short a hose, you ended up having problems with donation, is hard for me to see.

I'm really not trying to tell you that it's wrong that you do what you do. But bungieing and stuffing the long hose has some problems which have led to that approach being abandoned by almost all technical agencies and instructors, so I am not alone in feeling that it is both unnecessary and suboptimal.

And as far as my backup reg failing . . . It doesn't. But it doesn't in part BECAUSE it is bungied on a necklace, so it isn't trailing anywhere, dragging anywhere, or full of sand. It can't come loose from its holder and trail behind me and freeflow without me knowing it. AND I never, ever get in the water without having tested both regs for good function. I know a fair number of open water divers never test their octo regulators (I have seen this).

Anyway, what it comes down to is that there are a number of approaches to gear configuration, and each of us has to choose the one that makes sense and works for them. All I care about is to make sure the record is straight, and that problems which don't exist are not imputed to the gear configuration which I have decided is the best for me, and my buddies.

 

[Plumb bob]

Damn can't delete the post for some reason.. I realised after I posted that I was being drawn into a big timewaster.. :no

Suffice to say Boxcar overkill your quite wrong. :mooner:

 

[Boxcar Overkill]

I'm really not trying to tell you that it's wrong that you do what you do. But bungieing and stuffing the long hose has some problems which have led to that approach being abandoned by almost all technical agencies and instructors, so I am not alone in feeling that it is both unnecessary and suboptimal.

Thank you for the apology.

You'll note that I have been careful to limit what I've said to recreational diving. I can easily see why tec divers and cave divers would prefer having their hose routed the way you suggest.

For pure recreational diver, we have a long hose for only 2 reasons (1) an OOA emergency, and (2) practicing for an OOA emergency. For tec divers and cave divers, my impression is that they employ the long in non-emergency situations, such as passing through difficult passages or perhaps changing tanks. (I don't know, I don't do either cave or tec diving). That changes the equation of risk and consequences such that I can imagine having the long hose on your primary and wrapped as is tec tradition would be a benefit. I don't dispute that for cave and/or tec diving, the way you recommend is better.

But when you take away those other considerations, as pure recreational divers do, and you are left with only the question "which is the better way to share air in a single OOA emergency" I think the bungied long hose octo is better. I understand you may still disagree. But I would be surprised if the majority of the non-tec diving agencies route their long hose the way you describe. I bet, but don't know, that most instructors of recreational students donate their long octo that is bungied to their tank.

Edit: I would also add that I never said it was hard to donate when I dove it your way. In fact I find it just about the same - so long as I'm the one doing the donating and it's not being ripped off me. Both ways are fairly easy in practice. But if someone was clung to my waist and crawling their way up my body, I would prefer it not be wrapped around the back of my head.

 

[Boxcar Overkill]

Damn can't delete the post for some reason.. I realised after I posted that I was being drawn into a big timewaster.. :no

Suffice to say Boxcar overkill your quite wrong. :mooner:

Well, why didn't you just say so earlier! You could have saved me all these bytes!

 

[stairman]

Well in 23 years of diving Ive yet to have someone tear at my reg out of air.That being said Im still prepared for it if it happens.My backup is bungeed under my chin so theyll play hell getting that one.Being a cavediver the 7ft. primary is standard.As was mentioned above if thet grab it out of my mouth i have my backup in 1 second.If they knock my mask off I have a spare in a thigh pouch.My light is connected to my belt and I have 3 more to chose from.I wont say that setup is for everyone but its standard in the cave community.As is twin tanks with two 1st and 2nd stages and penetration limited to 1/3 starting air pressure.More safety is built in from the getgo and an ooa emergency is very rare.

 

[Boxcar Overkill]

Yeah, I see what you're saying. You cave divers have to do a lot with your gear that a purely recreational diver doesn't have to deal with.

Purely recreational divers can optimize the long hose for one specific purpose: getting air to an emergency OOA diver. We don't have to use it in any other way. We don't have to worry about deploying and restowing again, or changing tanks in the middle of a dive, etc. It's a simple question - whats the safest way to stow your hose so that in an emergency an OOA diver can easily get to it. Other than that, there's no reason for us to have a long hose. In a perfect world, I will never have to use my long hose, (except to practice at safety stop.)

Clearly some people believe that a configuration that is optimized for cave diving is necessarily also optimized for recreational diving. I respectfully disagree. While I don't think it is bad or dangerous to use the same configuration, I think that a diver that is free from the additional concerns of cave diver would naturally find that a slightly different configuration is optimal. Or put differently, you stow your long hose differently than I because you use your long hose differently than I.

 

[John_B]

Lots of people imagine issues with the long hose that simply don't exist in practice. But there's no need for you to use one if you don't want to, and you are welcome to stuff a long hose on your tank if you like. I would just like to be sure that people reading this realize that the problems are theoretical, not real.

QFT!

Boxcar, you may have used a long hose for your primary, but it doesn't sound like you got the right mentoring to get enough experience in how to deploy it efficiently. That's what's creating all the buzz.

I don't think anyone cares if you stow your alternate reg on a long hose with a bungie, but people do care if you spread misinformation about another configuration you clearly aren't implementing correctly.

HTH

 

[TSandM]

Boxcar, the only use of a long hose in technical diving is donating to an OOA diver. Yes, we change regulators when we use deco bottles or stages, but the long hose isn't required or really used for that purpose. We breathe off the primary reg, and it's attached to a long hose so that we have options for managing an OOA situation. The ONLY difference between technical and recreational diving in that respect is that a technical diver might find himself in a situation where he and his OOA buddy have to pass through an area in true single file, which is where the 7' length is really necessary. A recreational diver should never be in that situation, which is why a 5' or 40" hose can suffice.

With a 5' hose, the length wraps neatly around the body, as I said before, and there is no need to bungie anything. I have heard your concern about "something wrapped around my neck" before, but in practical terms, it just isn't ever going to be a problem. The hose passes BEHIND your neck, is not "wrapped around it", and would require a very peculiar set of body positioning and pull direction to cause any trouble whatsoever, no matter what the person "crawling up your body" is doing.

But you and I disagree, and that's fine.

 

[lowviz]

I firmly believe that donating the primary is the best approach, because it's extremely fast and guarantees a working reg to the person under stress. I would never say it is the only way to solve the problem, but I see virtually no downside to it, and many advantages.

I'll throw in my recreational 2 cents view without taking sides and stand back. It has been my personal (and repeated) experience that when I lose my LH primary reg unexpectedly that one or both hands instinctively start heading for my mouth. The first thing that I usually notice is that I'm holding my bungeed backup. Problem solved, time to figure out what happened...