I'd be grateful for some feedback / comments / suggestions on this plan, especially with respect to cord routing, streamlining, etc.
1. The canister goes butt-mount, as follows. Bungees on rails + bungee to secure to crotch strap. Not going under the strap, since I plan to reuse the same canister for DIR backmount, and for sidemount, and need to be able to swap back and forth reasonably easily. It's asymmetric to account for straight glands. With side glands, it should be symmetric and more streamlined, and it shouldn't have to stick out outside the rails on either side. I'm considering swapping the boltsnaps on the bungees with a stiff webbing mounted to the harness, since it's kind of wobbly right now (but not sure how important it is to be able to remove the canister in the water, that could be one concern). Cords come out on the right side, to match the heater location (plus, I want to be able to move the light from left to right hand, with left preferred as in backmount so I can use consistent protocols).
2. The cords get tucked under the wing, and run straight bottom-up along my back on the right side. Again, since (cross fingers) it looks like I would get a side-gland lid, the configuration should be more streamlined with the side glands than it is now, and hopefully no more than a few inches of exposed cord going straight up under the wing. For now, this will have to suffice...
3. The cords come out on my shoulder blade, at which point I might want to secure and cover them with a piece of webbing, not sure I should bother. They're a bit exposed, but it seems negligible. Then, in under the shoulder strap. Ignore the exposed E/O connection, it's a temporary setup I'm using to evaluate different placements and cord lengths, I plan to eventually replace it with hoses of appropriate lengths that don't require extension cables.
4. I will probably want to secure both cords with a small bungee on the inside part of the upper D-ring to prevent them from slipping down my shoulder and keep them tucked under the wing. The heater goes directly to valve, the light on the right hand as in DIR backmount.
The current cord lengths I'm using:
- 12-inch heater E/O cord on the canister + about 6-inch on the valve,
- 31-inch light E/O cord on canister + about 9-inch on the light head,
- both currently with the 75cm (30-inch) extensions.
So, in total, from the top of the canister to the valve or light head, that makes about:
- 48 inches of heater cord,
- 70 inches of light cord.
The heater cord is fine, maybe it could be a couple of inches longer to have extra margin, which can always be tucked under the wing. The light cord could be a couple inches shorter, but it seems manageable as it is, since it hangs from the shoulder rather than from the waist and doesn't dangle as much as a waist-mounted canister when a bit too long.
Thoughts?