GUE and Sidemount position ?

[wetb4igetinthewater]

I'm not but I've been diving with someone who is on an occasion or two.

Plan the dive and dive the plan.

@PfcAJ ,

The question was rhetorical. And the reality is, photography consumes a lot of attention and is best suited for those who are self reliant . When I shoot, my dive plan is dive plan is find pretty fish and interesting subjects, go as deep as I want, go wherever I want, just stay out of deco.

If someone is going to dive with me when my goal is photography, they can hang out close by me if they wish, as long as they don't scare anything away. We will have agreed on how we get each other's attention. They do have to have redundant air. In between subjects, I check on my buddy if I have one.

When I take pictures, I am very selfish as that is "me" time. Many other photographers are like this. Outside of that, I'm very altruistic with helping new divers. When I dive deep , the camera stays above the surface or only comes out at brief intervals at agreed upon locations.

So do you the benefit of sidemount? This time, the question is not rhetorical

 

[DevonDiver]

The AKEP guys do this on a regular basis. Their stuff is way out in the boonies. Somehow they manage. How can it be!?

It takes 5mins to assemble a set of doubles and hardly "dozens of kg". Skip the hyperbole.

As I said, you know basically sweet-zero about the reality of getting things done in SE Asia.

In 2001, I organised and ran a pretty large music/pop concert in the remote desert for deployed troops. So, yeah... I'm aware of what can be done.

Likewise, I've literally travelled the length and breadth of SE Asia.. overland...for months at a time. I've worked and utilised dive centres for technical diving in Philippines, Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia, Malaysia, Borneo.... the list goes on. I've run several technical diving centers in several SE Asian countries.

Can it be done? Yeah... it can

Can you do it? Maybe not.. it takes expertise and experience in local culture, logistics realities, business behaviours and a thousand other factors. That's why so many people f*_k up here... waste time, lose money, don't achieve their goals..

That's not to say that many Yanks don't think they're be hugely adept at doing business and deal in SE Asia.

It's a good spectator sport for those of us who've been here long enough to have learned the real lessons...

Can you afford it? Given sidemount costs as a benchmark 1... what costs above that benchmark is a sane human of typical income will go to pay?

Maybe money has no value to you....but most people wouldn't pay $0000's extra to fund their vacation as if it were a major National Geographic expedition...

Perhaps we should continue debate only once your mushrooms wear off...

 

[PfcAJ]

@PfcAJ ,


So do you the benefit of sidemount? This time, the question is not rhetorical

No. I think all the other stuff should be fixed. There's tons of folks who take pics and still maintain a solid sense of team. It takes discipline.

 

[DevonDiver]

*redacted - too snarky*

 

[wetb4igetinthewater]

No. I think all the other stuff should be fixed. There's tons of folks who take pics and still maintain a solid sense of team. It takes discipline.

You think. But many other people do not think, People think differently. Given that solo photography divers are not dying left and right, I think they can be left to their own devices. The funny thing is, the best images of sealife are typically taken by "undisciplined" divers who are not part of a team.

Just curious if you've ever tried sidemount. One of my first memories is how much more streamlined I was with having the cylinders under my armpits. I just loved how I was gliding so much more effortless. It was amazing. And so much easier to fit into tight spaces.

That said, I am really looking forward to seeing what GUE does with sidemount. I was told by a T2 diver who made the claim that it will take one or two years. I have absolutely no idea if this valid in any way shape or form. But I'm hoping they figure out the reg donation to an OOG diver that fits within their system. I'm hoping that they do not deviate from true sidemount, that there is a long hose, and that one is not limited with what cylinders they use. Like many others, I just have to be patient and wait.

 

[PfcAJ]

Just curious if you've ever tried sidemount. One of my first memories is how much more streamlined I was with having the cylinders under my armpits. I just loved how I was gliding so much more effortlessly. It was amazing.

I'm not interested in it at all. Benefits of a (real) manifold are too great.

 

[Dan_P]

@Dan_P

whichever version of ratio deco you use since that's the one you are saying is better than a computer with buhlmann and custom gradient factors. So please answer the question on what advantages that it has, what disadvantages that you acknowledge that it has, and why it is better than diving with a computer with an industry accepted vs. industry rejected decompression strategy?

First, just to have it out of the way - From your previous statements, I don't believe you to be the sort of fellow that would endeavour a dive such as the ones carried out in NEDU either.

That said, apart from purposely bending a bunch of guys to show that under those circumstances, there's a higher incidence of DCS in divers who do deep stops from a deep air dive on air, it's really not saying much about the safety level of Ratio Deco in a dive that's got pretty much nothing to do with those dives.
I do acknowledge the study, but I asked if you have anything that says Ratio Deco is dangerous?

I think it's good to have a scalable blueprint that builds recognition across training levels, adding layers progressively from the training at OWD-level. And I think it's good that it facilitates proactive in-water adjustments very well.
I think it's good that it works across open cirquit and closed cirquit systems, and I think it's good that all I need is my good old bottom timer.

I acknowledge fully that Ratio Deco can't possibly offer me "optimal" deco at all depths in much the same way I don't use "optimal" gas at all depths. I approach the benefits above at the cost of that.
None of the sources you presented say that's unsafe, nor do any I've found myself - they simply say it's suboptimal in terms of decompression (rather, deep stops have generally been overemphasised), and I acknowledge that. But there's a vast difference between "optimal" and "safe".

Nobody dives optimally in terms of deco safety, they'd still be on the hang.

And I'm still not saying anything is better than anything else.

 

[Dan_P]

Dan, I think the difference comes in the paradigm under which Ratio Deco is used. I like the concept of it, but I don't like that someone would plan a dive on RD and then on Buhlmann, look at the discrepancies, and say then claim that Buhlmann is bad because it doesn't match their proprietary/arbitrary RD implementation.

To be fair, it seems that a lot of the perception of the paradigm RD taught and used under, is subject to individual perception.
I'm not saying Buhlmann is bad. Ratio Deco does more things than deco, though; it's more of a holistic approach to the dive planning. One that can be done very easily, and adjusted very easily.

GUE teaches Ratio Deco as a method of fitting known and trusted algorithms.
UTD teaches Ratio Deco as a method of replacing known and trusted algorithms.

UTD teaches Ratio Deco as a method of incorporating known and trusted algorithms into an actual dive strategy, rather.

GUE teaches Ratio Deco to be used along with desktop planners.
UTD teaches Ratio Deco to be used instead of desktop planners.

What's the point of a desktop planner if you can safely and easily make do without it? That's the point, not some bizarre vendetta against laptops.
One could relatively easily map up RD in a programme and use that, if the algorithm was all that there was to it. But that would miss a lot of the potency of it.

GUE uses known algorithms as proof of accuracy of your personal Ratio Deco curve.
UTD uses known algorithms as proof of how bad they are compared to their rigid Ratio Deco curve.

Hardly. And Ratio Deco is anything but rigid.
But, to understand the how and why of its use, one must understand multiple links in a chain that also encompasses factors such as gas logistics, system interoperability and diver capacity throughout a training funnel. These are incorporated into RD as well. No stand-alone algorithm does that. That's what my point is, RD does far more than algorithmic legwork - and contrary to the individual perception of some, it's neither dangerous or occult.

The Italy rapport more confirmed the safety of Ratio Deco than it did prove it unsafe, and the dives carried out in NEDU have zero correlation to actual dives, whether laptop and computers, Buhlmann, RD or any other approach - shy of attempted suicide by decompression, that is.
I would urge anyone interested in seeing with their own eyes what I mean by that, to give the rapports from those projects a look.

But, veering back onto the subject at hand, the Z-system is not a dangerous death trap. There would be fatalities on it by now if it were. And it's no more convoluted than most dive systems/configurations one is not trained on, would be.

It is scalable and it is consistant.
If one doesn't care about that, bene.

 

[tbone1004]

@Dan_P your comment about UTD using Ratio Deco is 100% wrong. AG says multiple times in the videos of him discussing Ratio Deco that the whole concept of algorithms is wrong so they teach this strategy on decompression that is literally not based on an algorithm. You can't incorporate multiple types of algorithms into a deco strategy because when you do that you lose all sense of what those algorithms are about. Buhlmann and VPM are inherently conflicting so taking some parts of each of them basically negates any validity that either of them have.

 

[Dan_P]

@Dan_P your comment about UTD using Ratio Deco is 100% wrong. AG says multiple times in the videos of him discussing Ratio Deco that the whole concept of algorithms is wrong so they teach this strategy on decompression that is literally not based on an algorithm. You can't incorporate multiple types of algorithms into a deco strategy because when you do that you lose all sense of what those algorithms are about. Buhlmann and VPM are inherently conflicting so taking some parts of each of them basically negates any validity that either of them have.

Link, please.

Even so, first, if one can't consolidate multiple concepts like dissolved gas and bubble mechanics without losing validity, by implication that would mean any gradient factor model is invalid. By this logic, it would have to be one or the other, no middle ground. All m-value, no bubbles.
I don't really think there's any reason to make such an assumption.

The Italy project didn't compare extremes. It compared RD (prev. version) to one GF-model (30/80), in ONE set of dive parametres. Neither turned out dangerous, and there was no statistically significant difference in bubble growth proven. There was a difference in inflammation markers, but the significance is unknown. And the findings can't be extrapolated. That's the conclusion in the rapport.

Second, I think there are some terms being used somewhat interchangably here. By "algorithm", do we mean the context in which they're applied and with which diving methodology, or do we mean the actual algorithm that lies behind the programme in a software - as I said, one could crunch RD in a programme to boil the blueprint back down to an "algorithm". It wouldn't match the other typically used algorithms, but it'd be one none the less. But what would the point be in transferring something you can control in your brain and accounts for things that matter in the water (strategy), into something you can't control, in a machine, which takes nothing else into account (i.e. a laptop you can't bring diving or a dive computer that works reactively).

Third, I really think there's some kind of community-wide lover's tiff on with AG, based on the constant referral to his videos. What I'm on about, is diving.
Now, I'm not saying "algorithms" are bad. As I said, if ratio deco was crunched by a computer, that too would be an "algorithm". I'm saying RD does more than algorithmic legwork, and I'm saying that calling it "dangerous" is unsubstantiated and, well, seemingly incorrect.