Question about air2's

[doctormike]

???? There are 2 buttons. Just as many as there are on a standard inflator.

Three buttons on the unit in your hand. Inflate, deflate and purge.

I vote for making things as simple and as familiar as possible in an emergency, since thinking, training and practice are often dramatically degraded once you have to deal with two potentially panicked divers, one of whom may not be familiar with the Air2. Every diver is familiar with a standard regulator.

I'm not impressed with claims of having dived with one for many years without incident. Even if a diver has had to do a couple of air shares in emergencies using it, that still doesn't make it optimal, every emergency is different and you never know what the next mode of failure will be. Why not have things as familiar and easy to use as possible? Having an extra hose doesn't seem like a big price to pay for an independent backup standard-issue second stage, IMHO.

 

[rhwestfall]

I have rigs with Air-2's, Standard octo's, and Long hose/bungied octo's.......

in regard to the "tug", the Air-2 (ScubaPro) was part of a system. The Classic BC has the corrugated hose attachment lower, and on the front of the BC making it not tug. If you are diving it on something different, yes, you may need to lengthen the corrugated as wellas the LPI hoses.

in regard to dumping air, the Air-2 (ScubaPro) was part of a system. Again, the ScubaPro line of BCs have historically had a pull-to-dump on the oposite side of the LPI assembly. You don't need to remove the unit from your mouth to dump your air. Many can achieve this by implementing a pull-to-dump on the LPI of they do not have the Sp styled BC. Nay-sayers of this device are fooling themselves and others as the OPV/but dump they use is the same thing and as likely to the failure mode they cite......

Its funny that the "donate your primary" is now accepted as a very good idea, but seems to be called a bad thing if the donor is switching to his Air-2 - which has been the protocal for the decades these have been around.... Sadly, some don't understand that the primary is what is to be donated.... or that you should then have a longer primary hose in your configuration...

it all breaks down to the simple statement of "know how to dive your equipment'..... and discussing with your buddy the things to do.

Heck, nobody around here in my diving circle dives a Long Hose/BO except me. Each new buddy has to learn that concept, which is "I'm handing you a functioning regulator". Wasn't that concept what was taught in OW?

Oh wait, buddy breathing was eliminated as a core skill.......

 

[doctormike]

I guess all of these conversations come down to the appropriate application of standards. Sometimes standards are a good thing (e.g. tank maintenance, hand signals, dive tables), other times blindly adhering to standards can suppress innovation. We aren't still diving J-valve tanks without SPGs, and it's good that that particular standard was replaced by something better.

As far as I can tell, the main advantage of the Air2 is one less hose. I guess if you really find that to be an overriding concern, it makes it worthwhile. But if you do have one, then you really need to commit to ongoing practice and training. Even so, I would prefer to have a buddy with a regular regulator on an adequate length hose (preferably 7 feet long!), just to keep things flexible and as close to normal as possible in an emergency.

 

[redacted]

As far as I can tell, the main advantage of the Air2 is one less hose. I guess if you really find that to be an overriding concern, it makes it worthwhile. But if you do have one, then you really need to commit to ongoing practice and training. Even so, I would prefer to have a buddy with a regular regulator on an adequate length hose (preferably 7 feet long!), just to keep things flexible and as close to normal as possible in an emergency.

I would suggest that the one less hose is a minor advantage. The main advantage is an alternate that is easily located and accessed by the diver. it is not an alternate that is somewhere/anywhere within a 39 inch radius of the diver's first stage. And it works quite adequately in recreational diving conditiomns where you train and equip to deal with one failure at a time.

 

[CT-Rich]

Three buttons on the unit in your hand. Inflate, deflate and purge.

I vote for making things as simple and as familiar as possible in an emergency, since thinking, training and practice are often dramatically degraded once you have to deal with two potentially panicked divers, one of whom may not be familiar with the Air2. Every diver is familiar with a standard regulator.

I'm not impressed with claims of having dived with one for many years without icident. Even if a diver has had to do a ncouple of air shares in emergencies using it, that still doesn't make it optimal, every emergency is different and you never know what the next mode of failure will be. Why not have things as familiar and easy to use as possible? Having an extra hose doesn't seem like a big price to pay for an independent backup standard-issue second stage, IMHO.

Not sure about the logic of this. This arguement applies to all rigs. I am unfamiliar with any,rig that is truly considered
Considered optimal. It is like saying the optimal brewing of coffee. You can say it but, that doesn'mean everyone will want to drink it.

 

[doctormike]

Not sure about the logic of this. This arguement applies to all rigs. I am unfamiliar with any,rig that is truly considered
Considered optimal. It is like saying the optimal brewing of coffee. You can say it but, that doesn'mean everyone will want to drink it.

Yeah, I guess. It goes back to my last point about standards. Sure, it's true that no one configuration is ever perfect, and that people do like to optimize things for themselves, but standards do have their place.

Since the vast majority of scuba divers are not familiar with the Air2, that means that your average insta-buddy is likely not to be trained on it's use in drills, let alone in an emergency situation. Yes, I understand that you can address that by diving with regular buddies, training those buddies in its proper use, etc... And I understand that the donating diver switches to the Air2 while donating his or her primary. But you may be involved in a rescue with someone that you didn't even enter the water with. It just doesn't make sense to me to have such a non-standard configuration in a situation where everyone involved may be functioning at a severely limited capacity.

Every certified diver is going to be most comfortable breathing from a standard regulator. Even an Air2 owner is going to spend the vast majority of his or her dive time breathing from a standard regulator. I just think that it's good to keep things simple and familiar in bad situations.

I stand by my logic, and I don't think that the coffee analogy is appropriate. What coffee you drink is entirely personal preference, and has absolutely no impact on anyone else. This just isn't the cases with OOG situations.

I guess the best way of summing things up is to say that the Air2 may well be optimal, and if everyone was using it, that would be a good solution. But it's not a standard, and therefore may cause unanticipated problems.

HOWEVER, I could be wrong (I often am) - that's why I like these forums!

 

[rhwestfall]

..... a 7' hose isn't "standard" except on SB.....
(I've seen more Air-2's and variants in my 25 years of diving than i have seen 7' hoses and bungied octo's)

 

[James R]

FWIW - OW students that go through classes with the LDS I teach for get trained on both the Air2 & and regular alternate (octo).

I think if I have the long hose config and someone is OOA, they wont care what I hand them or how. It's not very likely that I will come across some random OOA diver that surprises me (ie I don't see him/her) out of the blue (or murk?) by grabbing for a regulator.

 

[Herb-alaska]

Air 2 is a second stage integrated with a inflator valve some love them some hate them and both sides are going to be very set in their opinion either way.

Just quoting myself because I called this early in the thread. Everyone has a preference and is set in their way and believes that their opinion is the best. We have a had 6 pages of AIR2 is going to kill you and Air 2 is the best thing around. Again everyone has to decide for themselves but integrated octos do have a place in the recreation diving field if you don't like them don't use them but I do not believe an AIR 2 is going to kill anyone anymore than a gun is going to kill someone. It is the person using the Air 2 and do they know what they are doing. An air 2 has 2 buttons and a standard purge button on the end which is very similar to every other 2nd stage I believe anyone with 15 seconds of time can figure out how to use it.

But if you don't like it remove it or don't buy it but don't be critical of another diver that finds that they like it.

 

[rhwestfall]

I think quoting yourself is a violation.....