Inaugural BP/W dive trip

[divesergeant]

OK, so here I am on Grand cayman with my new Kydex Back Plate and 17 lbs wing. It took a few dives to work out how I wanted the thing mounted to avoid clunking my head. Although, as my dear brother says, on me that is a non-vital target area!. I ended up PM-ing Tobin and he got right back with a few suggestions.

I adjusted as he suggested and just finished two rugged East End dives with Ocean Frontiers. End result; no head clunking and great dives that felt as if I had nothing but a tank on my back.

Fitting the Hog harness was silly-simple following the guides on the board here.

As for those wondering about the inflator hose elbow being in the middle of the wing, don't lose too much sleep over it. It seems weird, but it does work. My final setup has the opening on the tank pointed 45 degrees over my left shoulder and the tank straps as high as they will go and still have the top strap hold the tank.

While diving, the ultra small wing and cleanly designed Back Plate seem to give virtually no drag.

So, yes I swore a few times and threatened to throw it overboard on the first several dives until I got it adjusted to suit my build. Now, I absolutely love it.

If I get ambitious, I'll try to take some good photos of the finished setup and post them.

DS

 

[scuba127]

What were you using for exposure protection? Did you have to add weight to the Kydex Plate?

 

[divesergeant]

I dive in beach shorts and a sleeveless Under Armor-type material shirt. I had to add three pounds of weight. I put an XS Scuba quick attachment pouch on the upper tank strap and used that for the weight. I'm not entirely satisfied with the weight setup, but it served for now. I adamantly refuse to wear a weight belt, so the pouch on the tank strap worked OK.