GUE's stance on CCR

[nadwidny]

At $400 to fill a twinset with 21/35, i would think that with regular T1 level dives, you would quickly make up the expense of a CCR.

My big question is about the learning curve required to become proficient enough to execute expedition level dives. Just going by IART's bare minimums, it's over 200 hours to progress from newbie to trimix/deco, and a huge chunk of the skills ingrained through don't transfer from OC to CC very readily..

For jebus sakes people, don't believe everything you hear on the internet (including this post I suppose). When I transitioned from doing T2/T3 level OC dives to CC I did about 40 dives getting used to the machine. After another 40-50 I was back doing the same exploratory trimix dives I had been doing on OC. IF YOU DON'T SUCK AS AN OC DIVER to begin with the learning curve isn't that big. It's really not that freaking hard to make the switch. The problem is that the agencies take on students for CC training that can't dive properly to begin with.

---------- Post added September 8th, 2013 at 08:51 PM ----------

Roughly guesstimating, how much of your diving would you say gets done with your KISS vs OC?

95 %. I dive CC unless I'm doing Mexico caves or single tank 80 stuff.

 

[huwporter]

Where is it $400 to fill 21/35? That's wild.

Australia. There are a very small number of shops that bank cheaper 21/35 and can top up a part-used twinset for significantly less than that, but most shops will charge around that for a dump and fill. And they say the good times of 'cheap' helium really are coming to an end, oh whoopey doo... :depressed: Apart from GUE, there is a lot of deep air or rebreather around here.

But you still need to fill your bailout gas whenever you go somewhere new, so your 'savings' are diminished quite a bit when you factor that in. Even a week of wreck diving with an CCR saves maybe 4 al80s worth of gas when compared to CCR.

We did five day's T2 diving in the Solomon islands earlier this year, on a trip where we had to ship our own helium in to the country. The OC gas bill for five dives was around US$2,500, the CC guys bill came to US$500. Those kinds of savings combined with the price we pay for helium even at home could make some serious holes in the total cost of a CCR pretty fast. CCR isn't for me, for a whole bunch of other arguments, but some places in the world have prices that wipe out the 'CCR doesn't even save you that much on gas costs' argument.

Cheers,
Huw

 

[PfcAJ]

What would the bill have been on rb80? My above quoted post should have ended with SCR rather than CCR, fwiw. Point being savings over rb80 are minimal.

 

[LiteHedded]

aj's covered pretty much all my issues with it.
I dont like it. for a few guys doing BIG expeditions it makes sense. but these are grown ups who are capable of going out and learning the unit on their own. now we will probably have a ccr 1 2 and probably a 3 that exists only on paper that anyone can sign up for. then they'll pop up at places like ginnie springs (already happening) and things will go bad. and asking a JJ class what the benefit of it over an RB80 was quite an interesting exercise. the instructor was really the only one with that answer (again this is one of those FEW guys who sees a real need for the thing)

they tend to explain away the risks of the unit with things like "gue divers have better awareness" etc. as well. leaves a bad taste in my mouth and seems like they're forgetting some hard learned lessons
bad news.

 

[TSandM]

Well, I don't have a dog in this fight at all, since I'm never going to do the dives that require or even would be more convenient with a CCR. But Michael Menduno did make what I thought was a good point at the conference last year, that the majority of rebreather accidents are user error, and that GUE is in an excellent position to create a culture of user responsibility, just as they have with OC. At the conference, JJ answered Menduno that the risk-benefit ratio still wasn't penciling out, but I wonder if the Mars experience has changed some of that. He did say something about the idea of reducing user error by training and procedures, when he answered this question for me on Friday night at the Mars talk.

I don't really think you can find any decision made by this organization that has been aimed at profit or expansion. In fact, I have sometimes thought that they shoot themselves in the foot on a regular basis, when it comes to trying to expand their training programs (which would only help their exploration and conservation arms). If they're going CCR, it's not to sell classes or rebreathers -- I'm sure of that.

 

[LiteHedded]

Well, I don't have a dog in this fight at all, since I'm never going to do the dives that require or even would be more convenient with a CCR. But Michael Menduno did make what I thought was a good point at the conference last year, that the majority of rebreather accidents are user error, and that GUE is in an excellent position to create a culture of user responsibility, just as they have with OC. At the conference, JJ answered Menduno that the risk-benefit ratio still wasn't penciling out, but I wonder if the Mars experience has changed some of that. He did say something about the idea of reducing user error by training and procedures, when he answered this question for me on Friday night at the Mars talk.

I don't really think you can find any decision made by this organization that has been aimed at profit or expansion. In fact, I have sometimes thought that they shoot themselves in the foot on a regular basis, when it comes to trying to expand their training programs (which would only help their exploration and conservation arms). If they're going CCR, it's not to sell classes or rebreathers -- I'm sure of that.

instructors charging 6 thousand dollars plus expenses to run a course leads me to believe there's a least a passing interest in profit. and instructors writing white papers encouraging other instructors to keep their prices high...

but I agree that there are dives where the risk-benefit ratio would warrant a close look at CCR. but they are extremely rare and I dont know that it requires an addition to GUE curriculum. clearly those guys are ALREADY diving these units on these projects.

and the dives where the benefit over the safer SCR unit is anything more than negligible is even rarer still.

 

[PfcAJ]

There's also a business incentive for Halcyon to sell a new rebreather.

Doll-hairs are DEFINITELY a consideration.

 

[TSandM]

Well, if they make T2 the prerequisite for a rebreather class, they're never going to sell very many of them, any more than they sell many RB80s.

I agree that anybody who NEEDS a CCR for the dives they are doing, is probably quite capable of acquiring a unit and appropriate training to use it. The value of a GUE class would be to standardize the unit and the policies and procedures.

Don't get me started on class costs. I have my own feelings about that

 

[LiteHedded]

Well, if they make T2 the prerequisite for a rebreather class, they're never going to sell very many of them, any more than they sell many RB80s.

I agree that anybody who NEEDS a CCR for the dives they are doing, is probably quite capable of acquiring a unit and appropriate training to use it. The value of a GUE class would be to standardize the unit and the policies and procedures.

Don't get me started on class costs. I have my own feelings about that

me too
perhaps better left for another thread

 

[mathauck0814]

It seems strange to me that GUE would bother. A number of folks in our regular tech diving circles are GUE T1/T2 guys (no need for cave out here, everything we have that's worth seeing is deep deep and very rusty) who, at the point they decided it made sense to move, researched the unit first, instructor second and most gave little or no thought whatsoever what variant of alphabet soup would appear on the card.

Is it really important that GUE issue your card? Further - are you really going to allow an agency to pick your unit for you? That seems foolish and contrary to what I see as best practices in diving.

If you're doing 100+M dives routinely (at least monthly) I'd say you're in a better place to select the unit that's best for you than some board with their own interests.