WillAbbott
Guest
This weekend was an interesting and eye opening diving experience, more so than EVER before. I've had my share for being a new diver of seeing things that made me shake my head at other divers, but thus far this weekend topped the cake.
I dove with 2 other divers (a 3some) one was a lady who had about 200+ dives, the other was a guy who had been certified about 2+ years now, and had about 60dives. We also were on a boat full of other club divers. Everyone on my boat was using Jack/back inflate BC's on the other boat we had going out, there were 2 BP/Wing divers that I know of.
This weekend I had to use a Jacket BC for the first time since using BP/Wings for about 3+ days of diving in a row, or more. It was the Seaquest Pro QD, which is a nice enough BC, I had enjoyed it's use previously, it was the BC I was going to buy before trying BP/Wings.
When I got it home and looked at it, and the regulator, I just couldn't stand the sigt of the overly long hoses on the BC hose, and backup reg. (though I've never dove a DIR hose config), the overly long inflator hose, and all the excess D-rings, and crap I didn't need. I had made some other changes to my gear as well, including putting a bolt snap only on my back up dive lite (an SL4) Which even without bungee's makes a huge difference in how far it hangs.
When we got out on the boat, I didn't see anything that scared me, but when we got in the water, we descended the anchor line. BTW I was probably the newest diver on the boat with 25logged dives since January this year. When we hit the bottom, the lady touched down, and turned around to check on me and the other guy, she led since she had dove the sites before. She completely touched down on the bottom, which wasnt a big deal being a sandy bottom, and she didn't silt up at all. I however remained about 3' off the bottom completely hovering, which I thought was fun, compared to the other 2 not doing the same thing. As we swam I noticed the other guy swiming at the typical overweigt 45degree angle, his feet were 45degrees bellow his head, he was floating higher in the water column than us, and looked like he was having a little bit of trouble with bouyancy, he also sucked air way fast, approx 10 and 15min dives at 70feet max and 60max respectively.
The lady was a pretty decent diver IMO, she never seemed to touch the bottom un-intentionally, etc. HOWEVER she had nothing securing her back up reg, or her computer, both of which dangled several feet from her body. As we swam over rock reefs, I couldn't help but cringe at the sight of her $800 computer scraping along the rocks. And as we swam in the shallows through grass, I couldn't help but laugh at the forest of grass her backup reg and computer had snaged and were dragging through the water behind her.
ON top of all this, I absolutely HATED the BC, it was the most uncomfortable, lose fitting (for being proper size and tighned up), tank swaing (could feel the tank shift from side to side), bouyancy nightmare, I've ever dove. It was a constant figt to maintain bouyancy, which caught me off gaurd, it shouldn't have been so difficult, yet it was, Maybe just because I got so used to how a BP/wings inflator works, as well as it's bouyancy characteristics. I would think I was perfectly neutral, and the next thing I know I was having to add/remove air, far more offten than the last time I used a BP/Wing set up. And of course the D-Rings were awkward to gain access to, as well as being in bad spots, I couldn't attach my computer to my waist D-Ring as the closest thing was far to far away to reach easily, and the rings higher up (without going to the chest D-Ring) were to hard to get it secured back to when done looking at it. The Inflator hose was so long, and hard to find, I offten went looking for it, and found my snorkel 3 times, my back up light 2, before finding the inflator hose (got too used to having it bungee'd to my left strap I guess) I missed my left side dump valve as well, I for some reason enjoy, using it sometimes over the inflator hose dump, esspecially when swimming downward, and wanting to increase my descent rate through lowered bouoyancy.
This dive was also the first dive I'd done doing a saftey stop mid water, with no reference. Though I could tell I wasn't remaining just at the same depth (floating between 14-20feet)
I couldn't help but think, "hey it's my first time with no reference other than a depth gauge, and your using a BC thats been fighting you on bouyancy all day, it's not too bad."
I also saw our 2 BP/Wings divers looking into a hole, just flapping thier fins around, silting up the bottom, I couldn't help but shake my head at that, as there was no reason to be moving thier fins while staring in a hole. Also a group of divers who as they were sitting there for the boat to pick them up decided their masks would be better off usefull around thier necks, though this isn't a big thing, for me I think it's rediculous and not smart to take the mask off till out of the water, what if you had to submerge, or fix an equipment problem, would you want to resecure your mask to your face?
All in All an interesting weekend, after the speaker at our club meeting who tried to enlighten the club into why Hogarthian/DIR is a good way to go (he dives Hogarthian) and my already strong urge to go more DIR than I am now (though probably not 100%), and strong desire to do diving correctly, through proceedures, and equipment, I was somewhat dissatisfied with the quality of diving I saw from FAR more experienced divers this weekend, esspecially when compared to myself (and I'm a VERY modest person, I'd be the first to say, I have a LOT of work to go yet before I consider my self a novice diver even)
Hope the post wasn't thought to be a rant or anything, just thought I'd share, I'm a big proponent of BP/Wings now, even more so than before, and would strongly encourange someone considering a new BC to try them out, and get at least 4 dives on it before deciding, it takes at least 4 to get used to it.
I'm also very thankful to this board and my instructor for teaching me early on the importance of learning bouyancy control, and securing danglies, thanks guys
I dove with 2 other divers (a 3some) one was a lady who had about 200+ dives, the other was a guy who had been certified about 2+ years now, and had about 60dives. We also were on a boat full of other club divers. Everyone on my boat was using Jack/back inflate BC's on the other boat we had going out, there were 2 BP/Wing divers that I know of.
This weekend I had to use a Jacket BC for the first time since using BP/Wings for about 3+ days of diving in a row, or more. It was the Seaquest Pro QD, which is a nice enough BC, I had enjoyed it's use previously, it was the BC I was going to buy before trying BP/Wings.
When I got it home and looked at it, and the regulator, I just couldn't stand the sigt of the overly long hoses on the BC hose, and backup reg. (though I've never dove a DIR hose config), the overly long inflator hose, and all the excess D-rings, and crap I didn't need. I had made some other changes to my gear as well, including putting a bolt snap only on my back up dive lite (an SL4) Which even without bungee's makes a huge difference in how far it hangs.
When we got out on the boat, I didn't see anything that scared me, but when we got in the water, we descended the anchor line. BTW I was probably the newest diver on the boat with 25logged dives since January this year. When we hit the bottom, the lady touched down, and turned around to check on me and the other guy, she led since she had dove the sites before. She completely touched down on the bottom, which wasnt a big deal being a sandy bottom, and she didn't silt up at all. I however remained about 3' off the bottom completely hovering, which I thought was fun, compared to the other 2 not doing the same thing. As we swam I noticed the other guy swiming at the typical overweigt 45degree angle, his feet were 45degrees bellow his head, he was floating higher in the water column than us, and looked like he was having a little bit of trouble with bouyancy, he also sucked air way fast, approx 10 and 15min dives at 70feet max and 60max respectively.
The lady was a pretty decent diver IMO, she never seemed to touch the bottom un-intentionally, etc. HOWEVER she had nothing securing her back up reg, or her computer, both of which dangled several feet from her body. As we swam over rock reefs, I couldn't help but cringe at the sight of her $800 computer scraping along the rocks. And as we swam in the shallows through grass, I couldn't help but laugh at the forest of grass her backup reg and computer had snaged and were dragging through the water behind her.
ON top of all this, I absolutely HATED the BC, it was the most uncomfortable, lose fitting (for being proper size and tighned up), tank swaing (could feel the tank shift from side to side), bouyancy nightmare, I've ever dove. It was a constant figt to maintain bouyancy, which caught me off gaurd, it shouldn't have been so difficult, yet it was, Maybe just because I got so used to how a BP/wings inflator works, as well as it's bouyancy characteristics. I would think I was perfectly neutral, and the next thing I know I was having to add/remove air, far more offten than the last time I used a BP/Wing set up. And of course the D-Rings were awkward to gain access to, as well as being in bad spots, I couldn't attach my computer to my waist D-Ring as the closest thing was far to far away to reach easily, and the rings higher up (without going to the chest D-Ring) were to hard to get it secured back to when done looking at it. The Inflator hose was so long, and hard to find, I offten went looking for it, and found my snorkel 3 times, my back up light 2, before finding the inflator hose (got too used to having it bungee'd to my left strap I guess) I missed my left side dump valve as well, I for some reason enjoy, using it sometimes over the inflator hose dump, esspecially when swimming downward, and wanting to increase my descent rate through lowered bouoyancy.
This dive was also the first dive I'd done doing a saftey stop mid water, with no reference. Though I could tell I wasn't remaining just at the same depth (floating between 14-20feet)
I couldn't help but think, "hey it's my first time with no reference other than a depth gauge, and your using a BC thats been fighting you on bouyancy all day, it's not too bad."I also saw our 2 BP/Wings divers looking into a hole, just flapping thier fins around, silting up the bottom, I couldn't help but shake my head at that, as there was no reason to be moving thier fins while staring in a hole. Also a group of divers who as they were sitting there for the boat to pick them up decided their masks would be better off usefull around thier necks, though this isn't a big thing, for me I think it's rediculous and not smart to take the mask off till out of the water, what if you had to submerge, or fix an equipment problem, would you want to resecure your mask to your face?
All in All an interesting weekend, after the speaker at our club meeting who tried to enlighten the club into why Hogarthian/DIR is a good way to go (he dives Hogarthian) and my already strong urge to go more DIR than I am now (though probably not 100%), and strong desire to do diving correctly, through proceedures, and equipment, I was somewhat dissatisfied with the quality of diving I saw from FAR more experienced divers this weekend, esspecially when compared to myself (and I'm a VERY modest person, I'd be the first to say, I have a LOT of work to go yet before I consider my self a novice diver even)
Hope the post wasn't thought to be a rant or anything, just thought I'd share, I'm a big proponent of BP/Wings now, even more so than before, and would strongly encourange someone considering a new BC to try them out, and get at least 4 dives on it before deciding, it takes at least 4 to get used to it.
I'm also very thankful to this board and my instructor for teaching me early on the importance of learning bouyancy control, and securing danglies, thanks guys
I get a real kick out of watching the the models in the SSI training videos drag stuff over the reefs. Some people just don't seem to get it.
