Unfortunately the first part of my course got lost during the breakdown. then my major problem was bouyancy - i was not able to swim more than 2 meters without either falling down or ending up on the surface.
The second part of my course is over. I spent another 6 hours in the water mastering CCR and it’s still a long way ahead of me.
Finally I’m able to swim without either falling down on the bottom or up – on the surface. Hurray!!!!
As a matter of fact I’m swimming normally now. But buoyancy is still the problem when finally ascending. At the end I’m forgetting that I have three buoyancy compensators I have to regulate. So all the time I’m forgetting about one of them, so I jump up, then a quick reaction – overdone, so I’m down too much.
Staying for 2 minutes at 5 meters is now my goal. I’m up and down between 6 and 4 meters in still water (we dived in a quarry, so no waves or currents). Mainly I’m concentrating too much on dry suit and the wing, forgetting about counter lungs.
OK, now details. I used Inspiration Classic but with Hammerhead. I liked this set up much more. At least computers are handsets – so it’s much easier.
http://www.rebreather.us/Hammerhead/Hammerhead.htm
1st dive – 90 minutes. Wow!!!! Mainly swimming – to find out whether I’m capable (lat time I was not) to maintain more or less neutral buoyancy from 7 down to 14 meters. At the half of the dive one more exercise – manual control of PpO2. Starting set point was 0.7, my goal is to keep 1.0 manually. Water temperature – 59F, average depth 39 ft. On OC I would be freezing (despite the dry suit) after something like 60 minutes. I was so comfortable – I felt warm throughout the whole dive….
2nd dive – 88 minutes. New exercises. Now please forgive me because I yet don’t know the whole vocabulary in English, so some things maybe wrongly translated. Flushing the loop – not that difficult as I thought. Half closed circuit – also not difficult. All exercises done well. But the final ascend – still the same problem.
3rd dive – 90 minutes. Repeating all exercise done till now (manual control of 1.0 set point throughout the whole dive, flushing the loop, half closed circuit). No buoyancy problems but the ascend
4th dive – 80 minutes. New exercise – I have too much gas in the loop and counter lungs. Trying to established the necessary amount of gas. Closing ADV and trying to manually control the amount of gas needed in the loop. The last one was not a big success, I ended up with still having way too much gas. But I managed to swim for some time without ADV.
of course before each dive I had to do all tests - are there any leaks. After each dive I had to tear CCR into parts and then put it back together again. And I had to change scrubber - this is the worst part. My hands were really swallen after clapping the container for ahlf an hour....
To summarize – I started liking it!!!!!!! It maybe fun.
Next part of the course soon. But before going any further I have to practice the ascend. So that it will be as good ascend as on OC.
The second part of my course is over. I spent another 6 hours in the water mastering CCR and it’s still a long way ahead of me.
Finally I’m able to swim without either falling down on the bottom or up – on the surface. Hurray!!!!
As a matter of fact I’m swimming normally now. But buoyancy is still the problem when finally ascending. At the end I’m forgetting that I have three buoyancy compensators I have to regulate. So all the time I’m forgetting about one of them, so I jump up, then a quick reaction – overdone, so I’m down too much.
Staying for 2 minutes at 5 meters is now my goal. I’m up and down between 6 and 4 meters in still water (we dived in a quarry, so no waves or currents). Mainly I’m concentrating too much on dry suit and the wing, forgetting about counter lungs.
OK, now details. I used Inspiration Classic but with Hammerhead. I liked this set up much more. At least computers are handsets – so it’s much easier.
http://www.rebreather.us/Hammerhead/Hammerhead.htm
1st dive – 90 minutes. Wow!!!! Mainly swimming – to find out whether I’m capable (lat time I was not) to maintain more or less neutral buoyancy from 7 down to 14 meters. At the half of the dive one more exercise – manual control of PpO2. Starting set point was 0.7, my goal is to keep 1.0 manually. Water temperature – 59F, average depth 39 ft. On OC I would be freezing (despite the dry suit) after something like 60 minutes. I was so comfortable – I felt warm throughout the whole dive….
2nd dive – 88 minutes. New exercises. Now please forgive me because I yet don’t know the whole vocabulary in English, so some things maybe wrongly translated. Flushing the loop – not that difficult as I thought. Half closed circuit – also not difficult. All exercises done well. But the final ascend – still the same problem.
3rd dive – 90 minutes. Repeating all exercise done till now (manual control of 1.0 set point throughout the whole dive, flushing the loop, half closed circuit). No buoyancy problems but the ascend
4th dive – 80 minutes. New exercise – I have too much gas in the loop and counter lungs. Trying to established the necessary amount of gas. Closing ADV and trying to manually control the amount of gas needed in the loop. The last one was not a big success, I ended up with still having way too much gas. But I managed to swim for some time without ADV.
of course before each dive I had to do all tests - are there any leaks. After each dive I had to tear CCR into parts and then put it back together again. And I had to change scrubber - this is the worst part. My hands were really swallen after clapping the container for ahlf an hour....
To summarize – I started liking it!!!!!!! It maybe fun.
Next part of the course soon. But before going any further I have to practice the ascend. So that it will be as good ascend as on OC.
