First Rebreather Questions

[rddvet]

It gives me the heebiegeebies to see people connecting their BOV to their 3 litre diluent bottle. Within a few breaths they would empty their diluent, simultaneously loosing breathing gas, loop inflation gas and wing inflate.

Agree. I’ve got a huge issue with people bailing to bov on a 3L. Maybe if they’re a rec diver never going past 60ft but who’s buying a ccr just for that.
Unfortunately those who are ok with it don’t want to hear that if they take a co hit that thing will be gone In seconds.

 

[flymolo]

When i have my fathom set up in the tech configuration (onboard 50s) I have a necklaced reg and a 7 foot hose.

I tried the addition of a necklace for awhile and switched back to just a bov and a long hose clipped off to my d-ring. The addition of the necklace made things too busy for me and I found I was just accidentally purging it all the time and it was just one more thing to get in the way while gearing up. In a bailout scenario I go to the bov and then switch to the long hose.

If i'm in a tight area of a cave i'll just pull the slack from the long hose so the long hose reg isn't hanging down far enough to drag on anything. With a bov and long hose the hose routing feels clean and uncluttered.

 

[Wibble]

Agree. I’ve got a huge issue with people bailing to bov on a 3L. Maybe if they’re a rec diver never going past 60ft but who’s buying a ccr just for that.
Unfortunately those who are ok with it don’t want to hear that if they take a co hit that thing will be gone In seconds.

Even without a CO2 hit, using a BOV on the small diluent cylinder could easily be emptied by distraction or even excessive “sanity” breaths.

 

[rjack321]

When i have my fathom set up in the tech configuration (onboard 50s) I have a necklaced reg and a 7 foot hose. I have zero issues. But I also still use the first generation length loop hoses Charlie put on the units that are longer than the current ones he puts on them. I went to the shorter ones and actually didn't like them as much.
Here is literally the one scenario I ever used the bungeed reg because I've never had a caustic. Doing a dive at orange grove I got some duckweed in my bov that I thougth I got out before heading down for the dive. After about 200ft into the cave I realized some of it was still there and annoying the hell out of me. Switched to necklace and purged and shook the bov for a few minutes and got the duckweed out. But yeah, I doubt I will ever need that necklaced reg, but at least for me its easy to use with the loop

BOV and necklace? Really why?

Having more crap hanging around isnt really that useful vs having one reliable response to gas problems

 

[piranhaman00]

Great discussion everyone! Thanks for the continued feedback.

The unit is a Kiss Spirit, the BOV will be connected to 40 cu ft tank while I do air diluent for the foreseeable future. I plan to use a Divesoft which appears to be a solid BOV unit.

I plan to use a gag strap for additional safety reasons. Still researching this however.

 

[Wibble]

40 cubic feet of diluent gas isn't that much especially if it's not full, e.g. a second dive.

A separate, dedicated bailout will basically not be used (just powering up the reg and a test breath). It's also completely independent from the CCR and the loop.

 

[rjack321]

40 cubic feet of diluent gas isn't that much especially if it's not full, e.g. a second dive.

Yeah if this 40cf is being used as dil, wing, & suit gas it's going to be pushing it to do two even recreational dives. Especially if you're new with somewhat bouncy buoyancy and boating diving. That really chews up the dil/wing/suit suit gas.

 

[kensuf]

BOV and necklace? Really why?

Having more crap hanging around isnt really that useful vs having one reliable response to gas problems

I'm one of those guys that does that, I don't find it that busy. The BOV on my fathom is driven by a QC6 connected to whatever my DIL/Bailout bottle is at the time. I've had an experience where the QC6 popped and I needed to add loop gas to catch a breath, it was unpleasant to say the least.

 

[rjack321]

I'm one of those guys that does that, I don't find it that busy. The BOV on my fathom is driven by a QC6 connected to whatever my DIL/Bailout bottle is at the time. I've had an experience where the QC6 popped and I needed to add loop gas to catch a breath, it was unpleasant to say the least.

You could just use an ADV? ^.^

 

[davehicks]

Yeah if this 40cf is being used as dil, wing, & suit gas it's going to be pushing it to do two even recreational dives. Especially if you're new with somewhat bouncy buoyancy and boating diving. That really chews up the dil/wing/suit suit gas.

I dive a KISS Sprit with a 40CF dil/bailout connected. I typically do 2 dives and then top off the bottle. The 3000psi 40cf is typically at around 2400-2500 after two dives, so not a huge reduction. I've done 3 dives on rare occasions if it's not practical to get it refilled but I won't start a new dive with under 2000psi and certainly not an extended/deep dive.

My suggestion is to have one or two extra 40cf bottles so you can rotate between fills. I dive a locally a great deal and have a Booster pump at home run from a filtered shop compressor to top off my Dil and O2 bottles. I use my old OC LP95s for O2 and HP100's as air sources. This saves a lot of trips to a dive shop and is very convenient. A $30 O2 fill of the 95 is good for over 20 hours of diving.