Hookah diving

[77mako23]

Hope everyone is doing well. Im new so please forgive me if I posted this in the wrong place. Thinking about buying a hookah for shalllw dives under 30’. Mostly 8’-20’. We would use it mostly for scalloping and lobstering in the Keys. I’m leaning towards Hookah Maxs 12v system. Does anyone have any experience with them or any others you’d recommend?

Those who hookah would you recommend the 50’ or 100’ hoses? Not sure if the 100’ would be tough to manage with 2 divers.

Also, some of the units are designed to stay in the boat but I’ve seen some folks will float them. Does anyone have any recommendations for floats and how you organize it?

Thanks everyone.

Nick

 

[underwatermatt]

Why do you want to be on hookah rather than scuba? just curious what your rationale would be, my experiences with surface supplied diving is that it ends up giving you a whole new set of problems. Don't get me wrong, it's a valuable tool for specific uses, I'm just trying to understand your rationale so I can best advise.

 

[77mako23]

Why do you want to be on hookah rather than scuba? just curious what your rationale would be, my experiences with surface supplied diving is that it ends up giving you a whole new set of problems. Don't get me wrong, it's a valuable tool for specific uses, I'm just trying to understand your rationale so I can best advise.

Thanks for the response. I went through the online NAUI diving class up to the water portion and Covid hit so they canceled the dives and I never rescheduled. Then the dive shop went out of business so I need to get with a new dive shop and start over.

We live close to some good scallloping areas and we usually just snorkel but I thought having a hookah would be fun on those days.

We are also going on a family vacation in August to the Keys and I felt this would be a nice way to get a little more time under the water (still being shallow) to catch those pesky bugs vs snorkeling and free diving. And we have a bay boat so it would be nice to not have to lug out a ton of dive gear on a crowded boat.

Those are kinda my thoughts.

 

[Waterwulf]

I think the 100 foot hose will be to much to manage unless you have a surface line tender or maybe float the slack part with floats. Have fun learning about it. I'm starting out in it too. I'll be using tanks as the air supply because I have the tanks.

 

[underwatermatt]

Thanks for the response. I went through the online NAUI diving class up to the water portion and Covid hit so they canceled the dives and I never rescheduled. Then the dive shop went out of business so I need to get with a new dive shop and start over.

We live close to some good scallloping areas and we usually just snorkel but I thought having a hookah would be fun on those days.

We are also going on a family vacation in August to the Keys and I felt this would be a nice way to get a little more time under the water (still being shallow) to catch those pesky bugs vs snorkeling and free diving. And we have a bay boat so it would be nice to not have to lug out a ton of dive gear on a crowded boat.

Those are kinda my thoughts.

Just so i am understanding, you are not a certified diver?

 

[high_order1]

Those who hookah would you recommend the 50’ or 100’ hoses? Not sure if the 100’ would be tough to manage with 2 divers.

Remember, you are not going straight down. That 50 will be like a dog leash. Is it enough, even if the bottom is only 10-15'?

Far as the unit, there are two types, battery and gas. Both have their pluses and minuses. Neither are really better than the other in my limited opinion (I've been researching them for awhile now).

The battery ones in a float generally are pool toys. I would be careful using them, they don't really seem to have a lot of buffer built in.

I do think that having one with a tank is smarter.

I will say that the battery float ones generally are way cheaper than the gas ones. They are almost all built off pumps that weren't designed to be for breathing air.

Good luck