Fundies on Monday!

[ScoobaChef]

Fundies Class Report-Day 3

Ow Ow Ow Ow Ow!

Ok, now that I have soothed my legs in a nice hot bath, I'm ready to report on another day of fun and mayhem at the hands of Liam.

We started the day down one teammate due to illness, so it was just me and James today. Coffees firmly in hand we set to work analysing out tanks and packing gear for the trip out. By 9am we're at the water's edge getting briefed and running through equipment checks and off we go for the first dive. We dropped down to 3m and swam in formation down the line, practicing our kicks as we go until we were in the 10m section of the training area.

First task was a run through of the basic 5 while holding position around the line. Procedurally we're looking pretty decent, but holding position was proving to be really difficult. Trying to be still without drifting into each other was nearly impossible and i kept feeling like i was going to pitch over onto my face. Liam noticed that my legs wouldn't really cooperate and kept counseling me to get them straighter and keep my fins horizontal.

Soldiering on now, we moved on to s-drills. Quite a lot of up and down and we drifted off the mark quite badly while stowing and deploying, but we did ok despite my stability issues.

Now comes the interesting part. If you guys haven't noticed by now, there were some definite issues with my legs and feet and it was starting to get ridiculous trying to hold a proper postion in a hover. So while we were at 10m, Liam had me empty my wing completely, exhale and lay flat on the sand. Can you guess what happened? My feet floated up and pulled my body perpendicular to the bottom with my head about a foot off the bottom. So wetsuit, steel 12l twins and an explorer 13.5 and i'm underweight!?!? The look on Liam's face was priceless! Having figured out the problem, we decided to call the dive at 1hr 10 min and head back in for refreshments and a debriefing.

---------- Post added April 15th, 2013 at 10:50 PM ----------

Part 2

After a quick break to eat, hydrate and ziptie some lead to my cylinders, back out to our flag and we did a staged descent around the line stopping every three metres to practice midwater maneuvers. On the bottom more s-drills going back and forth then moved on to valve drills. It feels like trying to rub your stomach while patting your head doing light signals while manipulating your valves but i managed to get through it without turning my air off completely.

Afterwards we did a staged team ascent, quick debriefing and then back down to collect our stuff and swim back, practicing our kicks the whole way. Pack the truck and back to the shop.

We cleaned up our gear and set up for tomorrow, then hit the classroom for the full debrief. We were sparedsome of the cringeworthyness because of a camera malfunction, but we went over our performance, mistakes and just general details in great detail. At this point we all know where our strengths and weaknesses lie and know what we need to do to keep improving.

Quick coffee run and we settled down for a lecture on gas planning. Lotsof formulas and calculations but so informative. This kind of info should be passed on in OW classes IMHO. We discussed the dynamics of gas planning ie. all useable, half useable and the well known rule of thirds. Then we calculated our SCR and worked through a number of plans for various dives before calling it a day and heading home with our assignment to calculate MG for every depth from the surface to 30m at 3m increments.

and that wraps it up! Tomorrow is the 4th and final day. Stay tuned.

 

[TSandM]

we settled down for a lecture on gas planning. Lots of formulas and calculations but so informative. This kind of info should be passed on in OW classes IMHO.

We have quite a number of instructors in the Seattle area (most of them with GUE or UTD training somewhere along the line) who so completely agree with you, that they do free Gas Management workshops for local shops and dive clubs. It was attending a gas management seminar (the first one that NW Grateful Diver ever did) that really rocked me back on my haunches and made me ask, "What ELSE didn't they tell me?"

I'm a little curious as to how you all decided that floating legs equaled being underweighted? In my experience, twinsets are almost all head-heavy, with the manifold crossbar and two regulators at the top end, so they almost all require some weight either low on the rig, or low on the diver, to get things to balance. On the other hand, a lot of doubles divers (sadly, even GUE divers AND instructors) don't calculate their weighting for empty tanks, and would get a bit of an unpleasant surprise if they ever got lost in a cave and had to turn their tanks down further than usual.

 

[ScoobaChef]

I'm a little curious as to how you all decided that floating legs equaled being underweighted? In my experience, twinsets are almost all head-heavy, with the manifold crossbar and two regulators at the top end, so they almost all require some weight either low on the rig, or low on the diver, to get things to balance. On the other hand, a lot of doubles divers (sadly, even GUE divers AND instructors) don't calculate their weighting for empty tanks, and would get a bit of an unpleasant surprise if they ever got lost in a cave and had to turn their tanks down further than usual.

Sorry TS, I was a bit vague about that. You are correct in that my weight distribution was head heavy and that more weight needed to be added down low to balance things. The reason we called it underweighted is that with 100 bar in the tanks, and an empty wing, fully exhaled, and thinner booties, I was made to lay still, flat on the bottom at 10m and my feet not only pulled me upright, but straight up off the bottom and was on my way up to the surface just like you would get when a drysuit bubble gets shifted to your legs.

it's still not a completely resolved issue, but we'll work on it more today.

 

[TSandM]

I see -- I got the "feet in the air" part, but not the "headed for the surface" part

 

[ScoobaChef]

It certainly was a case of "how the f**k is that even possible."

---------- Post added April 16th, 2013 at 10:00 PM ----------

Fundies Day 4 - The Grand Finale

Here we go! The last day of class. 8am at the shop, pack the trucks and by 9am we're in the water for our first dive. Practicing our kicks along the line, we were required to stay exactly side by side and at the same depth as we followed the bottom until we reached 10m. Our next task was for 20 min, hold position, trim and depth while facing the anchor line to our dive float. Kind of a difficult taskto begin with, but we had a pretty big storm last night and it was pretty surgy with .5m swells. Made it a pretty exciting experience, but I was able to just relax and stretch out and find that sweet spot and stay put.

---------- Post added April 16th, 2013 at 10:15 PM ----------

I'm exhausted, I'll finish this in the morning.

---------- Post added April 17th, 2013 at 12:05 PM ----------

Ok, picking up where we left off, after hovering and staying in position on the line, we took turns doing SMB drills and ascending as a team. After 4 trips up and down, we managed not to lose each other(much) or get tangled. Quick surface debriefing then back down to do the maskless swim back to shore. I actually found it rather comfortable and could still follow the line as I was guided along. Quick break for lunch and video review in the back of the truck then back out for our last dive.

the last dive was a mad mix of everything all put together. Team descent, s-drill, ascend, discuss, descend, valve drill, smb deployment, ascend, debrief, descend, more s-drills, ascend.... Over and over again until we were all moving together like a slightly oiled machine. Total runtime? 96 minutes!

Back to the shop for gear cleaning and lecture and our final exam. Brains totally fried by now and bodies screaming in pain, but we both made it. Solid Rec passes.

I feel very satisfied with my performance and I'm amazed at all the stuff I learned, but I think the best lesson of all is that now I have a better awareness of how far I've come and how far I still have to go and what I need to do to get there.

Class Dismissed!

 

[lamont]

Sorry TS, I was a bit vague about that. You are correct in that my weight distribution was head heavy and that more weight needed to be added down low to balance things. The reason we called it underweighted is that with 100 bar in the tanks, and an empty wing, fully exhaled, and thinner booties, I was made to lay still, flat on the bottom at 10m and my feet not only pulled me upright, but straight up off the bottom and was on my way up to the surface just like you would get when a drysuit bubble gets shifted to your legs.

it's still not a completely resolved issue, but we'll work on it more today.

If you're not flat on the bottom, but go head up to avoid the bubble migrating to your feet, do you cork? If not, then the problem is that as your legs go over your head a lot of the air in your drysuit goes to your lags, which are now higher, which expand and that'll take you to the surface just by boyle's law. You may also need to run with less of a bubble in your drysuit. And you might need to work on getting all the gas out of your wing. I'll actually flip over onto my back and point the inflator hose up and make sure nothing is getting trapped. If you've really got nothing in your wing, you should be able to rock side-to-side and not hear it rumbling about behind your head (I can hear gas in my wing even through a 12mm hood).

 

[TSandM]

Lamont, he's diving wet.

 

[lamont]

ah, no hablo wetsuit.

 

[TSandM]

Me, neither.