Incidents compounded ... you ever have one of these dives?

[Willie]

What we call fine tune control (breathing) is often under-appreciated ... perfectly dialed in their weight ...

Adding weight is not a substitute for poor technique, lack of practice, or avoiding a real weight check for equipment you own and have dialed in, along with periodic rechecks for the reasons I mentioned earlier. But having a little extra weight on you when you are unsure, or having problems which you are analyzing and in the process of addressing is certainly helpful.

In my case it actually allowed me the opportunity to learn some of those techniques. Before adding the weight, I would exhale every ounce of air from my lungs and hold it until I was about to turn blue and would barely creep down. I had someone check my BC for excess air. I turned upside down and pulled my dump valve.

With the extra weight, I had the opportunity to cruise with the current and adjust my depth almost effortlessly. Normal breathing kept me steady, shallower breathing would allow me to descend, deep breaths would allow me to soar over a rise in the coral. It was very satisfying. I am certainly looking forward to more practice and increased skill.

Willie

 

[MikeFerrara]

To say that no inexperienced diver who's claimed to be properly weighted, ever struggles with weighting issues is ignorant at best, and I'll certainly not accuse you of all people of making this claim. To be prepared to cope with change is very helpful.

I'm not really sure what you mean.

I asked about the last time they did a weight check, just that weekend was the reply, end of dive, same tank and equipment, same weighting, fully deflated bc, normal breath, eye level. But recalling their struggle 2 pounds or 4 pounds more would not have helped.

If this was an example, this might be the problem. They eye level thing is an approximation of neutral at the surface but it doesn't work well as a weighting check. You really need to make certain that you can comfortable descend and maintain depth, while breathing normally near but not with any part of your body above the surface.

This is another point where some agencies creat problems with the junk they teach.

 

[MikeFerrara]

The convenience of always being able to do a weight check properly, or at all is unrealistic. Folks change out, add, or remove dive equipment from their inventory, use tanks which may be different from the ones they own (such as on a boat), gain a few pounds over the holidays, rent equipment, change from fresh to salt water or visa versa, and as TSandM put it they may even be forced to do a weight check at the beginning of a dive with a full scuba cylinder and so on and so forth.

Whats wrong with doing a weight check with a full tank? We know what the air in that tank weighs don't we?

Weighting needs adjustments if you consider these circumstances and the fact that dive sites vary so dramatically. For example, there are some sites which require that you enter and decend in an area where a weight check isn't even possible, where there is no convenient ledge or an anchor chain or a swim step.

Then you don't dive a new equipment combination on that dive.

The idea that for every situation you can have your weight perfectly dialed-in is, to put it bluntly, ludicrous. What's the alternative? It's the practicality of being able to dive comfortably and safely on a "range" of weight and to be able to calculate a really close guestimate, sans a float at eye level weight check. In such cases it's much better to start a bit heavier, because you can shed weight, but gaining it is definitely harder, though we hear stories of divers using rocks (snicker). Within reason (I can't stress this enough) it's better to be a bit heavier if you have to choose between the two options. Being perfectly weighted is ideal, even if in some cases impractical. With experience diving in a variety of circumstances and with a variety of equipment, your calculations do get more accurate.

What's ludicrous about taking the time to check yourself in the equipment you're going to be diving in?

There are situations where we have no choice but to dive a bit heavy, like when we are carrying LOTS of gas. Properly weighted you'll be heavy by the amount of gas you carry which can be pretty heavy. In that case the weight still needs to be in the right place so it can be controlled but it's not the same as just strapping on an extra weight pouch in case another diver needs it. What I originally argued was the need for an instructor to carry extra weight for students. All you have to do is to make sure students get properly weighted before beginning the dive.

Which is why so many dive shops just use the starter formula of your physical weight divided by 10 + 10%, so a 200 pound person, would be 20 + 2 = 22 pounds.

This is a fine point for a guess at what to strap on when you get into the water to do an initial weighting check (wearing a full 1/4 inch wet suit). It's nuts to think your just going to use that guess and go out diving and be comfortable.

Often folks who really argue against this point of reason have never really expanded their diving horizon beyond the local fishing hole, on the same equipment and they aren't familar with variance. But the practical situation is being prepared to handle weighting yourself sometimes without a weight check.

I don't know. I think I'm argueing it and I've dived a bit more than just the local fishing holes and with a wide range of equipment. Besides, don't underestimate local fishing holes.

With experience you'll learn things like how much you wear with the different combinations of gear you dive. As an example I sometimes dive an al 80 bp/w and half my wetsuit, sometimes the whole wet suit, my doubles with my dry suit with light underwear and with the heavy stuff. I know what weight I use in with those different combinations. If I do something new I need to check it. If I dive a different type of tank, I need to check it unless I have the published buoyancy data on the tank and it happens to be right. Then I can adjust weighting based on the differences between that tank and another one. You still need to check it to be sure though.

There's no substitute for checking. Most of us have had less than perfectly comfortable dives because of equipment changes or additions. That's why I try to minimize equipment changes and make darned certain that I have some checking out time in anything that's significantly different.

 

[DanBMW]

On my first open water dive, quite a few years ago, diving off of the stern, my safe second got caught on a cleat. I ended up in the water with a hose trying to smack me up the side of my head. Still hear about that one!

 

[DiverBuoy]

Whats wrong with doing a weight check with a full tank? We know what the air in that tank weighs don't we?

What's ludicrous about taking the time to check yourself in the equipment you're going to be diving in?

Different tanks, rental equipment, new divers. Me thinks some perspective is in order. New divers, whether students or those just certified, more often than not don't own their own gear. During this early part of their exposure to diving they will dive a wide variety of rental or loaned gear. Very often circumstances being what they are on some dives they will not have convenient circumstances to perform a weight check. Conditions such as beach entry into a choppy surface with no access to a storage platform for shed weight.

Additionally new divers minds are racing with anxious thoughts. Remember their tables, their minds are saying "what will this new site have, I wonder if there is anything dangerous down here", "I hope I'll be warm enough", "I wonder how long this dive will last", "I've gotta try to remember to stay off the bottom I don't want to hurt anything or get hurt myself", "hope my ears don't give me any trouble this time", "I wonder if we'll move to a different spot after this dive", "I wonder how deep it is in this spot", "oh I forgot to add defogging drops so my mask won't fog", and on and on. But what you won't hear inside the mind of a diver with 5 dives under their belt is to look at that paint chipped boat loaner cylinder over there and say "oh cool we are diving the Catalina Aluminum, 3000 PSI rated, 80 cubic foot capacity, 7.25 inches diameter, 26 inches height, 31.6 pounds empty, but displacing enough salt water weight equal to 2.6 lbs positively buoyancy at 500psi, but with the 2lb neck ring weight or boot disk, only 0.6 pounds positive then that is offset by the 0.5 lb angled steel Sherwood yolk mount valve. So for 80 cf of gas divided by the general rule of 1 lb for each 13 cf of gas consumed, and about 13 cf of gas remaining at 500psi, that means 5 extra pounds of weight needed to start the dive. Wow! This is a lot to ask for a guy with 5 dives.

Example story how about a visitor to Laguna California. Perhaps he came with no intention of diving, but once in the area realized how close he was to the ocean and while driving along to enjoy it's beauty he spots a dive shop, and even finds a buddy, so he grabs 40 bucks worth of rental crap. But alas theirs no convenient indoor heated pool for a weight check, that's ok we'll do it at the ocean. Oh no, look at these conditions, surgy 2-3 foot swells, irradic foamy choppy surface conditions, and no buoy or platform to try out different weights, no anchor chain to cling to, no swim step or cement ramp leading down into the water, no ledges or edges, just an adrenaline rush entry. So you do what you have to, you get in, very quickly past the surf zone, and swim to safety past the breakers. Now your bobbing up and down up and down you have no clue what floating at eye-level would even mean in these circumstances.

New divers will typically spend a good deal of their early exposure to diving on a wide variety of rental equipment and tanks they won't know if they are steel or aluminum, neutrally buoyant tanks or not, they may not even notice if a tank has a boot weight or a neck ring, and they are even less likely to know how to calculating the weight of the air in the tank at various psi, or know all the ratings on the tank, water displacement bouyancy characteristics at various gas levels. To assume otherwise is unrealistic. It's akin to a throwback to the navy diving days when scuba wasn't mainstream ... reminds me of those sepiatone pictures with fully suited divers and full tanks on their backs, in garbage back plastic with tie wraps around their limbs doing pushups during dive training.

Welcome to 2005, we've established a recreational diving community. It doesn't have to be spoon-fed as that would insult intelligent people, nor does it have to be shameful if its convenient and comfortable.

There are situations where we have no choice but to dive a bit heavy

Stop there, I completely agree.

This is a fine point for a guess at what to strap on when you get into the water to do an initial weighting check (wearing a full 1/4 inch wet suit). It's nuts to think your just going to use that guess and go out diving and be comfortable.

Sorry not always realistic. Realism is rarely nuts, it's often sobering.

With experience you'll learn things like how much you wear with the different combinations of gear you dive. As an example I sometimes dive an al 80 bp/w and half my wetsuit, sometimes the whole wet suit, my doubles with my dry suit with light underwear and with the heavy stuff. I know what weight I use in with those different combinations. If I do something new I need to check it. If I dive a different type of tank, I need to check it unless I have the published buoyancy data on the tank and it happens to be right. Then I can adjust weighting based on the differences between that tank and another one. You still need to check it to be sure though.

Exactly my point, changing circumstances, gear, situations ... that's realism. With EXPERIENCE you know the weight you need. If you BUY something new that you'll own for a while, then you'll find a spot where you can do a weight check. Any good diver should. When you can't do a weight check, you guess. Experience makes us better at it.

There's no substitute for checking. Most of us have had less than perfectly comfortable dives because of equipment changes or additions. That's why I try to minimize equipment changes and make darned certain that I have some checking out time in anything that's significantly different.

Agreed nothing beats a check. Not having the time to do a check is not the issue.

 

[MikeFerrara]

DB, I can't believe that that an instructor is writing the stuff you're writing. It's even contrary to the minimal dribble that you are required to teach per PADI standards.

The newer the diver and the more unfamiliar the equipment, the more important it is to follow your training and do a proper weight check!. If the dive site or the planned dive doesn't allow for it they had better pick another.

Regarding your last post, please don't intentionally put what I write out of contest Like this...

Originally Posted by MikeFerrara
There are situations where we have no choice but to dive a bit heavy

Stop there, I completely agree.

I specifically stated when we are carrying lots of gas. An example would be double 104's..a little over 16 pounds (if it's not a cave fill) and a couple of decompression/stage bottles for another 12 or so for a total of almost 30 pounds of gas. Properly weighted you will be 30 pounds negative at the beginning of the dive. Don't just go rent that and dive it without giving it a try somplace first though.

I'm sorry but I really think you need to get into a good class or get with a good diver or two who can walk you through some of this in person before a student hears some of this stuff from you and get's themselves hurt.

 

[DiverBuoy]

DB, I can't believe that that an instructor is writing the stuff you're writing. It's even contrary to the minimal dribble that you are required to teach per PADI standards.

The newer the diver and the more unfamiliar the equipment, the more important it is to follow your training and do a proper weight check!. If the dive site or the planned dive doesn't allow for it they had better pick another.

Regarding your last post, please don't intentionally put what I write out of contest Like this...




I specifically stated when we are carrying lots of gas. An example would be double 104's..a little over 16 pounds (if it's not a cave fill) and a couple of decompression/stage bottles for another 12 or so for a total of almost 30 pounds of gas. Properly weighted you will be 30 pounds negative at the beginning of the dive. Don't just go rent that and dive it without giving it a try somplace first though.

I'm sorry but I really think you need to get into a good class or get with a good diver or two who can walk you through some of this in person before a student hears some of this stuff from you and get's themselves hurt.

Mike you are constantly switching the circumstances to fit your point. read this last set of thoughts your wrote again and remind me quickly where "new student" and "inexperienced diver" come into play. Your utopia of idealism is wasted on those of us who dive in the real world. I'm sorry but millions of us don't dive in a glass flat quarry with stairs, piers, and decent chains. And millions of those divers don't own equipment and don't have access to a place or circumstance where they can dial-in someone elses gear.

Normally I'd agree with your fundamentalist views but quite frankly this last series of narrow minded drivel posts are out of character.

 

[MikeFerrara]

Mike you are constantly switching the circumstances to fit your point. read this last set of thoughts your wrote again and remind me quickly where "new student" and "inexperienced diver" come into play.

I didn't switch anything. I originally responded to your suggestion that instructors need to carry extra weight. I disagreed.

Your utopia of idealism is wasted on those of us who dive in the real world.

Doing a weighting check with the equipment that you'll be diving has nothing to do with utopia. It's just safe diving 101 and it works well in the real world.

I'm sorry but millions of us don't dive in a glass flat quarry with stairs, piers, and decent chains. And millions of those divers don't own equipment and don't have access to a place or circumstance where they can dial-in someone elses gear.

glass flat quarries...you are a gas. You don't need glass flat to check your weighting and you don't need stairs piers or descent lines either.

Rented equipment can complicate things some as can any drastic change to equipment configuration. That's one reason why gear unfamiliarity and buoyancy control problems figure so prominantly in accident statistics. Taking the time to get familiar with the equipment and get properly weighted would cut down on some of that. It's hard to do everything wrong and expect the reults to be good.

Normally I'd agree with your fundamentalist views but quite frankly this last series of narrow minded drivel posts are out of character.

ok, You think suggesting that divers take the time to get correctly weighted especially with unfamiliar equipment is mindless drivel, yet you're the one who started this thread with a story of a hosed up dive with everything from communication problems to weighting problems?

I get a kick out of your continued reference to local fishing holes and glass flat quarries. Is that all you think we dive in this part of the world? Even so, and, as I said before, don't under estimate those sites either. A nice glass flat quarry can be 350 ft deep and range in temp from 80 at the surface to 38 or so at the bottom. Surface temps will varry from 80 at the surface in the summer to freezing during the course of the year requiring changes in exposure protection to match.

The Great Lakes has that same drastic change in temp and divers commonly dive wrecks that are 30 miles out of port, in current and rough seas where doing a weighting check from scratch can be inconvenient to say the least. That's about the last place you want to be when you're having weighting problems.

We have caves where the entry is crawling under a rock ledge in 2 ft of water which is a really inconvenient place to do a weighting check at the surface. We still do the dive correctly weighted.

I'd think that the fairly constant water temps out there on the west coast would be a big help in staying correctly weighted since you can pretty much dive the exact same exposure protection all year. No? Do you mean to tell me that you have no dive conditions that allow for weighting checks in that whole big ocean out there? No inland dive sites? No pools? I think you're pulling my leg. I thin you're just looking for excuses to skip important steps in dive preperation. If you and your dive buds stop doing that, you won't have any more dives like the one you started this thread about.

 

[PepperDM]

I dive using a 3 rule situation. After three things go wrong reguardless of what they are, starting from when I get up the morning of the dive until I ascend from the actual dive itself....I abort and dive another day. You're supposed to enjoy it not be frusterated with yourself or others.

 

[MikeFerrara]

I dive using a 3 rule situation. After three things go wrong reguardless of what they are, starting from when I get up the morning of the dive until I ascend from the actual dive itself....I abort and dive another day. You're supposed to enjoy it not be frusterated with yourself or others.

I agree that you shouldn't dive when you're not in the right state of mind and being flustered because too much has gone wrong can sure wualify. On the other hand I've done dives where everything went wrong for days prior and just getting to the dive site was a sheer act of determination. LOL

Once my wife, one other guy and myself were getting ready to start a cave dive. some one had trouble with something on the surface (I don't even remember what it was) then we get in and my wife is tying the line off with one of her special designer knots around a rock that was in a bad spot so I make a suggestion and she flips me off. We get that settled and get a little ways in and she has some other problem and aborts. We escort her out and on the way back in my buddies primary light dies just as we get to the grim reaper sign. We go back out and I yell for my wife to bring her light down and he says..."The rule of threes". I sask "What the hell are you talking about?" He says if three things go wrong you can't dive. "I say maybe you can't but I'm going diving". He concents to a shorter dive than previously planned and we dive.

On the way out there's a vertical drop from 50 ft down to about 140. We stop to do a stop just in front of a ledge at about 70 ft and everything is cool. All of a sudden I hear a clunk and I'm being sucked back down into the cave. I look at my buddy and he's just staring with really wide eyes and I thought the cave monster had me for sure. I reach out and grab the ledge but my legs just kept getting sucked down until I felt something roll off my back. As it turned out, it wasn't a cave monster after all but a BIG rock that had fallen and landed on back of my doubles.

Another time a friend sais "Lets drive down to Florida for the weekend". Well we did and he drove. After getting all packed and just about laying that little mini van on it's belly we stop to pick up a friend of his. He's got a drive way that's about 10 miles long and we get stuck in the snow...this is Kentucky. We finally get him loaded and get on the road and a while later it's getting foggy in the van....then we spot flames...the thing was on fire with all my dive gear in it! We pull over, shut the engine off and the fire goes out. We get towed into town...with us still in the van which is on the back of a flat bed and get a motel. The van is sort of running again by about 1 pm the next afternoon. We decide not to invoke the rule of three or even four and decide that we're going to Florida even if the whole thing qualifies as some kind of demented pilgrimage. We roll in late on Sat night, get some sleep and have just enough time to do a single dive and head for home in the hopes that we can still make work on Monday morning. Of coursen about the time we hit Kentucky, the snow starts. LOL and the whole thing starts over again.

So...in place of that rule of 3...I use the rule of like 3 to the 8th power. Any more than that and I just won't dive.