pony bottles

[Rainer]

At that point I decided that I needed to get a pony and get comfortable with using it in an emergency.

No thoughts about working on buddy skills?

 

[grassyknoll]

(I shudder to think about what would happen if you clipped a 19cf pony to a bad buddy diving upright with no buoyancy control.)

Well, if it's steel and negatively bouyant it might put him horizontal....

 

[dumpsterDiver]

IMHO, its emotionally and psychologically easier and "more fun" to add gear like pony bottles than addressing the totallity of the risks ponys attempt to solve.

Like crummy buddies,
poor decision making (both on the surface and/or at depth from narcosis),
weak skills, and
fear of equipment failure (sometimes compounded by not understanding how it works, how to maintain it, how to fix it yourself and sometimes by not knowing the probability of failures)

These are the reasons I use a pony. It is just safer and more fun and more responsible to dive with a pony. There are many, many dangers associated with diving, but if I can effectively eliminate one (drowning because my primary tank/reg fails) then I am safer.

I honestly feel guilty if I dive below about 60 feet with no pony because I know that it may be too far to swim if I'm out of breath. It is a huge psychological crutch that allows me to relax and really enjoy my solo dives in depths that often range between 80 and 190 feet.

I am teaching my 10-yr old how to dive now, and he will be wearing a 6-cu-ft pony for all dives. I feel more confident knowing that I can be separated from him for 30 seconds, and if worst comes to worst.. he just spits out his primary reg, grabs the pony reg from the necklace and slowly swims to the top. It is not complicated, it is not cumbersome and it will not teach him to be irresponsible or careless if he has his own "plan B".

 

[robzr]

Everyone has a different level of risk-acceptance. What a few posters are trying to suggest (and I agree) is that if your "propability-threshold" for possible failiures is at the level of catastrophic gasloss, you have a whole bunch of other issues you should be adressing (the smart-***** in me want to quote Reefraffs mer-man example)...

There have been XXXX number of pony-bottle threads on SB and while I´ve certainly not read that many of them, none of the ones I´ve read have been caused by someone having a mechanical failiure within NDLs or a depth where a CESA is possible, with a buddy who was "switched on and ready to help" or who planned and managed their gas soundly. So if you really are concerned about gasloss, it makes far more sense to focus on those things FIRST as they are obviously far more common (though they take more than swiping a cc to correct)...

ymmv

Actually there were a couple folks who have posted about getting valves clogged; onset was quick (re instant). You can't do a visual on a rental tank, and some buddies are better than others. I started a thread asking people to post real life experiences with Ponys/bailouts, or where a pony/bailout would have helped, becuase there seems to be a lack of actual stories - mostly just speculation. Unfortunately that thread quickly degraded into a few self righteous anti-pony folks posting condescending remarks to everyone else. Too bad...

Rob

 

[rjack321]

I am teaching my 10-yr old how to dive now, and he will be wearing a 6-cu-ft pony for all dives. I feel more confident knowing that I can be separated from him for 30 seconds, and if worst comes to worst.. he just spits out his primary reg, grabs the pony reg from the necklace and slowly swims to the top. It is not complicated, it is not cumbersome and it will not teach him to be irresponsible or careless if he has his own "plan B".

Although I presume that you 10YO will be quite shallow, 6cf really isn't very much. At least make it big enough to count when he needs it.

 

[dumpsterDiver]

I've done the calcs. It can get him to the surface from 60 ft easily!!!

Some people claim that CESA is a viable option from relatively deep depths and then these same people say that a small pony is too little to get someone to the surface in an emergency. If zero breaths is enough to make it from 60-80 -100 ft or more, then how can 6 cu-ft be too little?

 

[fast5frog]

What exactly do you do when you dive off a boat in Jersey and they require a pony bottle? Hmmm, I guess ya get one or don't dive, that's and easy debate...

 

[Rainer]

What exactly do you do when you dive off a boat in Jersey and they require a pony bottle? Hmmm, I guess ya get one or don't dive, that's and easy debate...

And your point is????

 

[Ice9]

Clay, you're right - planning for worst case scenarios would involve gear failures.

But we're also talking (in Fire Diver's post) about newer divers. Newer divers ought not to be doing solo dives until they've gotten more experience.

1. I'm not a solo diver, nor do I plan to become one. But when I turn my head and my insta-buddy is gone, thats effectively what I become. At no point do I like this situation, but its happened more than it hasn't.

Given that newer divers also are not likely in overhead environments where they cannot go straight to the surface, I'm still of the opinion that for newer divers the focus should be on getting the fundamentals down, which would be the things I mentioned.

2. I'm with ya here. I agree, more practice on the fundamentals is crucial.

And in the case of some sort of non-recoverable 1st stage failure, reliance on a buddy would be one of those fundamentals.

3. See #1

But for newer divers, for guys just starting out, to run out and get a pony bottle instead of making the other things second nature is - in MHO - pursuing a technological solution to a behavioral-based problem.

4. My behavior was properly adjusted eyebrow: ) but ya can't always control the behavior of buddies. Near as I can tell, adding the option of making a normal slow ascent instead of a CESA just can't be a bad thing. Even being new, and I admit I have no experience with it, I just can't see it being that difficult to deploy. Maybe I should try one and see...

 

[fast5frog]

And your point is????

Umm, my point is if it's required you have to have one whether or not you think you need one or not....no debate necessary.