Doubles VS HP 130

[CAPTAIN SINBAD]

Guys: I was looking to get into diving doubles to increase bottom time within recreational depths of 130 and above. Then I saw this monster tank HP 130. Its a beast of a tank but for someone looking to increase bottom time at recreational depth do you think doubles are necessary or should an HP 130 do the trick? I am not a gas hog, but sometimes, in some dives I do need more bottom time / gas than what an HP 100 gives. Part of me is saying buy an HP 130 and save the wings and dual tank set up. Another part of me says, sooner or later every recreational diver will get into tech and then the 130 may not see as much use.

Id love to hear from folks who go doubles instead of gigantic single tanks or vice versa. Thanks for your help.

Cheers -

CS

 

[Teller]

Doubles offer redundancy that you cant get with a single tank. You can use a H or Y valve with that HP130 but still not as redundant as doubles. Either way you need to ensure your not exceeding your NDL. BTW you dont have to go tech. There is plenty to see at the Rec level.

 

[dumpsterDiver]

I have some large steel tanks. The biggest is a 149 cu-ft. It is less weight than doubles, less drag, doesn't require any change in my recreational gear and has enough air for most any dive I want to do. the last time I used double tanks was 20 or 25 yrs ago... no need for them..

 

[grf88]

I use HP 130's as my preferred single tank for coldwater recreational diving in a drysuit. Mine are equipped with H-valves.

 

[CAPTAIN SINBAD]

Great. What is the buoyance of your HP 130 when empty?

 

[Instructor_Tom]

An HP130/LP108 is not really a "Big" tank. If you want really big go with an LP120 now that is a monster and a pain to trim properly.

As for trim and weight i dive a LP108 with a 3500 PSI fill on all my recreational and teaching dives. For buoyancy when in a 3 mil John/jacket i can drop 12lb when going from an AL80 to an LP108/HP130. Trim wise if you diving a worthington you wont notice any real trim change from the start to the end of your dive, however if you dive the faber you will notice a significant head down trim change once you get below 1000 PSI in you're tank. As the Faber's tend to go tail light at the end of the dive bad.

My advise...avoid the Faber tanks they are not good for back mount single or doubles.

Hope this is helpful.

DM T.


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[grf88]

Great. What is the buoyance of your HP 130 when empty?

Mine are PST's and they are listed as -1 lb when empty including valve.

 

[cbrich]

A
My advise...avoid the Faber tanks they are not good for back mount single or doubles.

I am not sure if I even what to call you on this BS. IMO Faber's trim out better for single or double configuration, both are longer than the Worthington counterparts, which makes trimming out better on tall people. I have HP100s and HP133s, and never experienced the top heavy feeling like I did with Worthington HP100s or HP130s.

 

[Instructor_Tom]

I am not sure if I even what to call you on this BS. IMO Faber's trim out better for single or double configuration, both are longer than the Worthington counterparts, which makes trimming out better on tall people. I have HP100s and HP133s, and never experienced the top heavy feeling like I did with Worthington HP100s or HP130s.

I have dove faber and worthington LP108s in both single and doubles configuration and the Faber's would constantly go tail light at the end of every dive. When your doing a committed decompression stop the last thing you want to be doing is fighting with your ring because you had a huge swing in you weight profile. In order to keep from being tail light you would have to start very tail heavey which is just plain stupid. The Worthington's will stay near level through out the dive even with an ending pressure in the sub 500 PSI range.


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[James R]

I couldn't disagree more with DM T regarding faber tanks. I own six faber tanks (4 singles and doubles). I've got thousands of hours with them in various configurations underwater - single, doubles, and sidemount. I find worthy tanks to be overly negative, too short, and make me want to turtle over on my back a lot more.

For me, the only area worthy tanks are better in is price - they're cheaper.