Shave head or pull out hair?

[leapfrog]

Hi Oxy. EVERYBODY IS GOING TO GIVE YOU THEIR IDEA AND OF COURSE, THEIR IDEA IS THE ONLY VALID ONE. Here is mine and you can take it or leave it.
1. First get your booties.
2. Next your mask and fins, forget the snorkel.
3. Get yourself a good, simple and easy to use dive computer that does air and nitrox and you don't have to touch it because it automatically activates once in the water and has a big easy to read screen.

Now you are good to go. Look at the other equipment divers use, ask questions, try to rent different brands at different centers. Ask people why they made the decisions they did and if they like their stuff. Everyone loves talking about their gear, so it will help you to break the ice when you go diving and get people talking with you.

4. Get yourself a suit. Something that you are comfortable with and makes sense for where you are diving. Find out why people use different configurations of wetsuit and look closely at semidry suits (often a good choice if you are not diving in tropical waters). Ask about drysuits too, just to get informed.
5. Now get your regs. Break the bank. This is the A1 piece of equipment. I advise you to get cold water regs even if you are not thinking of diving cold water yet, because you will have that versatility in the future and most tend to be really good regs. Are you a UW photographer? Do you want bubbles in your face? All those kinds of questions which you will have been disccusing with other divers will help you to make the choice.
6. Finally you need a BCD. I don't know what you call bells and whistles but you should be COMFORTABLE. The decision on which BCD should be on how many dives you are going to make a day/week/year. Don't get talked into buying a tekkie unless you really are going to be doing tech diving. Nothing looks more stupid than a guy finning around the reefs for fun with one of those bright red things on his back. Think comfort and think practical.

As I said...just another opinion!

 

[MauiScubaSteve]

My first set of gear was a nearly expired rental set sold after Hurricane Iniki closed that shop in Poipu. $300 for full reg set; jacket BC, long sleeve shorty, booties, fins and weight belt. Don't even remember the brands except the wet suit. Worked just fine for many years here in Hawaii.

Before heading of to the instructor factory, I bought close-out probably grey market gear from a Japanese shop in Waikiki. The SP MK-12/R190 from there is the only gear from NW's prefered list that I have ever bought new. The BC was a lower level Seaquest, and I added Oceanic compass and Mares farmer john and alternate second stage from Divers Direct in Florida.

That gear lasted for thousands of working dives, and cost me less than $1000 (including the first $300). Now I have all fairly recent gear, but my favorite BC is discontinued so I bought it off ebay for $125 shipped (a mid-range Seaquest). My personal regs are Oceanic, bought new from the distributer at instructor rate, but I like them a lot. My analog 3-gauge console is Oceanic and came with another Oceanic reg set of ebay (total $150 shipped). The most expensive piece of gear is my 5-mil Aqualung wet suit, and it is money well spent. I am getting about 1,500 dives per set of Mares fins, and will get another pair when needed.

I know working instructors who are still diving 15 year old sherwood products! I know many divers who are completely outfitted by yard sales, craigslist and ebay. The current economic downturn is clearing out closets, anyone on Maui need some good cheap gear? You will probably want different gear in 3-5 years (or less), many new divers would be just fine with 2 year old rental gear or just renting for a couple years.

Buy expensive gear when you know what you need, it will probably not be what you want now!

 

[ruready7]

Just make sure that where ever you buy, they are listed on the manufacturer's website and are auth dealers so you retatin the warranty. I got Oceanic gear (BCD, reg, octo, SPG) for 1400. Had other gear from class.

 

[Blackwood]

forget the snorkel.

I don't think the shop he's looking at would go for that.

Aren't PADI students required to dive with a snorkel and to perform at least one skill with it?

 

[dpbishop]

Dude, you live in Southern California. Don't stress over equipment. Leapfrog's list is OK, although I would put the computer at the bottom, but then I dove without one for 15 years or so. Fact is you could dive a life time in SoCal and never go past no-decompression limits. If money is tight, think used gear. Every June a thousand yuppie spawn get complete dive outfits for graduation presents. They do a few local dives, one Caribbean trip, then sell it in the Reader. Remember, even new gear is used gear after the first dive. Yearly service on a regulator will cost more than the best new piece out there, so if you find something used for a good price, have it serviced and you're good to go. (make sure it can be serviced; the only reason I hung up my Dacor was it was bought out by *&^%$#@ Mares and parts are no longer available)

 

[Oxy]

To the OP, and the "Quotee" respectively, I'd like to provide a couple opinions from someone who was JUST in your shoes within the last 6 months.

I spent WEEKS, literally, looking at Scuba gear. Everything from full face GSM masks to buying overhauled, exiled rental equipment.

To the Quotee's quote, there, I will say this:

I have done so many hobbies, from skydiving, to firearms, R/C Helicopters and Boats, and the list really goes on forever. Of all the hobbies I have ever participated in, only one had anything to do with my life being at stake, but the principles still remain the same throughout.

In any hobby there will always be "one step better" and even if you buy that, in 3 months, there will be "one step better" than what you bought. But there are always options that work for your price point.

I spoke with 6 LDS's and eventually settled on a gear package that I could afford. I've been on about 15 dives and have had zero issues with anything that I bought. Incidentally, everything I bought was on the Quotee's list of brands to avoid. Inconsequentially, all the LDS shops here use some of those brands as rentals, day in and day out, and have no problem with them.

I think in total I paid 1500$ for everything excluding fins/mask/wetsuit, some of which was heavily discounted due to closeout or new models, or package discounts, etc. (I could care less what color my stuff is, to be honest, if it works, it works.)

Again, I don't claim to be anything but a novice diver, at BEST. I'd still say going through the certification course again wouldn't hurt me. Ive logged 15 dives. I can honestly say that I have never once worried about my life with the gear I bought, it has performed exactly as expected, and comes with full warranties and can be serviced at my LDS of choice.

I'm not trying to flame - but in any hobby or sport, experienced, long term veterans have had the time and effort to put in years of dives/time and have upgraded to the best stuff because their career in diving warranted the extra money being spent.

They are right, those brands are the best. But they are NOT however, required to ensure your fun or safety.

I'd wager that very few people started with full AquaLung setups from head to toe on their first dive. More power to those that did. But some of us have to start at a much lower, attainable goal.

I have a lot of Oceanic gear that has performed flawlessly on my dives. I have a friend who's brand new Aqualung Dive Computer failed the first time it hit the water and he missed 2 days of diving because the dive shop in Mexico could not fix his equipment, and hes too snooty to take a rental (his problem, who knows, not mine).

Anyways - long story short.

If the product you are looking at and can afford has a decent track record, or you can find someone on here who uses it, it's probably going to serve you just fine for recreational diving.

Like anything, again, the veterans want nothing but the best and call everything else cheap/useless, forgetting that not everyone has had 5-50 years of diving to accumulate some of the more expensive, fancy equipment.

Would you be better off if you just bought the good stuff to start with? Probably, it will probably last longer (but who knows, really). Can you dive just fine without spending 4-5-6k on dive gear? I'm going on dive 16-20 this weekend, I will let you know when I get back how it went

Oh - I meant to add - one LDS around here has an Oceanic Veo 100nx that has been on 4700 dives with only routine maintenance. If my Oceanic computer lives HALF that long, I'll be in good shape for the rest of my life.

Ok my last hobby was an rc heli and I never learned to fly it.
This I can not really call a hobby cause I am not well to do.
This is more of a discovery (mid life) type thing.
quoting one response "job in dive shop might help" I eagerly agree!!!!!
It's just that this tooth is maybe like the ring in lord of the ring.
It is pulling me in.

 

[Oxy]

Hi Oxy. EVERYBODY IS GOING TO GIVE YOU THEIR IDEA AND OF COURSE, THEIR IDEA IS THE ONLY VALID ONE. Here is mine and you can take it or leave it.
1. First get your booties.
2. Next your mask and fins, forget the snorkel.
3. Get yourself a good, simple and easy to use dive computer that does air and nitrox and you don't have to touch it because it automatically activates once in the water and has a big easy to read screen.

Now you are good to go. Look at the other equipment divers use, ask questions, try to rent different brands at different centers. Ask people why they made the decisions they did and if they like their stuff. Everyone loves talking about their gear, so it will help you to break the ice when you go diving and get people talking with you.

4. Get yourself a suit. Something that you are comfortable with and makes sense for where you are diving. Find out why people use different configurations of wetsuit and look closely at semidry suits (often a good choice if you are not diving in tropical waters). Ask about drysuits too, just to get informed.
5. Now get your regs. Break the bank. This is the A1 piece of equipment. I advise you to get cold water regs even if you are not thinking of diving cold water yet, because you will have that versatility in the future and most tend to be really good regs. Are you a UW photographer? Do you want bubbles in your face? All those kinds of questions which you will have been disccusing with other divers will help you to make the choice.
6. Finally you need a BCD. I don't know what you call bells and whistles but you should be COMFORTABLE. The decision on which BCD should be on how many dives you are going to make a day/week/year. Don't get talked into buying a tekkie unless you really are going to be doing tech diving. Nothing looks more stupid than a guy finning around the reefs for fun with one of those bright red things on his back. Think comfort and think practical.

As I said...just another opinion!

good advise except the snorkel, it's required.

 

[trucker girl]

The only gear I bought new was my 7 mil wetsuit, mask-fins-snorkel (I happen to like my snorkel), booties and the bag I bought online (and, incidentally, don't like).

Everything else came 2nd hand through my LDS. Most of it is former rental gear and comes with a "store warranty" within reason. My LDS is top notch though- if you're a good customer, they take care of you. If you show up with stuff you bought on eBay, they'll take care of you, but charge you full price for fixing it.

I had a couple bad rental experiences on various trips before I bought my own gear, so I can't recommend renting. Finances will dictate your choice there. I do recommend buying used. Preferably from someone you can trust.

 

[Beachlover]

Did you really find that tooth at Redondo?

 

[Oxy]

I came to scuba from dirt bike riding/racing so to me scuba is way less expensive than my former hobbie(s) and so far without the hospital bills (knock on wood) plus the wife will go with me:blinking:.
I went with several different stores and some online retailers, the stuff I went cheap on was the wet-suit booties hood snorkel etc.. because I figured if I kept diving I would end up in a dry-suit eventualy, I was right. I steped up for a better than entry level reg and BC, speaking of wich I hear a back plate and wing is cheaper and more universal than the former. I spent right at 1500 without tanks to start.

I tried dirt but the street tires near killed me. I am wanting to spend more on a reg if I can find a deal that doesn't go cheap on the octo, comp, & bc to offset.