Pony bottle & recreational diving...Need input...

[Cave Bum]

Reminds me of what I learned in flying. "A good pilot can almost always get out of trouble. A REALLY good pilot avoids getting into trouble in the first place".

So, based on my statement above of "... when I was learning to teach flying...", guess where I stole that from...

My version was one of my instructors favorites... (just substitute 'pilot' for 'diver').

 

[peterbj7]

If you have an instructor (not necessarily even scuba) and you don't like what you are being told, suggested or how you are critiqued and you are paying for it then go get an instructor that will tell you only what you want to hear and in that way you will always be guaranteed to never have you self esteem questioned, your opinion or logic dissected and of course you will never be exposed to any new ways of thinking, any new approaches to a problem, no novel solutions or ever learn anything new or different from what you already know. Never do anything different or consider other possibilities--in this thread -- the only solution to the equipment problem(s) both real and imagined is just to get and carry more equipment. Seems like a plan. Why would I ever question such dogma?

N

I have rarely seen an argument that better takes a perfectly acceptable premise, one that most people involved in the discussion clearly agree with, and then twists it to the most illogical conclusion. I don't think anyone here has suggested what you conclude, and indeed only an idiot would. What are you trying to prove? That you're an argumentative SOB? Because most of us have already concluded that.

Actually, I've decided you must be a troll, saying the most outrageous things in the hope of tricking someone into agreeing with you. Go on, you've been rumbled - you really are trolling, aren't you?!

 

[Coldwater_Canuck]

If you have an instructor (not necessarily even scuba) and you don't like what you are being told, suggested or how you are critiqued and you are paying for it then go get an instructor that will tell you only what you want to hear and in that way you will always be guaranteed to never have you self esteem questioned, your opinion or logic dissected and of course you will never be exposed to any new ways of thinking, any new approaches to a problem, no novel solutions or ever learn anything new or different from what you already know.

Okay here's the problem: the instructor the OP mentions is against recreational pony's: fine. However, I know my dive shop lists courses by a bunch of instructors. One has "pony bottle" under "recommended equipment" for her courses; another guy lists "pony bottle" as required equipment for a recreational wreck course, my OW instructor had his second stage going to a pony bottle, my AOW instructor said it was a good idea: so it's clearly not a consensus.

I don't really get what you're saying here. Is it if you don't agree with 100% of what your instructor tells you, you need to find someone else? Because the OP may have an awesome instructor who he will learn a ton from but disagrees with this one particular thing, yet this post suggests to me he's being told to find another instructor or just do what he's told.

As a new diver, I appreciate any opinions and knowledge from more experienced divers. But I use these to try and form my own opinions and techniques, not to be a carbon copy of my instructor.

I'm also curious, would your arguments be the same if you were on the other side of the argument? In other words, if the instructor was telling students they had to buy a pony, would you be saying "you don't like what you are being told, suggested or how you are critiqued and you are paying for it then go get an instructor that will tell you only what you want to hear"?

Never do anything different or consider other possibilities--in this thread -- the only solution to the equipment problem(s) both real and imagined is just to get and carry more equipment. Seems like a plan. Why would I ever question such dogma?
N

It's pretty easy to knock down an argument no one ever made: this is a nice straw man if I ever saw one.

 

[Cave Bum]

I hope my karma didn’t run over anybody's dogma here…

(I've always wanted to use that line!)

Just trying to lighten it up... Okay, now, seriously, back on topic...

 

[tc]

If it burst how do you define "properly maintained?" Hoses don't just burst without a cause. Was it kinked, tugged, pulled on, had it been over pressured or was it old? Any of those things are reasons to reject a hose for continued use and replace with a new one. Those of us who eschew multiple levels of complex redundancy and instead replace it with reliable and simple components include equipment maintenance and INSPECTION as part of our system. That might explain why Captain has never had any equipment failures.

N

It was inspected regularly, properly cleaned after every dive and stored & transported without kinking. Only a couple of years old. Never overpressured.

Sorry but thats a weak attempt to blame the failure on my lack of care- not going to happen, the hose was properly cared for. Please don't make assumptions in order to make my example fit into your flawed theory.

Sometimes there are defects in manufacture or non-visible damage that simply can't be predicted.

 

[captain]

I have had failures, sometimes none in a month, sometimes 5 in a week, of several different brands of hoses all marketed as coming from the USA, all the brands imported here. Sometimes it's possible to see tiny holes in the rubber straight out of the box, usually there's absolutely no clue. It isn't usually a frequent occurrence but it does happen far more than it should. I don't recall these sorts of failures ever until the last few years.

If you can offer a practical solution for me other than buying several different makes and swapping them out at the first signs of trouble I'd be grateful to hear it.

If you truly had that many failures I suggest you get out from under the black cloud over your head or give up diving.

 

[Cave Bum]

If you truly had that many failures I suggest you get out from under the black cloud over your head or give up diving.

Or capitolize on it...

The Rouses named their business... 'Black Cloud Scuba' because of similar issues they had with their gear...

 

[dirtydon]

you own a pony bottle,use it.be a well trained buddy.and have one.be safe,be comfortable,have fun.that is what this sport is about.don,t worry about what anyone else thinks,its your life not theirs.

 

[Nemrod]

I have rarely seen an argument that better takes a perfectly acceptable premise, one that most people involved in the discussion clearly agree with, and then twists it to the most illogical conclusion. I don't think anyone here has suggested what you conclude, and indeed only an idiot would. What are you trying to prove? That you're an argumentative SOB? Because most of us have already concluded that.

Actually, I've decided you must be a troll, saying the most outrageous things in the hope of tricking someone into agreeing with you. Go on, you've been rumbled - you really are trolling, aren't you?!

When people start name calling or whatever you call what you are doing, I think it says something about them. However, I know you are just angry therefore I will not take it as indicative of anything further. I will therefore go ahead an apologize to you for causing you to become angry, I know it is not in your character to do so.

If a diver is having so many equipment failures as has been claimed in this thread something is wrong somewhere and it has nothing to do with me. Maybe you spilled some salt or a black cat walked in front of you, something is wrong.

BTW, those uniformly distributed small holes you see in hoses are supposed to be there and are not a defect.

N

 

[Cave Bum]

I don't know of any scuba regulators (modern, vintage, or tween) that could really be called failure prone. Although I'm sure there are a number of associated gadgets that many divers have rejected due to reliability problems. But whatever the failure rate is (1 in 1,000 to 1 in 100,000) adding a completely redundant gas supply essentially doubles the zeros in the denominator.

I don't carry my pony often. Shallow and/or with my wife/buddy, I just don't need it. But deeper and solo it is with me. It is extremely unlikely that I will need it. But the very slight burden of carrying it is worth the risk reduction to me.

I've been told, in discussions of tank reliability, specifically in the 6351-T6 material issue, that the reason the government didn’t feel a recall was necessary was that due to extensive inspection of scuba equipment, ‘almost’ all defects are detected prior to them becoming a problem.

To a point these extensive inspections of scuba equipment is the industry making agreements/contracts with it’s self. Having said that, it’s also the main reason we don’t see more problems with defective equipment killing divers. We overinspect scuba equipment to a point of changing the statistics! Well, that and training and redundancy.

Still there are failures.

I do an extensive amount of solo cave diving. My 'pony bottle' is an AL72. I test the quantity of gas regularly to be sure I am diving within the 'self rescue' range of the bottle -ie- I'll get to the maximum penetration, and decide "I haven't tested my escape gas consumption in a while, today would be a good day to do that...". I switch to my buddy bottle and exit on it, all the while monitoring the gauge on my back gas to be sure it hasn't sprung a leak along the way because it, now, is my backup gas supply.

Having emergency procedures and equipment to support them is outstanding!

But you have to practice those procedures for them to work, or at least work without having to think about them, in an actual emergency.

Be safe and have fun in the water! Bruce