Have you ever deployed a delayed surface marker buoy or been taught how to?

[Trailboss123]

I didn't answer the poll but I have the following to add.

PADI changed its standard a couple of years ago and deploying a DSMB has been added to the list of skills new students learn during the OW course. The instructor is permitted to teach it at the surface (which is pretty pointless) or under water. It is a "dive flexible" skill which can be added to any of the dives in OW.

What I normally do with this is to start with it during dive 3 in open water. I demonstrate it first on land then again under water and have the students try it. If a repeat is necessary I'll add it to dive 4 as part of the "plan" students make. Every student has their own DSMB and everyone deploys from under water.

Personally I was certified 33 years ago and was self taught. During my initial technical training I was subsequently taught a much more effective technique than I had taught myself. The PADI standard does not prescribe a specific technique but I incorporate what I have learned from various teachers I have had in the past. Some instructors who don't have much experience with this or a background in technical diving may want to demonstrate it on the surface. I personally see that as an undesirable option but realistically there is a generation of instructors out there who may not have sufficient experience with this skill to demonstrate it under water with mastery themselves yet.

To be perfectly clear here, this isn't a slight at instructors. Some people simply don't dive where deploying a DSMB underwater is a skill they need. If someone never learned it and never practices it then it's unrealistic to expect them to master it magically because their C-card says OWSI. My hope is that over time PADI will drop the option for instructors do demonstrate this skill at the surface as a new generation of instructors who learned this skill early on enter the ranks.

R..

Thanks for your response @Diver0001 - KUDOS to you and my guess is that you are one of the few Instructors that is electing to incorporate the skill under water vs. at the surface. As a PADI Divemaster myself, who has been working with many instructors up and down the West Coast of the USA since the change in standards, I have yet to work with or support one of them that has chosen to incorporate it into the OW course. They have all elected to do the minimum to meet the standards and only teach students how to inflate it once at the surface. Like you, I was self taught after recognizing my need to be competent at it on my very first trip to Cozumel, for safety reasons. Fortunately, that first trip to Cozumel gave me the opportunity to witness and watch my DM deploy his DSMB 26 times and I paid close attention to his technique and it has served me well over the years.

 

[rmssetc]

if you ask the shop "hey, can I send up my own SMB at the end of the dive?", they'll tell you "no!!"

Huh?

Perhaps I represent a very small sample size, but when I asked that at 3P or Aldora, the answer was an affirmative "yes". I'll find out what Liquid Blue says in a few days.

 

[Diver0001]

I bet a lot of very experienced divers have never seen it done or dived in a place where it was needed. In part, that is because of changing attitudes toward it. In my first few years diving in Cozumel, I never saw it done. Now everyone does it.

John, the first time I saw it done was in about ... I'm going to say 1990 in Cozumel, of all places. The dive guide had one. The next time I went (a couple of years later) I bought one of my own and decided to teach myself. I had flown kites from an early age so I set up the deployment of the line on a plastic kite string holder (see picture).

You can imagine what happened. (hint: it turns out that DSMB's deploy a lot faster than kites do......)

My second attempt was to wind the string around a snorkel, thinking that if I held the snorkel up that the string would whip off the end of it without the same delays that the back and forth movement of the kite string holder caused.

You can imagine what happened. I did, however, get my first lesson in DSMB deployment, which is that if you are getting dragged to the surface you should let go. Second ever deployment and I lost my first DSMB (it would not be the last one I lost).

I kept at it, however. Back home I broke the skill into small parts and eventually figured out how to fold it up so it could be unrolled easily and then inflated with the octopus without getting caught up in it. Initially I was learning this in water 2 meters deep and just working on deploying the blob itself without any string attached..... I wanted to get that step down first.

Once I mastered that I started working on how to attach a string to it and eventually settled on using a wreck reel (this was about 1998). I had wreck reels so that's what I used. Eventually I had that looking ok.

Around 1998, DIR started coming out of the shadows and my thinking about everything changed. Some for the better and some for the worse (at the time) as it turned out. I never really 'went dir' for reasons that go beyond the scope of this post but to me it was a goldmine of innovation and best practices and I used that to my advantage. I changed from a reel to a spool and found DSMB deployment even easier.

In ... 2002, I think, I took my initial technical training and during one of our first dives the instructor deployed a DSMB. He (and I am not kidding) pulled it out of his pocket as we were swimming and in one smooth movement deployed it, held it up to his face and exhaled a little air into it until the blob was standing upright, signed "watch me" and then took two deep breaths and inflated the thing almost 1/2 full (we were at 15m when he did this) and let it fly.

It looked like he was born with a genetic disposition for this skill. I learned how to emulate that and then practiced it on every dive over about 60 dives (and another 100 or so in the topics) until I .... I THINK ... I could do it as well as he could. My avatar shows a "chalk sketch" of me deploying a DSMB during a trimix dive, encumbered with all of the other crap you have to take with you on a trimix dive.

I think I have it nailed now... at least enough to show OW students.

R..

 

[rhwestfall]

When I first was certified, and much later with AOW, this wasn't in the mainstream. When I took either Rescue or NAUI MSD a few years back, it was a component. I had learned of it from SB, and had taught myself, and on occasion have used it when necessary. My daughter did not have any exposure to it in her recent certification (OW), and will see that it is a skill set she has if it is not in her next classes....

I always dive with one, and I have purchased them for both my wife and daughter.

A time comes when you need it.............................

 

[scubadada]

I learned to dive 47 years ago, did DSMBs exist then, I don't have the slightest idea, probably not.

John, the first time I saw it done was in about ... I'm going to say 1990 in Cozumel, of all places. The dive guide had one. The next time I went (a couple of years later) I bought one of my own and decided to teach myself. I had flown kites from an early age so I set up the deployment of the line on a plastic kite string holder (see picture).

View attachment 439150

You can imagine what happened. (hint: it turns out that DSMB's deploy a lot faster than kites do......)

My second attempt was to wind the string around a snorkel, thinking that if I held the snorkel up that the string would whip off the end of it without the same delays that the back and forth movement of the kite string holder caused.

You can imagine what happened. I did, however, get my first lesson in DSMB deployment, which is that if you are getting dragged to the surface you should let go. Second ever deployment and I lost my first DSMB (it would not be the last one I lost).

I kept at it, however. Back home I broke the skill into small parts and eventually figured out how to fold it up so it could be unrolled easily and then inflated with the octopus without getting caught up in it. Initially I was learning this in water 2 meters deep and just working on deploying the blob itself without any string attached..... I wanted to get that step down first.

Once I mastered that I started working on how to attach a string to it and eventually settled on using a wreck reel (this was about 1998). I had wreck reels so that's what I used. Eventually I had that looking ok.

Around 1998, DIR started coming out of the shadows and my thinking about everything changed. Some for the better and some for the worse (at the time) as it turned out. I never really 'went dir' for reasons that go beyond the scope of this post but to me it was a goldmine of innovation and best practices and I used that to my advantage. I changed from a reel to a spool and found DSMB deployment even easier.

In ... 2002, I think, I took my initial technical training and during one of our first dives the instructor deployed a DSMB. He (and I am not kidding) pulled it out of his pocket as we were swimming and in one smooth movement deployed it, held it up to his face and exhaled a little air into it until the blob was standing upright, signed "watch me" and then took two deep breaths and inflated the thing almost 1/2 full (we were at 15m when he did this) and let it fly.

It looked like he was born with a genetic disposition for this skill. I learned how to emulate that and then practiced it on every dive over about 60 dives (and another 100 or so in the topics) until I .... I THINK ... I could do it as well as he could. My avatar shows a "chalk sketch" of me deploying a DSMB during a trimix dive, encumbered with all of the other crap you have to take with you on a trimix dive.

I think I have it nailed now... at least enough to show OW students.

R..

Some folks still use a line holder like you illustrated to run their dive flag for drift diving. It works just fine but is not most convenient. Most divers now run their flag off a reel. I've never seen anyone shoot a SMB with such a device.

 

[boulderjohn]

I've never seen anyone shoot a SMB with such a device.

It would be a good way to get to the surface in a real hurry, if that is what you want.

 

[Diver0001]

It would be a good way to get to the surface in a real hurry, if that is what you want.

I concur and I can confirm from experience that a line holder of the type I linked above is not fit for use for diving.

R..

 

[rhwestfall]

I concur and I can confirm from experience that a line holder of the type I linked above is not fit for use for diving.

R..

folks use those "kite reels" for float/flag use around here. I prefer the cheap ratchet reels for that. DSMB is on a spool. Lift bag (deco) on a reel.

 

[dmaziuk]

That's what I prefer, too, but AFAIU that basically requires an open-bottom sausage. Which has its downsides, as it makes the sausage less suitable as a signaling device when you're on the surface.

Both of mine have "duck bill" valve in the bottom that let you have it both ways. Though I'm not sure how well/long it'll hold if I take the 1.8m one fully inflated and wave it frantically in the air. The downside is bulk: they don't roll up as tight and compact as the ones without.

 

[Dan]

You bring an additional/auxiliary 45m spool and have a buddy stand-by with it, ready to clip-on to the DSMB's spooline if in ripping current it completely pays-out to the bitter end. . .

I just added a 100’ (30m) yellow-line spool onto my existing 20’ (6m) black-line DSMB to keep the whole kit compact & fit in my BCD waist pocket. I use heavy-duty blue rubber-band over the spool to keep the yellow line from unraveling while sitting in the BCD pocket. A stainless-steel figure-8 caribiner is clipped around the rubber band as a tab to pull the rubber band off the spool for quick deployment.

In an easy drift dive, near safety stop depth, I just use the 20’ black line part of the DSMB kit, by unraveling the black line off the tube spool, leaving the yellow-line spool alone & dangling at the end of the black line, as shown below.

When I encounter a ripping current, requiring quick deployment at depth, up to 120’ (36m) depth, I would unravel the black line completely, then pull the rubber band off the yellow line spool, as shown below.

Let the yellow line unwind until the SMB reaching the surface.

Would that work?