Octo on bungeed necklace?

[RAWalker]

Hey Cave Bum,
If I ever start cave diving and am in your area I wouldn't mind a diving with or taking a lesson with you. All to often I find that divers that get involved with any for of tech diving forget how to evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of differing equipment.
It's clear to me that your positive evaluation of integrated octos as a positive enforcement for OW divers removes you from the others that seem short sighted. I'd feel much more comfortable with an instructor capable of thinking things through on his own than with one of the others that can't see past the tech part line.

 

[RJP]

First some wings like my OMS have a shoulder dump for when you are upright.

Well, as long as you brought THAT up...



Now's as good a time as ever to remove THAT and replace it with one of these:

 

[RAWalker]

Well, as long as you brought THAT up...

I wasn't talking about the inflator hose port but on the opposite shoulder is a standard pull dump. The elbow I addressed separately as most wings don't use a elbow dump but jacket BCD do. Also some people like the elbow dump so just telling people to replace it isn't helpful here.

 

[Clammy]

Although I'd have to say the elbow dump really does seem like a more than should be common failure point. Here come the worms...

 

[RJP]

Also some people like the elbow dump so just telling people to replace it isn't helpful here.

But some people like a Spare Air too...

 

[Cave Bum]

Hey Cave Bum,
If I ever start cave diving and am in your area I wouldn't mind a diving with or taking a lesson with you. All to often I find that divers that get involved with any for of tech diving forget how to evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of differing equipment.
It's clear to me that your positive evaluation of integrated octos as a positive enforcement for OW divers removes you from the others that seem short sighted. I'd feel much more comfortable with an instructor capable of thinking things through on his own than with one of the others that can't see past the tech part line.

Thanks for the positive comment.

Whether an instructor teaches with an octo/inflator combo or a traditional octo, I think it behooves us to teach donating the primary regulator, the one that we’re breathing off of; the known good regulator. I think we should teach this from the very beginning, starting with the first OW classes, so as to instill good basic habits.

From what I’ve read, most of the recent improvements in dive equipment and procedures have come from cave diving. The BCD is based on cave divers carrying plastic milk jugs for floatation so they didn’t rest on the floor of the cave causing a silt-out and later using horse collar 'May West's'. The first Octo was born when Wes Skiles had a friend, who owned a machine shop, drill and tap a first stage so Wes could add another second stage. As these good ideas surface, and are proven in practice, we should incorporate them in our overall diving philosophy.

Still in all, this is not a "one-size-fits-all" world and one gear configuration or one set of procedures is not going to work for all of us in all forms of diving.

Usually, when we teach technical diving, we use a rig without an octo/inflator combo, but that's because that’s the standard that has developed. This is primarily due to Bill Main's Hogarthian system which includes reducing failure points. I bumped into Bill at Ginnie a couple of weeks ago and he still follows those rules rigidly, at least it appeared so as we chatted and got out of our gear on adjoining picnic tables. I even made the mistake of suggesting that he try side mount when he said he and his dive buddy, Doug, couldn't find a way around the restriction in the new section at Ginnie and was met with a less then a enthusiastic response.

However, if you ever see Lamar Hires, the CEO of Dive Rite, diving his O2ptima, you'll notice he has an octo/inflator combo on it. I have one on my Transpac because I use that for teaching OW and usually don't take it off when I use the Transpac for doubles in the cave unless I'm teaching and need to be a good role model.

I've had several failures of inflators including some on solo cave dives but I've never had a failure of a octo/inflator combo.

The point isn’t so much if octo/inflator combos are good or bad, it’s shouldn’t we be teaching the ‘donate the primary reg’ method.

That's my opinion. To all the others out there... Flame away…

 

[Just another Cinderella]

So if you are donating the primary reg first, what is the length of your primary hose??

 

[Cave Bum]

So if you are donating the primary reg first, what is the length of your primary hose??

40" Hose

 

[Cave Bum]

I wasn't talking about the inflator hose port but on the opposite shoulder is a standard pull dump. The elbow I addressed separately as most wings don't use a elbow dump but jacket BCD do. Also some people like the elbow dump so just telling people to replace it isn't helpful here.

My Dive Rite Transpac II came with the elbow dump on the Rec Wing and the first thing the owner of DR told me when I got it was 'change to a straight elbow'.

The reason in tech diving is twofold, the additional failure point and the high profile that tends to get caught going through restrictions.

If you're using it in open water and not worried about squeezing through small places, I'd keep the elbow dump, they're handy.

 

[ptyx]

So if you are donating the primary reg first, what is the length of your primary hose??

For open water situations:

• A 'regular' hose works perfectly - but sharing air is limited to emergencies and you can't really navigate while sharing (as you would do with a traditional octopus)
• A 40-44in hose can be routed under the arm, which is more comfortable, and sharing is a bit better - but you still can't really navigate.
• A 5ft hose allow to comfortably share air, and still enjoy the dive - but might be a pain to stow depending on your height (it was for me)
• A 7ft hose is even better while sharing, and about as easy/easier to stow than the 5ft

I'd recommend to go with either the 40-44 inches (depending of your height), or the 7ft - if you plan to share air often or go caving/wrecking later. I have both and find myself switching regularly as I can't decide which configuration is best

The inconvenients of the 5ft/7ft hoses are that stowing them while not sharing air is more complicated than with a shorter hose, and that you need to pay more attention to the second stage both underwater and on the boat (it needs to be clipped at all times when not used). Up to you to decide if the extra comfort while sharing air is worth it or not.