General advice to new scuba divers: do not waste your money!

[Belzelbub]

I doubt that anyone can overbreath a reg even if they have lower capacity to deliver gas on paper.

Agreed. It will be really hard to overbreathe just about any regulator today. They will deliver air. The difference, though, will be in the work it will take to breathe from that regulator. That's a separate measurement, though and there isn't necessarily a correlation between max capacity and work of breathing.

 

[L13]

If they are tuned to mfg. specs, you can't really tell when sitting on a chair on surface. Almost just as difficult to tell in the pool swimming laps or just laying on the bottom. The difference comes later in openwater conditions with increased depth, current and other environmental conditions that make it more challenging u/w.

Every 1st stage I mentioned supplies more than enough air for more than 2 stressed divers at any point on any recreational dive. I doubt even you could tell the difference in 1st stages in any recreational dive environment, a decent 2nd stage will cover up all the differences.

For myself, I am like an experienced chef or food expert who can tell you the ingredients of a certain dish by just tasting it and not knowing these ingredients beforehand. I can tell the subtleties in differences based on use in openwater. The difference between G260 and S600 is so subtle but the difference between these two and an Atomic second stage is more obvious (all tuned to mfg specs of course).

Exactly! 99% of new divers buying a first reg are not "like an experienced chef".

Try any of those with a Cressi regulator, it is like driving a Hyundai and then driving an Audi or BMW/Mercedes.

Exactly! It is like recommending that the average new driver should buy the Audi/BMW/Mercedes as their first car. A Hyundai or something more mid-range is a perfectly good first car, especially if you are on a budget! And even if you do buy the Mercedes, maybe not the most expensive highest performing one for your first car.

 

[L13]

Agreed. It will be really hard to overbreathe just about any regulator today. They will deliver air. The difference, though, will be in the work it will take to breathe from that regulator. That's a separate measurement, though and there isn't necessarily a correlation between max capacity and work of breathing.

The WOB will be dominated by the 2nd stage. In a recreational environment a decent 2nd stage will cover up all the differences in 1st stages.

 

[BoltSnap]

Every 1st stage I mentioned supplies more than enough air for more than 2 stressed divers at any point on any recreational dive. I doubt even you could tell the difference in 1st stages in any recreational dive environment, a decent 2nd stage will cover up all the differences.

Maybe but there are also differences in form, number of ports, rotating turrets, environmental seals, etc. that make a difference to some people but not others. It isn't just "performance." There is a lot more to it.

Exactly! 99% of new divers buying a first reg are not "like an experienced chef".

So everyone should eat crappy food or cheap crappy wine? As above, there is more to it than what the new diver sees/feels when they are new. As they gain experience, they start to tell the difference. My beginner students do and they all, no exception that I remember, choose mid to higher end model. Most of them think longer term.

Exactly! It is like recommending that the average new driver should buy the Audi/BMW/Mercedes as their first car. A Hyundai or something more mid-range is a perfectly good first car, especially if you are on a budget!

Mid range in SP, Atomic, Zeagle or the like vs. mid range in Cressi. The price differences, if that's worrying you, is usually less than a meal at a mid range restaurant. For less than a $100, I'd rather buy a better regulator. It is also about availability of support service interval between service, etc. One other factor is how much somebody is going to be diving in the 3 - 4 years. If somebody is buying a regulator just to use to clean the bottom of their boat and nothing else, the least expensive regulator will probably do no issues. It all depends on your needs and the type of diving you will be doing in the mid to long term (3 - 5 years).

 

[L13]

Maybe but there are also differences in form, number of ports, rotating turrets, environmental seals, etc. that make a difference to some people but not others. It isn't just "performance." There is a lot more to it.

Look at the topic of this thread. It is targeted at "new scuba divers". Most of those features aren't that important for them. But I agree that for more advance divers, they can be very important; often more important than "performance".

So everyone should eat crappy food or cheap crappy wine?

There are more choices than crappy food and 5 star restaurants. There is good food that isn't the most expensive food in town (which may or may not be the best food in town, and even top chefs might disagree on which is best).

One other factor is how much somebody is going to be diving in the 3 - 4 years. If somebody is buying a regulator just to use to clean the bottom of their boat and nothing else, the least expensive regulator will probably do no issues. It all depends on your needs and the type of diving you will be doing in the mid to long term (3 - 5 years).

Your typical new diver buying a first regulator probably won't even be diving in 3-5 years. If they are, they are probably buying a new reg by then, regardless of what they bought first, now that they know enough to know what they want for the details of their diving.

 

[Eric Sedletzky]

The WOB will be dominated by the 2nd stage. In a recreational environment a decent 2nd stage will cover up all the differences in 1st stages.

This is absolutely correct.
You will be able to breathe a tank down further with little no increase in breathing effort using an unbalanced 1st stage like a MK2/G250-G250 as opposed to using something like a MK25/R190.
People think only one stage needs to be balanced, which is true up to a point. The point is when the tank pressure begins to go below the operating IP of the 1st stage, then the unbalanced R190 will begin to breathe hard because the spring pressure of the R190 is set to whatever normal operating IP is.
But with a high quality pneumatically balanced second stage, they can compensate for pressures much lower than normal IP, in some cases down to 10 PSI and in shallow water breathe just fine essentially on fumes. So a MK2 with a G260 will be able to be breathed further down than the MK25 with an R190. I don’t know if this is good or bad, it is a fact though. Personally I’d like a little warning if I wasn’t so much of a gauge checker, which I am.
All this regulator hair splitting should be moot because any diver should know to be well on the surface before any of this low tank pressure and hard breathing becomes an issue.
So just get whatever you want based on your budget and personal likes because in the real world it really doesn’t matter.

 

[CT-Rich]

I don't know if I can stomach the entire thread, but the first couple of pages gave me a feel for the discussion.

First, buy what you want. If it is shiny and pretty and you can afford it, have at it. There is nothing worse than spending $200 and realizing the $250 purchase would have made you happy.

a couple of thoughts about exposure suits. For starters, this is your biggest comfort purchase. If you are cold, you are not having fun. If you are going to be doing Great Lake diving or some other cold water location, starting with a drysuit makes sense. For most diving it won't. Dry suits have some disadvantages, the first is cost. A nice one will go north of $1,500US. They require more lead, and a harness. rock boots, and undergarments variable to local conditions. that all adds up, easily an additional thousand. They are also more complicated to operate because you need to learn to manage two bubbles instead of one. As a new diver, you have enough task loading and adding to it, unnecessarily is not a plus.

Here is a second reason. You may not get to a point where you want to go tech for several years. A good 7mm wetsuit that fits will cost a fraction of what a drysuit would and the maintenance on a dry suit can be a PIA. a bad seal or leaky knee needs to be fixed to use the suit. A wetsuit that gets dinged up while you are learning is still going to be wet if you tear a small hole climbing over some rocks. Buoyancy in a wetsuit is much easier to learn and there are fewer moving parts. When you are ready to go tech, you will have a much better understanding of what you want gear wise.

Computer wise, buy what you like. A nice vibrant display is great and a little room to grow isn't a bad thing. A cheap puck will do the job for a couple of hundred bucks and you have a basic redundant computer it decide to buy a multigas computer later. I wouldn't recommend the awesome computer right away, because you may never need it and the version you decide to but for tech diving five years from now might be much better and more feature laden.

Just on these two items you can keep your initial investment way down. Make sure you like diving and really want to do the type of diving that will justify the purchases. I have a dry suit and if I can get by without using it, I definitely try to avoid it because it is more weight and extra work to clean up after a dive.

 

[lexvil]

While I didn’t keep up with this discussion, the premise is good, don’t waste $ but my interpretation differs in some/many ways;

computers, the real cost difference can be a lot but in my opinion buying a cheeeap basic computer is, depending on how much you dive and where, wasting money. A VD (vacation Diver) who only goes to warm (ish) water and boat dives (with a guide) can probably get by with nothing but an SPG, the are unlikely to ever do enough dives, deep enough to have any risk, they will follow the guide on a 30 to 50 ft 37 to 42 minute dive and surface near the boat get back on to a snack and bottle of water.

Regulators are irrelevant since just about anything can do this profile with good enough performance.

exposure protection is of little relevance too in many of those trips as they aren’t down long enough or deep enough for it to matter.

fins are of little relevance too for the vacation diver.

there is nothing wrong with this “few” dives per year diver, probably 80%+ of people getting certified will be in this group, they support the “in the water” part of the industry.

but once you think you really like diving, enough to go in cold water, to want to do longer dives, to dive in less that great conditions you’ll need better stuff.

sealed first stages, a better reason for those is keeping outside stuff out of you first stage, this is more important with pistons, it takes a long time to wear down the chrome in the ambient chamber but it will happen to the shore diver’s reg.

second stages, better designed ones are far more and easily adjustable, this matters to me and some others, a old very basic design can function and serve perfectly for most, I want more. Buying used saves a bunch of $$ if you have some basic knowledge and sometimes luck.

exposure, you don’t need a $3500 drysuit, not that you don’t want or need a drysuit but a great one can be had for $1k or less.

fins should fit (not easy when you wear size 15 shoes) and move you well through the water, not so stiff that you roll with each kick and not so soft that it’s like riding a bike in first gear on flat ground, there are some really well designed fins available, the best ones are pricy and with newer thought applied, they may look like 60 year old designs but there are improvements. Jut because a fin is popular doesn’t make it work well on your legs! More $ is probably wasted on fins than anything else.

masks, fit first after that different choices like straps, one lens or two, some people like clear (I can only assume they like looking at their own eyes ‘cuz that’s all I can see with a clear skirt) colors are available but fit is foremost.

there are many ways to not waste money, one is not buying crap that won’t serve your needs because its a few $ cheaper. Cheap is good but crap is crap.

 

[Eric Sedletzky]

There are so many ways to go when it comes to scuba diving gear and there is no right one way.

I know one guy who pretty much only bought used stuff at garage sales and used sporting goods stores (pre internet and Craigslist). He would buy any old jacket he could find and wear it out until it was shredded, then when he needed another one he’d find something else and wear it out until it was shredded, faded out and coming apart. It didn’t matter what it was as long as it was used and cheap. His regs were old Tekna regs and used consoles. Fins were some plastic ones that finally cracked so he found some old Jets and couldn’t destroy those so they lasted as far as I kept in touch with him. His wetsuits were also all used, he’d scour the classifieds and the gazette. He was easy to fit as a generic 5’10” guy with an average build. His whole philosophy was that scuba (and freediving for abalone) needed to be cheap and there was plenty of good used gear out there to make it happen. His number one priority was to save money.

Then there is the person who loves to spend money on new and shiny. They are constantly in the dive shop and love to surround themselves in the culture. They see value in overkill and high quality in theory being better.

There’s nothing wrong with either. Some people don’t have the time and patience to seek out and buy used. They don’t want someone else’s old and worn gear. They make plenty of money so their priority is to buy the latest and greatest available.
These would be the people driving the new Mercedes not the used Ford.

There is an in between in all this, the person who buys packages. For a once or twice a year vacation diver this is fine. You can save some money and have new stuff.

Also, all gear works. There really isn’t anything made that is a death trap, unless it’s something used and crusty and not serviced prior to use, this could be problematic.
Some of it is better quality (in name brand and in theory) and maybe better designed but it all works.

 

[buddhasummer]

"mediocre dry suit"

I guess as long as it actually works it's ok. But a properly functioning dry suit is not something I'd call "mediocre", I'd be calling it spectacular.