plain backplate/harness diving?

[Moogyboy]

hello all

Just out of curiosity...does anyone still dive with an old-style tank harness and backplate anymore? I'm talking about those basic nylon-webbing things that you used to see scuba models wearing in the dive magazines as late as the '80s, and which seemed to be standard equipment in the '60s and '70s before BCDs came about. Also, I'd be interested in hearing any experiences and impressions from folks who used to.

Incidentally I have one of these, just never used it.

cheers

Billy S.

 

[Snowbear]

? Do you mean the old plastic backpack?

No - but I and many others on this board use a stainless steel or aluminum (there are a few plastic ones as well) backplate with webbing for a harness. Is that what you're asking?

 

[SDAnderson]

hello all

Just out of curiosity...does anyone still dive with an old-style tank harness and backplate anymore? I'm talking about those basic nylon-webbing things that you used to see scuba models wearing in the dive magazines as late as the '80s, and which seemed to be standard equipment in the '60s and '70s before BCDs came about. Also, I'd be interested in hearing any experiences and impressions from folks who used to.

Incidentally I have one of these, just never used it.

cheers

Billy S.

I know two guys that still use theirs - both highly experienced divers - and a few more that have one gathering dust in a corner somewhere. Most of us have migrated to the new, improved version.

They worked just fine and any modern back plate diver would adjust easily to using one. They weren't as stable/comfortable as the modern backplates and all the slots and holes in a modern backplate make them a little more useful. You have to remember that, back when Megaladon's still infested the waters, we didn't have many of the modern conveniences like SPG's and wings, so we didn't worry about places to tuck our SMB's and clip our consoles, etc. I don't think any of them required a STA, either, but that's a different story.

If you've got a real jones to learn about the paleolithic of diving, there are a mess of folks that you should get to know over at The Historical Diving Society.

 

[Moogyboy]

Yeah, I was talking the old fashioned plastic backplate and nylon webbing, the old Sea Hunt era technology. Mine is an ancient Sherwood backpack from perhaps the '70s, with the original metal buckle. I replaced the old metal tank band with a modern nylon and velcro one so it would fit my tank.

I brought this up because

1) I'm curious what it's like to dive without buoyancy control, all that extra fabric, what special skills/techniques it requires, etc. There's something alluring about the utter simplicity of it. I suppose I could at least try it in the pool.

2) because I'm fascinated by the disparity between what I occasionally still see in ads and photography, and what actual divers actually use and wear in the water. I mean, you still see photos in magazines and books of pretty divers paddling around the reef in a bikini, a simple backpack, and nothing else. How many divers actually still dive like that? (It does make for nice photos, tho, I admit...)

cheers

Billy S.

 

[rjchandler]

One would look very nice on that avatar of yours.

I still dive mine. I've attached a wing to it. They are prolly better for singles than the "modern" plates because they were built for singles. The pack is still part of many jacket bc designs. They were also usually drilled for doubles - but I never tried that.

bouyancy isn't that big a deal - particularly in warm water - if you have your weighting right.

 

[fdog]

I Had a couple hundred dives with the infamous plastic backpack in the 70s and early 80s.

Since I havent dove with one in about 20 years it's all by memory, but my impression was that it was more comfy than my backplates. Of course, this was with single 72's back then, and all I dive with a backplate (now) is doubles.

I wore a horsecollar BC and weighted to be neutral at the surface, at the begining of the dive. This way I could end the dive and snorkle back to shore without being squashed between the tank and my BC.

When I got an O'Neil drysuit, I just used the drysuit as a BC, since it had an oral inflator on the chest. We then put the tank and backpack on over that. It was very clean and stable, albeit without the high float at the surface of a real horsecollar BC. Weighting was, again, neutral at the surface at the begining of the dive (not the way I dive now).

The "contour" backpack was a big deal when it was released. Ironically, I see backplates slooowly following the same evolutionary steps.

Just read your extra post, I did know a few guys who had dove without BC's. They weighted to be neutral at about 20'. Never tried this myself except as a freediver.

All the best, James

 

[rcohn]

For cold water diving, horsecollar BCs or drysuits were frequently used for buoyancy control.

Ralph

 

[jonnythan]

Well, um, I dive a metal backplate that only has nylon webbing on it. There is a buoyancy wing attached to the back.. but it's not not diving with "all that extra fabric" and I do appreciate the "utter simplicity"

 

[roakey]

Go to:

http://diver.net/bbs/

And click on "Gallery of California Backpack Divers"

Look ma, no wing!

Roak

 

[headhunter]

Go to:

http://diver.net/bbs/

And click on "Gallery of California Backpack Divers"

Look ma, no wing!

Roak

Those pictures bring back some memories!

That's almost exactly how I used to dive for years. I used both the plastic and metal backpacks. The only difference is that I used to use a horse collar BC. It was an ugly orange thing, but it worked fine. The only thing I didn't like about the horse collar was that it was like wearing a balloon around your neck at surface. When it was deflated, it wasn't all that bad. I regularly used it down to 80 - 100 feet and don't remember ever having a problem with it.

If memory serves me correctly, the steel used on the metal backpacks was thinner than the modern backplates I'm seeing now. I also remember them being quite a bit smaller. But that didn't stop us from bolting twin 72s to them. I can't remember what exactly was different about the manifolds for twins then, but I remember them being different. I think I remember a single yoke on the manifold.

Notice in those pictures that nobody has more than one regulator. Your buddy was your redundant air supply and you always stayed close to your buddy. Buddy breathing was something that was second nature to us. We practiced it on almost every dive. We'd be vertical in the water and as the donor you'd hold on to your buddy's right arm while putting the regulator in his mouth with your right hand. The rule for the donor was to not let go of the regulator or the buddy because you could lose control of the situation. I know this is not the way things are done now, so please don't flame me for pointing out some historical facts from the perspective of the people I dove with 25 years ago. Also, I'm not sure if the procedure was taught uniformly at that time. It may have been, I just don't know.

I replaced my backpacks with a Seatec Manta jacket style BC in around 1986. I bought it because I got a great discount when I was working mostly in the Ski Shop at Sport Chalet. I'd occasionally help out in the SCUBA shop when needed. After a while, I wished I had kept the backpacks. At first the jacket seemed better, since it was an improvement over the horse collar and having an inflator hose was nice. But after a while, I realized that I liked the horsecollar better underwater, since it didn't wrap around my whole body.

By the way, I'm finally about to get rid of that old jacket style BC. It works and there doesn't seem to be anything wrong with it, I just want to move to the modern backplate and wings. It seems like it has all of what I liked about the old backpack and none of what I didn't like about the horse collar and jacket style BCs.

Thanks for the trip down memory lane.

I feel old now!

Christian