Nitrox Diving

[arubajohn1952]

Just completed my Open Water Cert. and would like to go on to some of the Adventure courses. I understand that Nitrox will lengthen my submerged time but doesn't it depend on the breathing rate and the capacity of the tank?

I guess I'm asking what the advantage of Nitrox diving is. I'm sure there are some helpful opinions out there. I have been bitten by the scuba bug badly and am excited about furthering my experiances.

thank's

John:06:

 

[UCFDiver131]

Yes, Nitrox can extend your bottom time, however seeing as you are a new diver, you are likely consuming air too fast for it to matter right now. I certainly could be wrong. Nitrox comes in hand when you are maxing out your bottom time and wish you could stay down longer.

 

[MSilvia]

It can extend your no decompression limits, but that only matters if you have enough gas to stay that long.

 

[ScubaSixString]

Yes, Nitrox can extend your bottom time, however seeing as you are a new diver, you are likely consuming air too fast for it to matter right now. I certainly could be wrong. Nitrox comes in hand when you are maxing out your bottom time and wish you could stay down longer.

When you use nitrox and don't max out your bottom time, it reduces the time you have to spend on the surface between dives. It also provides a bit of a safety factor against DCS (although there is an O2 tox risk)

 

[speedhound]

Nitrox has a higher percentage of oxygen, and lower percentage of nitrogen, than regular air. Less Nitrogen means less chance of the bends...the downside is that with more oxygen you're increasing the chance of an oxygen toxicity hit (if you go near or below the MOD - Maximum Operating Depth).

Some people use Nitrox with air computer settings, to give an extra safety margin. Some use it simply to reduce nitrogen loading compared to air on a dive.

It is a worthwhile class to take if you have the chance.
Dive Safe and Have Fun!

 

[DiveBandit]

arubajohn1952, Nitrox will give you more NDL time. If you get to use any of that extended NDL time depends on your air management. Surface intervals (among safe nitrox divers) average about an hour which is a little longer than air diving. You'll really notice the difference between 50 and 100 feet. PADI no longer requires any dives for this course, but if your a new diver you may want to opt in on the dives for experiance. good luck and happy diving.

 

[Dive-aholic]

Welcome to the Board! As has already been stated, Nitrox does extend your no decompression limits. What that means is you can dive 10 minutes longer at 60 feet on Nitrox than if you were on air. But when your SPG reads 500, you should be on the surface anyway. Most of the initial dives you'll be doing won't require Nitrox. You should be too shallow for it to make a difference because the effects of Nitrox aren't really seen or worth it until you start diving to 60 feet or deeper. I'd recommend going out and diving as much as you can. Keep track of your air consumption and NDLs. When your dives are ending because of NDL rather than air consumption, take the class. If you take the class now, you'll probably only forget the information because it won't be worth paying the extra money for nitrox fills if air consumption is ending your dives.

 

[H2Andy]

nitrox:

by increasing the percentage of oxygen in air, and thus decreasing the percentage
of nitrogen in air, you will be diving "shallower" with Nitrox (22% to 40% O2) than
with air (21% O2)

now, even with air, the shallower you are, the longer you can stay, right?

thus, by diving with Nitrox, you will be diving "shallower" in terms of absorved
nitrogen. thus, you will have longer bottom times, assuming you have the gas
to stay there longer (i.e. you're not sucking your tank dry in the first ten minutes).

is nitrox safer than air? depends. if you dive Nitrox to its no-decompression limits, you
don't have any gains in safety. however, if you dive Nitrox but plan shorter dives,
you will increase your level of safety by "padding" your no-decompression limits.

will nitrox decrease my surface interval: technically, yes, but a minimum one-hour
surface interval with Nitrox is recommended it, and you should obey it. thus, your
surface intervals are not likely to be shorter.

what is oxygen toxicity? oxygen is toxic with depth (really pressure). by adding oxygen to your mix, you are limiting how deep you can go with a given mixture before the dangers of oxygen toxicity become unnaceptable. additionally, you can only have
so much exposure to raised levels of oxygen during a day, so you have to monitor that
(usually not a problem with recreational diving). these two factors are easy to
monitor, and you can do so safely.

should you dive nitrox? that's up to you. it's a bit more expensive than air, but
it does increase your bottom time, especially in the ranges of 50 to 100 feet or so.
there is anecdotal evidnece that nitrox dives "tire you out" less than air dives.

 

[ArcticDiver]

Without a question take a nitrox course. Also, learn much more about just what causes DCS. After those two things you can make the decision for yourself.

Nitrox has been discussed many times on this Board. Do a search and spend about an hour reading all the threads.

If you do choose to use Nitrox, I do at every opportunity, be sure to follow good procedures because you now have oxygen toxicity to include in your calculations. The best procedure is to dive using paper or electronic(dive computer) nitrox tables.

If your computer allows you to set it to "21%" instead of "Air" you are able to use Air Limits but actually using nitrox tables. Some people prefer to use the more restrictive limits for the addes sense of security it gives them.

It is up to you.

 

[MoonWrasse]

You might want to search the board for NITROX - this is an often asked about subject