DIR- Generic Fundies as a first encounter with doubles

[irycio]

Hi all, my first post here

So I'm signed up for Fundies for March 2020 (planning FTW!) and the instructor suggested I do it in doubles, even though I'm aiming purely at rec pass and don't think I'll do too much doubles diving anyway. Her reasoning was that unlike drysuit it makes not much of a difference and I will get to practice valve drill. The latter is clearly positive, the former I cannot judge.

Do you think it's a prudent thing to have a first contact with doubles during Fundies? Or should I stick to what I've been familiar with and what I will probably be using most of the time afterwards anyway? Or should I do a doubles primer before? At some point I'd like to do Rec 3 or something similar, where doubles will be prerequisite anyway, but it's a question of at least a year.

I've been diving bp/w and drysuit for some 70+ dives now if that helps.

Thanks all in advance for your input!

 

[Alexandros]

Hi!

When I reached out to my GUE Fundamentals instructor a couple of years ago, he too strongly suggested to have the course in doubles and drysuit. Even if you're not aiming for "technical diving" I think that the whole experience of fundies with doubles is more complete and in any case doubles are a very useful tool to get accustomed to.

I listened to my instructor and decided to take the course with doubles. We had a couple of try-dives with doubles prior to Fundies, so as I could get a feeling, and eventually everything rolled smoothly during the course! In hindsight I do think taking Fundamentals with doubles, drysuit, primary light was a correct decision.

My suggestion is just listen to your instructor's suggestions

ps: I did get a Rec pass, but I was supper happy with what this course gave my anyway!

 

[EireDiver606]

I wish I did my course in doubles in hindsight but I didn’t have any practice beforehand so it wasn’t really possible for me.

Get some practice in on rented doubles regularly before fundies, practice hovering, and smb deployment. You have plenty of time so if I were you, I’d aim for a tech pass. If you do fundies in tech configuration, everything will be slightly easier down the line (as opposed to getting a fundies rec pass with wetsuit, singletank, then doing rec 2 or rec 3 in a all the gear that you’ve never done hard multitasking in).

Listen to your instructor and get accustomed to being comfortable in a drysuit and doubles but don’t try to do s drills etc maybe (unless you have a GUE instructor/ diver present) as you might develop poor habits without the instructor being present which will impact your class.

Any more questions, feel free to ask.

Safe diving and good luck

 

[Compressor]

@irycio Welcome to ScubaBoard. Great advice above by people who have taken the course.

 

[1atm]

Switching to doubles was fairly easy for me. The main difference is that they are heavier on land, but once in the water I did adjust very quickly. You will learn not to do fast rolling movements, but other than that I found doubles actually to be easier under water than singles. Imho doubles are more stable and at least with steel 12L doubles as common over here, it's easier to trim out nicely.

Where I would caution you a bit, is the drysuit. I'd say you need to be comfortable with managing the gas in the suit before you go for fundies. When I did Fundies (in doubles+drysuit), it was my 5th dive in a drysuit, and I did struggle a lot. In the end I managed a rec pass, but it was a lot more strain than if I had been comfortable in the suit beforehand. Don't get me wrong, drysuit/doubles is in the end a great combo. All I'm saying is, don't learn how to dive the drysuit in fundies. Learning doubles as part of fundies is fine imho.

 

[ls23]

The comment from 1atm could have been word for word from me. Double 12s dive and trim very nice and are in my experience no big adjustment from diving singles at all. All that was noticeably different for me, was that you have to add a little more gas to your wing at the beginning of the dive since you are carrying double the gas weight.
I did Fundamentals when fairly new to doubles and drysuit, being new to the drysuit was a bit of a problem, being new to doubles not at all. So I'd definitely also recommend doing it in doubles since you get to learn valve drills and don't have to change tanks/go fill as often.

 

[CptTightPants21]

I agree with the above. The switch from single to doubles isn't as big of a leap as wet suit to drysuit. The actual diving of doubles isn't too complicated, it's the adjustment that is needed for trim that can a little annoying--adjust tank banks an inch here, loosen the harness an inch--luckily there is no better place to do this than with a GUE instructor.

I think there is a lot of benefit to doing fundies in doubles even if you don't have a lot of experience in them. I think that a doubles primer with GUE or even just diving a set of doubles a bunch of times with friends to help you out would be EXTREMELY rewarding and help get you started on the learning curve. I have a hard time saying that the FIRST time you use doubles should be in fundies, but it also isn't the end of the world. I think Alexandros's experience and progression posted above is the right way to go.

 

[seeker242]

Do you think it's a prudent thing to have a first contact with doubles during Fundies? Or should I stick to what I've been familiar with and what I will probably be using most of the time afterwards anyway?

Whatever your personal preference is. Either way, it doesn't really matter much if you are going for rec pass. I did it in single tank and wetsuit and later transitioned to doubles and dry without any problems.

 

[1atm]

One more small piece of advice in case you decide to get dry suit experience before fundies: there are different philosophies how to dive a dry suit. To avoid the problem of acquiring “bad” habits (or habits different from how you will dive within GUE), make sure that whoever teaches you is somewhat aligned with the DIR way of drysuiting.

That means specifically

• Use the wing for buoyancy, do NOT use the suit for buoyancy (as would be taught in some rec classes for example)
• Always strife for running the minimum level of gas in the suit
• Practice dumping gas and managing suit gas above all else. Trim etc you can learn in fundies, but it will be a lot easier if you go into fundies being comfortable about how to dump gas from the dry suit efficiently

Just as a disclaimer on the “bad habits”: I don’t mind how anyone else is diving and what works for them, but since the OP asked about fundies, this would be the relevant perspective

 

[irycio]

Thanks for all the inputs, most appreciated.

To be clear, as per the first post I've already been diving drysuit for a longer time, so not the first time with it. Might want to come back to putting gas more into wing than ds, but then again, with current weighing down to around 18m comfort in drysuit = neutral buoyancy to large extent.
25m+ and I may start putting gas into the wing as well.